42 posts tagged with "Product Newsletter"

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for September 2023.

DRIVE​

Updated interface​

This month we have updated the Drive interface and icons to follow Microsoft's open-source FluentUI 9 design language.

We believe this modernized visual interface is more user-friendly and appealing. We have also taken this opportunity to simplify the tab panel on the left side to group the tabs less used in one "mixed" tab.

Folder / Data room export index​

You can now create a full index of all files and folders in Excel. Select the folder you want to use as the root of the index and click on "Create folder tree index". Once created, you can download the Excel from the "Exported folder trees" tab. This is particularly useful when you need to share a full index of shared folders in a dataroom.

This is the end result in Excel:

Better sharing and permissions panel​

We have unified the sharing & permissions pane so you can see current permissions when you add new users.

Improvements in guest folder subscriptions and notifications​

Internal users can now subscribe guest users to notifications easily from the subscription pane. This is especially useful for dataroom usage so you do not need to manually notify user of new files and folders.

TOOLS​

Version 10​

This month we have released a fully revamped version of Synergy Tools, which should bring significant performance improvements and new functionalities.

Clipboard and PDF access from Tools​

Synergy Tools has a new user interface to make it easier to access files from the clipboard and perform advanced features such as large uploads.

2023-10 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for October include:

• Unify Drive and Workflow applications into one SynergyOS app

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for July 2023.

This month we have been focused on housekeeping, fixing small bugs and making performance improvements.

DRIVE AND WORKFLOW​

ACTIVITY FEED​

The activity feed is an essential feature to bring security and compliance to companies. This month, we have been working on unifying the underlying architecture of the activity feed for both the Drive and Workflow.

DRIVE​

Breadcrumb update​

The breadcrumb now can be used as a drop target to move files from one folder to a parent folder or as an upload target to upload files from your computer.

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for June 2023.

This month we are thrilled to announce the launch of the SynergyOS Whistleblower Channel and Compliance Portal.

WHISTLEBLOWING & COMPLIANCE PORTAL​

This new product is designed to enable companies to establish a secure and confidential whistleblower channel, ensuring compliance with the EU Whistleblower Protection Directive.

The Whistleblower Channel

The EU Whistleblower Protection Directive mandates that companies provide a safe and confidential channel for reporting breaches of European Union law. The SynergyOS Whistleblower Channel is designed to easily meet this requirement, providing a secure platform for anyone to report any concerns without fear of retaliation.

Compliance Portal

The SynergyOS Whistleblower Channel is not just a standalone product; it is an integral part of our broader compliance solution. It integrates seamlessly with the SynergyOS Compliance Portal, creating a unified system for managing compliance across your organization.

When a report is made through the Whistleblower Channel, it is automatically logged in the Compliance Portal. This allows for efficient tracking and management of reports, ensuring that no concern goes unnoticed. The Compliance Portal provides a comprehensive overview of all reports, their status, and any actions taken, facilitating transparency and accountability in your organization's response to whistleblower reports.

The SynergyOS Whistleblower Channel and Compliance Portal together provide a robust system for managing compliance, fostering a culture of integrity, and ensuring adherence to the EU Whistleblower Protection Directive.

DRIVE​

Guest users login​

Guests users now can only log in using a temporary password sent to their email, instead of using a combination of email and password. There are two reasons for this change:

• To increase security: when you share with a guest user, that person is working at a specific company. If they change employers but keep their username and password, they could access confidential information that they should not access anymore. To avoid this potential problem and to make sure that you are sharing only with current employees of other companies, we have changed the log in mechanism for guest users for a temporary password that they receive in their email.

• For convenience: guest users tend to forget their passwords for external systems. In addition to improving security, we can make it easier for guest users to log in without having to remember passwords.

Search UI improvements​

We have made it easier to use search filters with a better interface. Once you select filters, it is easier to see what you have selected both on the selection pane on the main sidebar.

WORKFLOW​

No updates this month.

2023-06 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for July include:

• Change in Drive folder permissions
• Improvements in file and folder subscriptions and notifications
• Client feedback for new functionalities

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for May 2023.

DRIVE​

Tools update​

Improvements in SynergyOS Tools performance.

WORKFLOW​

Custom views​

You can save custom views for you and your teammates and add views to your quick access section.

Preview Office files and PDF attachments​

Now you can directly preview Office files and PDFs within Workflow.

