Appspace 8.8 Lynx Release Notes for Cloud

Feature Highlights:

• Swift Poll Creation: Administrators can create polls effortlessly through the Sharebox, with potential community tab integration for broader discussions.
• Robust Filtering and Display: Employees can search, filter, and view polls by various criteria, such as popularity and status (open or closed), with polls displaying the author and publish date.
• Interactive Elements: Employees can interact with polls via social reactions and comments, fostering community engagement. Voting functionality allows Employees to vote, view results, and change their votes as needed.
• Publisher Flexibility: Publishers can create and share polls across multiple spaces, promoting wide participation.
• Translatability: Polls are translatable, ensuring accessibility across different languages.

The Polls feature serves as a valuable tool for collecting data, gauging sentiment, and driving engagement, ultimately enhancing communication and participation within the organization.

The Navigation Bar now dynamically displays menu items based on available space and the maximum number of primary items configured in the theme settings. This ensures a more flexible and adaptable navigation experience, with any remaining items conveniently grouped under “More.”

Administrators can control the maximum number of displayed menu items in the Appspace console under App Configuration > Theme > Design. This enhancement provides greater flexibility in customizing the navigation bar to suit your specific needs and preferences.

• Personalized Prompts: Employees who haven’t logged in for a specified period will receive notifications about recent activity in the feeds they follow, encouraging them to stay updated on interesting posts.
• Administrator Control: Administrators can customize the timing and frequency of these notifications through the admin console.
• Targeted Delivery: To receive prompts, users must be following feeds set to “Highlight,” and any post type except featured posts will trigger a notification.

This enhancement fosters a more engaging and interactive app experience, keeping users informed and connected to the content that matters most to them.

The SharePoint connector and various third-party push and pull connectors now support inline media, enabling seamless integration of rich content from external sources into Appspace stories and pages. This enhancement preserves the original formatting and visual fidelity of the content, enhancing the user experience.

Supported Inline Media:

• Banner Images: Designated banner images from SharePoint content are displayed within Appspace (when available).
• Inline Video: Playable videos from SharePoint content are embedded within Appspace (if supported by Appspace functionality).
• Inline Files: Downloadable files from SharePoint content are displayed directly within Appspace (if access permissions allow).

This enhanced functionality streamlines content integration and enriches the Appspace experience with visually engaging and informative content from various external sources.

• Reservable Zone: The reservation sidebar opens automatically, and the map zooms in to provide a detailed view of the reserved area.
• Non-Reservable Zone or No Nested Resources: The map simply zooms in on the selected zone, allowing for closer inspection without triggering the reservation process.

• Administrators can now export connector logs for analysis and troubleshooting.
• A new “Post Editing Permission” toggle has been added to the Connector Settings page, enabling control over whether imported posts can be edited within the platform.
• When editing synced posts, users will be presented with a warning message to prevent unintended modifications.

Additionally, support for inline images, inline tables, and simple formatting has been added to further enhance content integration.

• Joined date
• Last logged in
• Manager

A new “Logs” section has been added to the Connectors module, allowing administrators to easily monitor connector activity and troubleshoot any potential issues.

This resolves an issue where the rule was applied to non-designated users.

Pathfinding

Spotlight Feature

Introducing the new Pathfinding feature, designed to enhance our map solution with optimal point-to-point navigation within environments. Previously reliant on Enhanced Services’ elite kiosk, this update brings productized pathfinding capabilities to the Locations module, featuring a new map setup and configuration tools.

Administrators have the ability to define walking paths and resource relationships, ensuring accessibility. They can manage nodes and segments directly within the interface. End users can easily find directions by defining start and end locations, with the system providing clear, point-to-point guidance. This update significantly improves navigation and accessibility across mapped environments.

Feature Highlights:

• Point-to-point navigation without tracking the user’s real position.
• Multi-layer map setup for varied visualizations.
• Accessibility features for creating routes that bypass obstacles like stairs.

Reservation Services 2.0: Catering Management

Spotlight Feature

Introducing Reservation Services 2.0, a significant enhancement aimed at providing a seamless experience and addressing crucial gaps, such as Catering Management. Developed across two releases, this feature set is designed to refine and sustain existing processes while adding comprehensive new capabilities.

Feature Highlight:

• Comprehensive Catering Features: A dedicated module tailored to meet the specific demands of catering operations.
• Seamless Catering Task Management: Centralized planning, ordering, tracking, and management of catering services for streamlined operations.
• Enhanced Efficiency and Organization: Improved user experience through a focused module on Catering Management, enhancing overall efficiency and organization for catering-related activities.

Reservation Services 2.0 promises to elevate the user experience by providing a more integrated and efficient approach to managing reservations and catering services.

Space Reservation Improvements

Resource Lock

• A temporary lock feature to streamline resource bookings, preventing double-bookings by securing a resource for a set period while the employee is actively making the reservation.
• The resource lock activates upon resource or time selection and remains in effect for a configurable duration, ensuring others cannot book the same resource simultaneously. If the employee becomes inactive, or does not complete the reservation within the duration, the lock lifts automatically, making the resource available again.

