Electronic Document Exchange
Electronic Document Exchange Component Only
CAPITAL Electronic Document Exchange is an optional component that enables forms, documents and Visual Builder reports to be sent across the Internet using your computer's or network's in-built support for Email services.
In addition to the above, if you have software installed on your network that allows Email to be routed to a fax server, CAPITAL can normally be set-up to communicate with your Email-to-Fax gateway.
When Electronic Document Exchange is installed, users are given the option to print (hard copy), Email or fax forms, documents and Visual Builder based reports. You may specify an Email destination address, or when possible, CAPITAL will retrieve it automatically from the applicable account. As well, a subject heading, extra text to be included in the body of the Email, and additional file attachments may be included with your Email.
Emailing is similar to printing: anything that can be printed via Visual Builder can also be Emailed using Electronic Document Exchange. For example, rather than print an invoice or statement and mail or fax it manually to your customer, you can choose to Email it directly instead.
When the recipient of an Email generated by Electronic Document Exchange receives your message, the document is passed along as a file attachment in industry standard Portable Document Format (PDF). PDF attachments can be viewed using the Acrobat Reader program, freely available for download from the Acrobat web site. The web address for obtaining this software is:
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html
A large number of systems already have the Acrobat Reader program routinely installed.
Features Of Electronic Document Exchange
The main features of Electronic Document Exchange include:
Seamless integration with CAPITAL's printing services.
Support for interfacing to Email-to-Fax gateways.
Automatic conversion of printed documents to the efficient, compact, defacto industry standard PDF format, to facilitate electronic document exchange.
The ability to schedule Emails to be sent immediately, after a specified time, or in batches after a nominated period of time has passed.
The ability to nominate which running copy of Visual Builder handles Email and/or fax requests on your network, as opposed to normal print requests.
Default file attachments may be included with every Email.
Copies of every Email may be 'visibly' or 'invisibly' sent to multiple destinations.
Emails and PDF attachments can be automatically deleted after being dispatched, or moved to an archive directory.
Messages may be prioritized as 'send immediately', of high importance or of normal importance.
The Event Viewer records whether there was a problem sending your message. (It does not, however, report whether the message successfully arrived. This can sometimes takes hours or several days to determine, depending on the nature of the destination.)
On-the-fly text may be included with each Email, as well as additional file attachments.
Email messages can be sent to multiple users simultaneously.
What is Portable Document Format (PDF)?
PDF files can be viewed using the freely available Adobe Acrobat Reader software, which can be downloaded from the Internet at no cost. PDF files are compact, and can be distributed, viewed, searched and printed by anyone with access to Acrobat Reader.
PDF files also preserve the print image of the form, document or report that you would otherwise have to print out and mail or fax. For this reason PDF has become the universal defacto industry standard for electronic document distribution. Because they tend to be highly compressed, they are very suitable for transmission via Email.
Setting Up Electronic Document Exchange
Installing Electronic Document Exchange is a two stage process:
1. You must begin be configuring CAPITAL to communicate with the Email/SMTP/MAPI services of your operating system. For instructions on how to do this, consult the topic: Email Services Installation.
The Email services installation must be set-up for each individual computer on your network.
2. You must configure Electronic Document Exchange by specifying whether Emails and form/document attachments should be deleted or archived, and when or how often Emails should be sent. For instructions on how to do this, consult the topic: Electronic Document Exchange Installation.
If you have an Email-to-fax gateway that can route Email messages to a fax server, it can be integrated with CAPITAL Electronic Document Exchange. This will allow for the translation of these messages into faxes. If you do not have such a gateway you can skip the third step:
3. Configure CAPITAL to communicate with your Email based fax server. For instructions on how to do this, consult the topic: Electronic Document Exchange Fax Server Installation.
If an Email message is rejected, your Email server will normally send the message back to you at some point. It is therefore important to include a return address on your Emails, so that any returned messages or replies, arrive in the correct mailbox.
4. For each user who has his or her own mailbox, an Email address should be included under that person's staff profile. To do this, select from the main menu Tables|Staff Profiles. Edit the user you wish to set-up, and on the tab under Email, enter the user's return Email address.
If you do not specify a return Email address, the system default Email address will be assigned to the Email.
For more information consult the topic: Staff Profiles.
Sending Emails
To send a form/document or Visual Builder based report as an Email, tick 
the Email option on your printer dialog, or select Email... from the area's File Menu. You may also click
on the
button,
if it is shown on your toolbar.
Once you have selected Email and pressed the or button, the Send Document As Email box will appear. Change or accept the Email's details, and press the button again to dispatch it. For more information on sending Emails see the topic: Send Document As Email.
Some
areas of CAPITAL show both an Email menu item and an Email Client menu item. The Email Client menu option
will start your standard Email software, such as Eudora or Microsoft Outlook. Be sure to choose the 'Email'
menu item to send a form/document as an Email.
Checking The Email Message Status
When an Email is dispatched to Visual Builder, a record of the entry is placed in the Event Viewer. To view these records, start the Event Viewer by selecting Tools|Event Viewer from the main menu, and from the Type field select Email.
If CAPITAL Visual Builder was able to successfully convert the form/document or Visual Builder report into a PDF and transmit it to your Email server, then under the column the word 'Sent' will appear. If the Email was not sent because of a technical problem or because it has not yet been scheduled to be sent, then the words 'Not Sent' will appear.
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