Activity logs with more details​

Additional details in the activity logs to make it more user-friendly.

Changes in tools, enterprise edition​

New version of Tools to be deployed on terminal servers in virtualized desktops.

2023-06 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for April include:

• Change in Drive folder permissions
• Client feedback for new functionalities

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for April 2023.

DRIVE​

Convert Office files to PDF with SharePoint in the cloud​

You can now automate the conversion of Microsoft Office files to PDF.

WORKFLOW​

Search​

We keep iterating and improving workflow search to make it faster and easier. We have added all search fields available in the search tab to allow you to search anywhere.

Message attachments​

Now you can add file attachments to conversations and tasks.

In-line attachments​

You can also add in-line attachments to be included in messages. These include images and videos.

Save attachments into drive​

Save your attachments also in Drive with one click. We have integrated the Drive file picker to make it easier to access your files from both workflow and drive.

Once a file has been saved to the Drive, you will see a folder icon to indicate that it is saved and enable to open it with one click.

2023-05 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for May include:

• New functionalities in Workflow
• Client feedback for new functionalities

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for March 2023.

SUMMARY​

We are very excited to announce the launch of SynergyOS Workflow, our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) product designed for relationship-based companies such as financial services, law, consulting, and corporates.

There are many CRM products on the market designed for automated selling (for example, for selling a software-based product) where the main focus of the CRM is on email automation and marketing campaigns. On the other side, there is a reduced focused on CRM for companies that are build on personal relationships. Professionals at an investment bank, a law firm, or a consulting firm, spend most of their time building and cultivating relationships, which may turn eventually into clients. We have built Workflow with this type of customer in mind, to make it easy to track those companies, the people work in those companies, and all the related activities and interactions. These interactions can be tracked though notes, conversations, emails, and tasks.

Going forward, we will include updates to both Drive and Workflow in the monthly and quarterly updates. We are also working on extending workflow into a new application called "Messages".

DRIVE​

Copy several hyperlinks at the same time to paste in emails/chat.​

You can now copy several items faster as hyperlinks to paste them into emails or chats, instead of having to copy items one by one.

Checkout: new feature to sync files to work offline​

Checkout allows you to save files to your computer in the Synergy/Working Copy folder. This way, you can access your checked-out files through Windows File Explorer / Mac Finder and edit them normally. Once you finishes your edits, you can sync back your files to SynergyOS through the Drive application.

This is very useful for two uses cases:

• Offline work: when you want to work on files without internet, for example, during a flight.
• Heavy files: sometimes you want to work on very heavy files (images or videos usually) and you do not want to constantly sync your changes to the server every time you click save.

More options to convert Office files to PDFs​

In this release we are giving more options to convert Office files to PDF. You can use:

• Your local desktop Office application: our built-in integration directly uses your Office for pixel-perfect conversions.
• LibreOffice Server: now you can also convert files in the server with LibreOffice. This also works from the webapp, without the need to install Synergy Tools.

Better Compare functionality for Microsoft Word​

We have improved the integration with the native compare functionality of Microsoft Word, to make your redlines faster.

WORKFLOW​

We have released different

Email filing​

With the new SynergyOS Outlook add-in (link) you can save emails into Workflow and assign relationships to contacts, companies, projects and contracts. This way, you can easily track relevant information from all those entities and easily share email information from anyone from your company without having to forward emails all day to any new team member.

Notes​

Notes help you to write and organize information about any entity (contacts, companies, projects and contracts). This way you can log information about a call, a LinkedIn message, or a WhatsApp chat, so you can find the relevant information faster.

Notes also help you to track what files you share with people and companies outside of emails. For example, if you share a file through LinkedIn, you can log that activity too. If you share files though email, you can easily track that email and related files through the SynergyOS Outlook add-in.

Conversations​

Conversations are similar to email threads but designed from the ground up for groups. Conversations also bring some of the good capabilities of chats such as reactions and interactivity. If you want to discuss any topic you create a conversation, select the type of conversation (general, review, approval, announcement) and then you can chat with your team.

Guest users can also be part of the conversation and will receive emails for every new message addressed to them. You can also save emails directly into conversations, so you always have the right information in the right place.

Tasks​

Emails, notes and conversations are different ways to save and log information. Many times, that information requires someone to do something: a task, in other words. Tasks helps you to create and manage your To Dos from a unified place, with a reference to the original source of information that motivated the creation of the task.

