Groupware connector

The JustRelate Exchange Connector synchronizes appointments automatically and consecutively between the CRM server and the MS Exchange server. You can thus create appointments alternatively in the CRM (e.g., in the Team calendar) or in the groupware calendar. The Groupware Connector automatically creates new appointments in the respective other application and updates and deletes appointments accordingly. It is not required to transfer appointments manually on the client side using functions.

This also ensures that all appointment participants are notified automatically after an appointment has been created or modified.

In addition, the Groupware Connector supports the automatic import of emails.

The JustRelate Exchange Connector is a service that covers the following tasks:

• Automatic synchronization of MS of Exchange appointments with CRM-based appointments.
• Every appointment is automatically created, modified or deleted in the other application.
• All important pieces of data are transferred, e.g. appointment type, place, date and time, notes of the appointment or visit report, appointment category, attendee, attendee status as well as connected data like contacts and attachments.
• Automatic distribution of the appointments to the person responsible, and automatic notification of the attendees by the MS Exchange Server.
• Status-dependent synchronization, i.e., for example, completed appointments are not synchronized anymore.
• Consideration of the working hour model, i.e., for example, only appointments within working hours are synchronized, selected appointments beyond the working hours can be synchronized manually as needed.
• When exporting from the CRM, case and contact assignments (For contact) are added as text to the groupware appointment, preventing important information only maintained in the CRM from getting lost.
• When editing appointments in the groupware client, you can select participants and attachments directly from the CRM database.
• You can easily configure the Groupware via your personal settings.

For editing appointments in the CRM, the Team calendar is available. While the CRM Groupware Connector ensures that the data in both systems is up do date, the CRM Team calen­dar displays all synchronized appointments as well as other activities of your staff members in the CRM system graphically. The clear graphic presentation enables you to easily check the availability of your staff members, and plan appointments graphically.

Calendars not associated with a CRM user can be synchronized with the CRM, so that CRM users can link appoint­ments with other CRM processes (sales cases, marketing processes or service cases).

The following table lists the range of synchronization of the Groupware Connector, depending on the Groupware server and its version.

In the Outlook add-in, the Open function of emails is extended (PsaOutAddinCubes.dll 4.0.0.145). This makes it possible to open the contacts of an Outlook-based email in the CRM without having to check the email in to the CRM.

If the function cannot find a checked-in email, then, after confirming the message "The email was not found in JustRelate CRM. Should the assigned contacts be opened?" with "Yes", the CRM contact form will be opened and all contacts of the email (sender, recipient, CC, BCC recipient) will be loaded. The extension is not limited to emails, but also works for all other activities that have recipients.

The Google interface for automatic server-driven synchronization of appointments and emails with Google G Suite has been extended by the following features:

• Synchronization of "free" markings. 
• Notification of external contacts. Invitations, changes and cancellations are now also sent to external appointment attendees if the groupware flag is set for the attendee in the CRM appointment.
• Access to Google Calendar can now be set for imported appointments. This feature can be activated or configured via the variables PSA_GRW_USE_ACC, PSA_GRW_USE_ACC_BAS and PSA_GRW_USE_ACC_ADD.
• To avoid "empty" appointments in the CRM after importing Google Meet appointments without description, the text block is now automatically generated for a meeting as well as for the Meet function at the note field of the appointment.
• Conference data can now be provided to support Google Meet video conferences.
  

It is not possible to retrieve emails for groups since groups are not users.

Tip: Alternatively, you could set up a normal user mailbox to which a group has access and to which all emails of this group are forwarded. An advantage of this would also be that this user has a recycle bin, whereas groups do not.

A corresponding email address in the username of a team (the group) then results in additional filtering in the mailbox (collective mailboxes).

It is possible to use an HTTPS proxy server that relays the connections from JustRelate CRM server to Exchange Online. In order to do so, just add the corresponding settings to the Java VM:

-Dhttps.proxyHost=proxy.firma.com -Dhttps.proxyPort=12345

Please note 

• that it is required to set the HTTPS-related properties as in the example above, and
• that these settings also apply to obtaining the OAuth2 token from the Microsoft 365 login server.

This applies to the following JustRelate CRM versions:

• 07.05-20190904, Patch 35 (2022/07/01) or later
• 07.06-20201001, Patch 22 (2022/07/01) or later 
• 08.00-20210802, Patch 12 (2022/07/01) or later 
• 08.01-20220624, initial release (2022/06/24)