June 2006 Edition
Feature Spotlight: New Production Portal Features
Q&A with Technical Support: Client Setup with the Portal Integration Tool
Smart Tip of the Month: Let Production Portal Do the Typing
Additional Resources: Improving IIS Performance with Compression
Knowledge Builder: New Articles
Feature Spotlight
New Production Portal Features
The recently released MetaCommunications Production Portal includes many enhancements and revisions, including: Estimating, Analysis reports, partial Administration, a My Items area for managing your important records, and a more streamlined integration with Virtual Ticket using the Portal Integration Tool. Also included is the highly anticipated Approval Manager software which allows for the routing and overall management of your proof approval process.
Q&A with Technical Support
What is the Portal Integration Tool and what does it do?
The Portal Integration Tool is an enhancement to the MetaCommunications Production Portal (MPP) that allows for quick access to Virtual Ticket, a new form printing utility, and the invoicing and administrative functionalities of the Job Manager client, even when you have none of the applications already installed on your computer. When you choose a related function in MPP, a dialog will appear the first time the option is selected asking if the Portal Integration Tool is installed. Once installed, the Portal Integration Tool verifies if you have the desired application installed and if not, quickly downloads the application. In seconds, you can quickly be inside of Virtual Ticket, print records with your printing forms, invoice a job, or administer Job Manager from virtually anywhere in the world without having to take the rest of the software with you!
Smart Tip of the Month
Let Portal Do the Typing
Beginning to type in most fields in MPP will result in Production Portal attempting to fill in the rest of the information for you. For example, suppose you have a customer in the database named Acme Builders. When you begin typing "Acm" in the customer name field on the Job Entry and Edit window, Production Portal will search the database for a matching customer and fill in the rest of the name automatically once you have typed enough characters to determine what record you are looking for. To locate a field that will share the keystroke load with you, simply look for a field with a magnify glass next to it.
Additional Resources
Improving IIS Performance with Compression
MetaCommunications Knowledge Base article 16225 provides links to several articles on improving your use of bandwidth and your overall web server performance through the use of HTTP Compression. MPP administrators should review these articles if the performance of their Internet Information Services (IIS) service has become slow.
For more information visit:
http://www.meta-comm.com/support/knowledge_base/article.asp?id=16225
Knowledge Builder
New articles this month
16218 - Jumping to Production Portal windows from Virtual Ticket
This article provides examples for jumping from Virtual Ticket forms to Production Portal windows.
http://www.meta-comm.com/support/knowledge_base/article.asp?id=16218
16225 - Improving web server performance with HTTP compression
This article contains links to Microsoft articles which provide information on improving the performance of Internet Information Server (IIS) through the use of HTTP Compression.
http://www.meta-comm.com/support/knowledge_base/article.asp?id=16225
16234 - Registering .NET Framework 1.1 in IIS
This article describes how to register .NET Framework 1.1 for use with the MetaCommunications Production Portal.
http://www.meta-comm.com/support/knowledge_base/article.asp?id=16234
16236 - Installing the Portal Integration Tool
This article describes how to install and change the preferences for the Portal Integration Tool in the MetaCommunications Production Portal.
http://www.meta-comm.com/support/knowledge_base/article.asp?id=16236
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