Search​

Saving all this information in Workflow is very comprehensive so it also requires a very powerful search capabilities to fins any information you are looking for. Workflow incorporates SynergyOS state-of-the-art search capabilities to fins anything instantly.

2023-04 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for April include:

• New functionalities in Workflow
• Client feedback for new functionalities: we believe Drive has reached a maturity point and we would like to find out what new functionalities our partners would like to improve their workflow

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for February 2023.

WORKFLOW​

This month we have released the first version of SynergyOS Workflow, our Customer Relationship Management (CRM) product designed for professional services firms.

Projects​

A central place to track all company projects. Project is the general name of the functionality but it can be customized according to industry conventions:

• Finance: Deal
• Law: Matter
• Consulting: Project

Projects represent very different types of activities: sales opportunities, partnerships, To Dos, and accordingly, can be categorized in different pipelines.

Contracts​

All your legally binding documents in a central place to make it easy to track all signed contracts with metadata, including signature date, effect date, and expiration date. All original files are located in SynergyOS Drive and linked into Workflow.

Contacts​

Internal and external contacts database with all related activities, including notes, emails, conversations, emails and files.

Companies​

Companies database with all related activities, including notes, emails, conversations, emails and files.

Pipelines​

You can customize the project pipelines to fit your best use case. You can have distinct pipelines for different activities. For example, you can have 1) a sales pipelines for new customer opportunities, 2) an internal projects pipeline for internal improvement processes, and 3) a marketing pipeline for different marketing activities.

Custom fields​

All main entities (projects, contracts, contacts and companies) have pre-defined fields that store the most common types of information. For example, name, phone number or address are default fields.

We also provide an easy-tu-use functionality to create custom fields to make Workflow more powerful for your specific needs. For example, you might want to create a custom fields for contacts where you can include the name of who is the lawyer / advisor of a specific contact or company.

DRIVE​

New Conversion features​

We have launched a new feature that converts files from different formats, designed for document automation. The key file conversions are:

• Text: plain text, markdown
• Word (.docx)
• HTML

2023-03 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for February include:

• Workflow: new entities including notes, conversations, tasks, and emails
• Copy several hyperlinks at the same time to paste in emails/chat
• PDF conversions for Office files on the server with LibreOffice
• Revamp of local Office operations (PDF, compare) in Tools

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the monthly Product Newsletter for January 2023.

GENERAL UPDATES​

New search fields: author, file creation date, and file modified date​

Now you can be more specific in your advanced search parameters to find information faster. The new field author is automatically created for each file and it's composed of the person who created/uploaded the file and every person that saved a minor and major version.

Convert old Office files to current format automatically (.doc to .docx)​

You can now convert old Office file formats (.doc, .ppt, .xls) to the current Office file formats (.docx, .pptx, .xlsx) automatically with one click. Select the file you would like to convert and click on the convert button. We have also enabled a dialog to prompt you to update old files when you try to open them.

Lock and unlock files in bulk with an optional messages​

New option to lock and unlock multiple files in bulk with an optional lock message. This can be used for offline mode when you are traveling.

View all your locked files​

You can find all your locked files at once from a new section in the file explorer.

Folder shortcuts​

Create folder shortcuts to organize your content better and navigate to another folder in a different location with one click.

Web bookmarks (URLs)​

Save bookmarks to webpages within Drive so you can track relevant information from teh web right with your files. Bookmarks can also be categorized with tags and all the standard file functionality.

2023-02 Roadmap​

The upcoming features on our roadmap for February include:

• Copy several hyperlinks at the same time to paste in emails/chat
• Revamp our offline functionality in Tools to include folders
• Publicly launch v1 of Workflow

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the Product Newsletter for 2022-Q4 (October, November, December).

This quarter we are excited to share our new branding, SynergyOS, to align with our end goal of becoming the "One Source" of truth for all your company information. This information includes not only files, but also emails, messages, customer, and project information, as well as all the custom data objects that your company needs.