Quickly find videos using the new search bar, filter your “My Videos” for personalized content, and stay up-to-date with sorting options like “Recent” and “Popular.”

• Divider
• Font Colors
• Highlight Colors

Stories, Pages, User Posts, Event Posts, Praises, and future post types will now be readily accessible within a single comprehensive dashboard. Apart from the usual CRUD operations and filtering capabilities, the Posts Management module revolutionizes content moderation by providing quick identification when addressing reported or inappropriate content, ensuring the platform remains safe, engaging, and aligned with community guidelines.

Key Features:

• CRUD Operations – Manage create, read, update, and delete actions for all posts types from a single location on the Appspace console.
• Advanced Filtering – Refine content to precisely target and locate posts based post types, languages, publishers, dates, author, tags, and feeds.
• Reported and Featured Content – Quickly identify, manage, and take action on reported posts, while also be available to easily feature high-value content for increased visibility.
• Streamlined Moderation – Moderate content efficiently, ensuring alignment with community guidelines and brand standards.

As long as the “Allow Visitor Reservations” rule is enabled, visitors can be invited without generating building passes or adding the building to the building pass view in the Employee App. This ensures that locations not meant for regular employee visits can still accommodate visitors when necessary.

This feature was released as part of the Cygnus 8.7-ac.4 interim release.

The Visitor Kiosk improvements allows drop-in visitors to be able to select another host (from the same location), if the original host had not responded to the visitor’s request within a certain duration.

This feature was released as part of the Cygnus 8.7-ac.4 interim release.

• Empower employees to not only book resources, but also manage their availability by designating their booking as “Busy” or “Free” within their personal calendars.
• This allows employees to reserve resources without affecting their calendar availability, promoting flexible meeting scheduling.
• This feature can be configured in the Reservation Settings, by selecting one of the following options from the Free/Busy Reservations dropdown menu:
  • Default to Busy
  • Default to Free
    
    
    Note

    If “Default to Busy” is selected, all reservations will default to busy, except for bookings with an “All Day” duration, automatically defaulting the Busy/Free toggle switch to “Free”.

Spotlight Feature

Key Features:

• Dynamic audience segmentation: Allows for targetted content based on specific roles, responsibilities, or interest.
• Automated updates: Ensures audiences stay current as employee attributes change, eliminating manual upkeep.
• Improved communication relevance: Delivers personalized content that resonates with each recipient.
• Enhanced engagement: Drives higher engagement and action with targeted messaging.

The Audience module is only accessible to Account Owners and Location publishers within the Appspace console.

Spotlight Feature

Currently supported in Pages and Stories.

Spotlight Feature

Supports the following user-generated content:

• User Posts
• Event Posts
• Praises

Supports user comments on all post types.

Spotlight Feature

Introducing Praises for Quick Posts, designed to nurture a vibrant workplace culture of recognition and appreciation. This intuitive and interactive feature allows employees to celebrate their peers’ accomplishments, aligning with our commitment to delivering a cohesive and enriching user experience.

Seamlessly integrated into the app ecosystem and equipped with robust analytics capabilities, Praises is set to drive app adoption and provide valuable insights into employee sentiment and performance.

Feature Highlights:

• Pre-Defined Praises: Offers a selection of ready-to-use compliments across diverse categories for quick and effective acknowledgment.
• Direct Praise Functionality: Employees can easily praise colleagues within the platform, with public acknowledgments visible to the team, amplifying the positive impact.
• Enhanced Engagement: Encourages positive interactions and boosts morale through regular recognition and appreciation.

Future enhancements will include customizable praises, allowing personalization to align with organizational culture and values. This feature aims to enhance employee satisfaction, motivation, and overall morale within the organization.

This feature was released as part of the Cygnus 8.7-ac.4 interim release.

Spotlight Feature

The Global Mentions feature in the Employee App, is designed to revolutionize interconnectivity and reference capabilities. This enhancement allows employees to seamlessly mention colleagues not only in comments but also within posts, pages, stories, and resources, significantly improving collaboration and communication across the platform.

The Global Mentions feature ensures a unified user experience, making it easier for users to connect and engage with colleagues across various contexts and content types.

The Global Mentions feature has been extended to enable users to tag the following in the Comments, Sharebox, Page, and Stories within the Employee App:

• People
• Spaces (Communities, Topics, Channels)
• Pages
• Stories
• Events
• Resource

This feature was released as part of the Cygnus 8.7-ac.6 interim release.

• Feed Notifications Level Settings – Keep informed and engaged with instant or scheduled summaries of content updates from selected Channels, Topics, or Communities.
• Pin Content to Feeds – Feed managers can now pin crucial content, like Community Rules or essential announcements, to the top of the main feed for increased visibility and user engagement.
• Bookmark Posts – Bookmark favorite Posts for easy access later. This new feature streamlines personal content management, making it effortless to revisit important information and discussions.

