Workflow-feature: Attachements to eMails

[john99]

Hello,

a simple scenario could be the following:
The company receives an order via email on the standard email-
account (e.g. info@company.com). That email
will be either manually forwarded to "order entry" or, if the mail
is clearly "identifiable" as an order (e.g because the text string
"order" is found), or automatically forwarded to the person in
charge. This person writes an invoice, prints it out and the
"order entry system" generates a paper output, and a PDF.
Afterwards the "Order entry person " attaches this PDF with
drag and drop from the "Desktop" to the mail and writes for
example an additional note and attaches it as well to the mail.

It would be much better if that step(writing a note) could be
done directly in ZIMBRA (easier than opening an editor, saving
the document and attaching it to the mail)!

Because it could happen, that a mail is routed to different
persons, the person which added the "attachement/note"
and the date should be recognizeable.
I am exited to hear if that killer feature could be soon
integrated. For such a cool feature we would even pay,
(if you are going to support it in feature releases).

John

[KevinH]

Hello,

a simple scenario could be the following:
The company receives an order via email on the standard email-
account (e.g. info@company.com). That email
will be either manually forwarded to "order entry" or, if the mail
is clearly "identifiable" as an order (e.g because the text string
"order" is found), or automatically forwarded to the person in
charge. This person writes an invoice, prints it out and the
"order entry system" generates a paper output, and a PDF.

The forward based on some criteria could be a filter.

Afterwards the "Order entry person " attaches this PDF with
drag and drop from the "Desktop" to the mail and writes for
example an additional note and attaches it as well to the mail.

Well can't drag and drop the PDF from the desktop but it's quite easy in Zimbra to add an attachment when composing a mail in Zimbra. Of course the notes can just be the body of the email.

It would be much better if that step(writing a note) could be
done directly in ZIMBRA (easier than opening an editor, saving
the document and attaching it to the mail)!

Because it could happen, that a mail is routed to different
persons, the person which added the "attachement/note"
and the date should be recognizeable.
I am exited to hear if that killer feature could be soon
integrated. For such a cool feature we would even pay,
(if you are going to support it in feature releases).

John

The date/time and FROM is stamped on all outgoing mail. So I think al your cases are for the most part covered. Let me know if you've got any additional questions.

[harry]

Kevins proposal is ok, but nevertheless too complicated. Users will never accept it!

As long draging items in and out of the browser is not supported, it's very very hard
- if not impossible - to convince users.. (not only to use that procedure,
but to really like Zimbra in general..)


Harry

[KevinH]

Harry,

If you can point us to another browser based application that does drag/drop into a browser without plugins (ie works on all browsers) let us know. Without that support I'm not sure what else you'd expect Zimbra to do.

[mattdono]

Hello,

a simple scenario could be the following:
The company receives an order via email on the standard email-
account (e.g. info@company.com). That email
will be either manually forwarded to "order entry" or, if the mail
is clearly "identifiable" as an order (e.g because the text string
"order" is found), or automatically forwarded to the person in
charge. This person writes an invoice, prints it out and the
"order entry system" generates a paper output, and a PDF.
Afterwards the "Order entry person " attaches this PDF with
drag and drop from the "Desktop" to the mail and writes for
example an additional note and attaches it as well to the mail.

John

It sounds like you are describing a specific process within your company. I don't know what other tools you use for workflow, so it is a little hard to say what you can/should rely on for the best process. Perhaps you might consider a process revision? Sometimes a low-tech process revision can resolve any high-tech shortcomings you might find.

Email can be an effective tool for workflow, but some of the controls that mention might be find hard to find in any of the other email products (Outlook, TB, etc.), with the drag-n-drop being the only difference. In some business cases, email is a very poor tool for managing workflow. In others, it is very useful.

If drag-and-drop functionality is a critical aspect of your business process and retraining is not feasible, then you might be in a bind.

However, with a little bit of retraining (which really would be "do X instead Y"), you might be able to tweak your process and more effectively use the tools that Zimbra currently has.

My company is using email (and shared calendaring) as central tools in our workflow, so we're in a similar circumstance.

We have been using Zimbra for only about a month, and my team seems to be retraining themselves (we previously used a SendMail server with TB front-end). Certainly, I have some suggestions on improvement; however, but I'm waiting to see which ones resolve themselves and which ones really have a negative impact on the core work that has to be done.

Note to KevinH: I have a list, but it is pretty minor. Most everything else is working like a charm.

Anyway...my $0.02...

[KevinH]

Note to KevinH: I have a list, but it is pretty minor. Most everything else is working like a charm.

Feel free to post it in the User (here) or in the admin forum. If you don't want to make them public just PM me.

[mattdono]

Feel free to post it in the User (here) or in the admin forum. If you don't want to make them public just PM me.

We'll do. I hate to be cliche, but I'm a "glass-is-half-full" guy, so some things really don't register as "problems".

Also, we have only been on Zimbra for about a month and some of the things on the list, I suspect, are just learning issues for me any my crew. Some of the features (i.e., Search Builder), we are already taking full advantage of and will only explore more. [EDIT: See my post over here for more details.]

I mentioned the Tasks on a different post and you had replied with the "send-a-mail-to-yourself-tagged-as-'Task'" suggestion and the team seemed cool with that...for now. Shared tasks was actually the biggest issue for my team, but mostly because we work virtually and having a list that can be commonly worked on, viewed, notes made about, completed, etc. is beneficial. I have some business requirements framed out on the Tasks suggestion and will forward them after some additional consideration and discussion with my crew.

Anywho...

[vcolombo]

It sounds like what you're trying to acomplish may be possible with the new 4.0 version of SugarCRM. You can automate creation of entries based on pick-up of email from certain accounts. Hopefully at some point we'll see tighter integration of SugarCRM and Zimbra.

-Vince

[mattdono]

It sounds like what you're trying to acomplish may be possible with the new 4.0 version of SugarCRM. You can automate creation of entries based on pick-up of email from certain accounts. Hopefully at some point we'll see tighter integration of SugarCRM and Zimbra.

-Vince

I made another post about SugarCRM, asking if anyone has connected SugarCRM and Zimbra. When I re-read your post tonight, I noticed something in your verbiage that raised my eyebrow.

You said, "tighter integration of SugarCRM and Zimbra".

Have you connected SugarCRM and Zimbra already and are only hoping for a "tighter" integration?

Or, were you meaning "tighter integration" as in being able to connect SugarCRM and Zimbra, period?

My team is likely to be installing SugarCRM this coming work for our marketing and sales efforts. If you have some experiences with SugarCRM and Zimbra, I would like to hear about it.