GENERAL UPDATES​

New Progressive Web Apps (PWA) from customers own domains.​

We are moving all applications to the browser to make them easier to access and keep everything up to date automatically. The first application is the new Drive webapp, which now runs in the browser. This means that you can (and should) delete the previous desktop application, as they become obsolete. Furthermore, all applications are now served from your (the customer's) own domains to promote your own branding. For example, imagine a company called Greendation, with a company domain www.greendation.org, will access SynergyOS under its own domain: drive.greendation.org, workflow.greendation.org, portal.greendation.org, and so on.

Preview tab​

There is a new tab in the Drive webapp to facilitate the preview of files. Click on preview (or use the dot-key . as a shortcut) and immediately see the content of Microsoft Office files, images, text files, and notes without the need to open a separate application. This is especially useful when reviewing many documents at once, as you would when using a Data Room.

You can also open previews in full screen and share preview URLs with your colleagues.

New Drive Search UI and options​

Drive User Interface (UI) updated with 2 features to make it easier to use:

• Global search on top bar: search everywhere directly from this box

• Folder quick search on sidebar: find folders instantly from the File Explorer tab

Save files to Synergy from Windows Explorer and Mac Finder​

You can save files to a folder in your operating system called “Synergy Save As”, which you can find directly in your pinner folders.

Once you save a file there, a Tools window will open automatically with Synergy’s File Picker to select where you’d like to save the file.

Additional version control improvements​

1. New files created and file uploads to be minor versions by default (internal)

2. New option to overwrite last saved version (if that version was saved by you). This is very helpful when you identify a small typo or small change to be made. Now you can open the file, make that correction, and in the save version dialog you can overwrite the last version (and avoid “noise” in you version history)

3. New option to convert a version (major or minor) back to Draft status (if that version was saved by you). This improvement follows the same train of thought as the previous point. We have more improvements we plan to release next quarter, including the option to receive notifications by email when new versions of a document you have edited are saved. This has been requested by several partners. An initial design of the User Interface has already been produced. If you have any thoughts on this, please get in touch to discuss.

Additional features in public links: enable end-users to customize expiration date, passwords​

Now you can add a message, a password and a custom expiration to public links.

Subscriptions and folder/file notifications​

You can now subscribe to receive email notifications for important actions on files and folders. We have released the most important file and folder actions first and we are adding new options for subscriptions every week.

Subscribe by clicking on the subscribe button:

Change your notification setting from here:

Manage all your subscriptions from this tab:

Company Directory to invite and manage guest users (external) from the Drive​

There is a new tab in the Drive to quick manage users and groups. From here, you can quickly invite new guest users to share information.

Recent 5 folders in sidebar​

Your most recent folders now appear in the recents section, automatically updated, to make you more efficient to go back to those folders. Those 5 folders are automatically updated when the following actions are made to files inside those parent folders:

Drive keyboard shortcuts page​

You can learn all Drive keyboard shortcuts from a new page withing the Drive to become a pro user and save time in your workflow.

Co-Authoring in Desktop Office applications​

New integration with SharePoint to edit collaboratively Microsoft Office files in your desktop Office applications. You can enter this mode with right click on a file and click on "Co-Authoring with SharePoint".

2023 Q1 ROADMAP​

The upcoming features on our Drive roadmap include:

• New search fields: author, file creation date, and file modified date
• Bulk lock and unlock of files
• Convert old Office files to current format automatically (.doc to .docx)
• Copy several hyperlinks at the same time to paste in emails/chat
• Revamp our offline functionality in Tools to include folders

We are very excited to announce that we plan to release the first version of Synergy's Workflow product in February: a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Project Management product. In this first iteration, Workflow will include the following core features:

• Projects / Deals / Matters: same concept but different naming depending on industry.
• Company list
• Contacts list
• Pipelines

We would very much welcome your feedback, comments and suggestions. We are always keen to hear how we can make SynergyOS better for you and your organization.

Thank you for your trust,

The SynergyOS team

Welcome to the Product Newsletter for 2022-Q3 (July, August, September)

GENERAL UPDATES​

New standard Color Tags​

We have added default color tags for files and folders to allow for easy categorization of documents on the go without using the full tag functionality. For example, you might have to review several documents. To easily mark all the files to review, you can color tag them in yellow. Once you finish with each file, you can remove the color tag.

Thumbnails view on sidebar​

When you save a MS Office file (docx, pptx, xlsx), a PDF file, or an image, the server creates a thumbnail of the document in the details pane. This will make it easier for you to quickly identify files.