Limited Release

Stories, Pages, User Posts, Event Posts, Praises, and future post types will now be readily accessible within a single comprehensive dashboard. Apart from the usual CRUD operations and filtering capabilities, the Posts Management module revolutionizes content moderation by providing quick identification when addressing reported or inappropriate content, ensuring the platform remains safe, engaging, and aligned with community guidelines.

Key Features:

• CRUD Operations – Manage create, read, update, and delete actions for all posts types from a single location on the Appspace console.
• Advanced Filtering – Refine content to precisely target and locate posts based post types, languages, publishers, dates, author, tags, and feeds.
• Reported and Featured Content – Quickly identify, manage, and take action on reported posts, while also be available to easily feature high-value content for increased visibility.
• Streamlined Moderation – Moderate content efficiently, ensuring alignment with community guidelines and brand standards.

• Community creation.
• Community privacy settings.
• Community membership setting.

Limited Release

Key Updates:

• Contextual Search Relevance – Global Search now goes beyond simple keyword matching. The intelligent search engine understands the context and intent of queries, delivering highly relevant results across the Employee App platform, even if specific keywords aren’t present.
• Spotlight on Search UI – Experience a sleek, redesigned Global Search UI that’s now front and center in the Employee App. It’s contextually aware, appearing wherever users are, and offering instant access to powerful search tools.
• Search Result Highlighting – Pinpoint crucial information instantly with intelligent highlighting in search results. The UI dynamically emphasizes the most pertinent content, tailored to specific search queries.
• Crafted Experiences – Experience tailored search results that highlight the most relevant information for each content type, whether it’s looking for news articles, announcements, or policies.

• Support mapping content to Pages.
• Support mapping content to Stories.

• Support for tables in Pages.
• Support for image cropping.

Spotlight Feature

Appspace will only support and certify upon Windows-based MTR devices, to ensure compatibility and performance as referenced here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftteams/rooms/certified-hardware?tabs=Windows

• Application Name (Channel Name)
• IP Address
• Health Status (Device Status)
• Date Since Offline
• Sync Status
• Tags

This feature was released as part of the Cygnus 8.7-ac.5 interim release.

Feature Highlights:

• Persistent User Settings, allows for the retention of applied filters, sorting options, and search results even after navigating away from the Devices page.
• Optimized Table View, provides enhanced readability and consistent column sizes (also customizable) across various screen dimensions.
• Streamlined Device Registration, for a more user-friendly and visually appealing device registration process.
• Collapsible Sidebar, for screen real-estate optimization.

Firmware Support

This feature was released in Appspace App for Devices 2.74.

Modernized UI

• React Integration – We’ve completely revamped the login process with our new React UI standard, delivering a visually cohesive, responsive, and modern experience on any device.

Single Sign-On

• SSO Prioritization – We’ve streamlined your login experience by intelligently prioritizing SSO. If SSO is enabled for your account, you’ll be automatically directed to your identity provider, saving you time and hassle.
  The specific redirect process will depend on your SSO configuration:
  • SSO Mandatory – If SSO is mandatory for your account, users who have entered their email address will be automatically redirected to your SSO login flow.
  • SSO Optional – SSO is now prioritized during login. For accounts with optional SSO, a brief pause after entering your email allows you to choose password login if desired.
• Clearer Instance Selection – Users with access to both public and private cloud instances will now be presented with a clear selection screen, ensuring they can easily choose the correct instance for login. This enhancement prevents accidental logins to the wrong cloud environment.
• Direct Private Cloud Access – When accessing Appspace through your organization’s domain (ie. company.com) and possessing solely a private cloud account, employees will be seamlessly directed to the private cloud login, bypassing any extraneous steps.

Seamless Mobile Access

• Seemless App Launch – Logging into the Appspace platform now seamlessly redirects you to the Appspace App if it’s installed, eliminating the need to manually switch between your browser and the app.
• QR Code Login – Administrators can now generate personalized QR codes for employees, facilitating swift and secure access to Appspace. Share these codes through email, display them on digital signage, or integrate them into internal communications. Employees simply scan the code with their mobile device for instant access to the correct Appspace instance. If the Appspace App is installed, it will even launch automatically on Android or iOS devices.

Frontline Worker Login Streamlined

• Consolidated Login: The Frontline worker login process has been simplified by consolidating the Username/Phone and Email login options into a single, streamlined form.

Enhanced Admin Controls and QR Code Login

• Customizable Session Timeout – Administrators now have the ability to customize session timeout settings in the Appspace console. (Note: If SSO is configured, the system follows the SSO’s predefined rules.)

If Appspace App is installed on the mobile device:

• Public Cloud – launches the Appspace App.
• Private Cloud – launches the Appspace App with the private cloud link (auto-populated).
• Frontline Worker Public Cloud – launches the Appspace App with Frontline Worker sub-domain linked (auto-populated).
• Existing Login (same instance) – User remains logged in.
• Existing Login (different instance) – User is treated as a New User.

If Appspace App is not detected on the mobile device, the mobile’s native browser is launched with the Appspace URL.