Outlook for Windows​

Re-enabled the functionality to attach files: we have found a fix to the issue users encountered when attaching files from Outlook. Now files and emails can be saved from Outlook by using drag and drop again.

Thumbnails view in drive navigation​

You now have the choice between the standard list view and a new thumbnail (Tiles) view. This is particularly helpful when you are browsing folders with multiple image files or documents with a specific visual look and streamlines the identification of files and removes the need for opening the files.

 

SEARCH IMPROVEMENTS​

Improvements in search engine with exact search and Boolean operators​

We have added several new options to the search engine to make it more powerful to find what you need.

Default search: fuzzy search with OR​

A fuzzy search looks for close matches with the search term, rather than exact ones. For example, search for a term and the engine will look for:

• The word
• Similar words. Example: if you search "test", it will search for tests", "testing", "tested", etc.
• Inside other words. Example: if you search for "end", the search results can be "send", "ended", etc.
• If you include several words, by default the search engine uses the OR Boolean operator to search for one search term or the other.

Exact search:​

For exact search, you need to use quotation marks (“term here”) before and after the search terms. With the exact search, you will only look for those specific terms.

Boolean search: AND, OR, NOT.​

Now you can use Boolean operators to make your search much more powerful. For Boolean search, you need to use CAPITAL LETTERS for the AND, OR, NOT symbols between search terms.  

AND Search​

Use AND to search for both terms/phrases at the same time. Example:

 

OR Search​

Use OR to search for any of those terms/phrases independently. This is the default behavior of standard search. Example:

 

NOT Search​

Use NOT to exclude a term from the search terms/phrases. Example:

 

Combination of several Search options.​

You can use any combination of search terms and Boolean operators with parenthesis. Example:

DRIVE MOBILE APP UPDATES​

We have made improvements to the iOS and Android Drive app:

Share files​

Now the share menu provides visual feedback when it is downloading files before opening the share menu.

Microsoft Office previews​

There is a better viewing experience when you open Microsoft Office files. Now you can also control zoom levels.

You can download the apps from here: iPhone / iOS Android

 

VERSION CONTROL SYSTEM IMPROVEMENTS​

We have been working to improve Synergy’s Version Control System based on feedback from our partners. We have made the following improvements and we will keep iterating with the roadmap below.

New version naming for drafts​

Drafts are now named logically after the previous version. We have changed from “6.00 Draft” to “Draft post 6.00”. We have heard from several partners that this new nomenclature is much easier to understand. If you have any additional feedback, please let us know.

Add more information about versions in the save version dialog with:

1. Minor: these are internal versions, for sharing within the company
2. Major: these are external versions to be shared outside of the company

In addition, we plan on making the following improvements in the coming weeks:

1. New files created and file uploads to be minor versions by default (internal)

2. New option to overwrite last saved version (if that version was saved by you). This is very helpful when you identify a small typo or small change to be made. Now you can open the file, make that correction, and in the save version dialog you can overwrite the last version (and avoid “noise” in you version history)

3. New option to convert a version (major or minor) back to Draft status (if that version was saved by you). This improvement follows the same train of thought as the previous point. We have more improvements we plan to release next quarter, including the option to receive notifications by email when new versions of a document you have edited are saved. This has been requested by several partners. An initial design of the User Interface has already been produced. If you have any thoughts on this, please get in touch to discuss.

 

2022 Q4 ROADMAP​

The upcoming features on our roadmap include:

• 5 recent folders in sidebar.
• Additional version control improvements
• Convert old Office files to current format automatically (.doc to .docx)
• Additional features in public links: enable end-users to customize expiration date, passwords, previews, etc.
• Drive multi-account to connect several accounts at the same time
• Virtual Data Room
• Webhooks and file notifications

Separately, we would like to share (again) with you that our development team is currently hard at work on Synergy’s next product: a Workflow / Customer Relationship Management (CRM) product, which is fully integrated with rest of the Synergy platform. In the first iteration the Workflow we plan to include the following core features:

• Company lists
• Contacts lists
• Pipelines
• Projects / Deals / Matters (same concept but different naming depending on industry. The name can be customized to your industry)
• Tasks
• Time Tracking

We would very much welcome your feedback, comments and suggestions, which in turn might inform and influence the finished article. We are always keen to hear how we can make Synergy better for you and your organization.

Thank you very much for your trust,

The SynergyOS team