Technical FAQs

Docubee is a great no-code platform for automating your business processes. If you are a developer, we offer several ways to integrate Docubee directly into your site with straightforward APIs, and a few lines of code. If that isn’t your speed, no worries! You can learn more about how you can use Docubee code free here. Otherwise, read on!

You’ve got your perfect website and your customers know and love your unique style. With Docubee, it’s easy to use your own forms to collect data and much more. With additional effort, you could even send documents hosted on your site to Docubee and auto-populate them with data collected in a form.

To demonstrate a very simple use-case, here is a survey form in Docubee which can be used to collect and track response data. The Docubee workflow will be a very simple two step process – a web form and email step. Check out how to create a workflow template here.

The Docubee Workflow

Using Docubee’s fast form creator, it was easy to create a simple survey form.

Once created and published, the workflow’s form can be directly linked via URL for collecting survey data, or it can be submitted from your own site by initiating a POST request. This way you don’t need to worry about storing the data. Docubee allows you to track and export all responses.

Each field in the workflow designer has a Field Label and Property Name. The label is what shows up on the Docubee web form, and the Property Name is what the response data corresponds with in the Docubee dashboard.

So far, there are six “Single-Line Text” fields on the form, five of which have a data type of text and one of type e-mail.

(Label / Property Name)

• What is your favorite product? / Favorite_Product
• Why did your purchase this product? / Why_Purchase_Product
• How satisfied are you with this product? / Product_Satisfaction
• Would you recommend this product to a friend? / Recommend_Product
• Would you recommend this company to a friend? / Recommend_Company
• Your Email / Respondent_Email

The property name is also how the data is stored in the POST request body to Docubee that initiates the workflow.

The Docubee API

The workflow can be initiated from your site by having your form post to custom route on your server. The handler behind that route needs to format your forms response data to POST to the workflow instances API endpoint:

POST - https://docubee.app/api/v1/workflowInstances
Content-Type: application/json
Request Body
{
  "wfModelId": "yourModelIdHere",
  "wfData": {
    "Favorite_Product": "yourDataHere",
    "Why_Purchase_Product": "yourDataHere",
    "Product_Satisfaction": "yourDataHere",
    "Recommend_Product": "yourDataHere",
    "Recommend_Company": "yourDataHere",
    "Respondent_Email": "yourDataHere"
  }
}

Response
Content-Type: application/json
{
  "wfInstanceId": "instance-id",
  "redirectUrl": "url-if-there-is-a-next-workflow-step"
}

After a successful POST request, the workflow will be initiated with the data and a thank you email would be automatically sent to the email contained in the “Respondent_Email” property.

The survey responses can be tracked in the Docubee Dashboard under the “COMPLETED” instances tab.

All survey results can also be exported to a CSV file using the “Export Workflows” button.

Example CSV Export:

Docubee can be used for a wide variety of different use cases, from something as simple as collecting survey data, to more advanced use-cases requiring documents hosted on your site to be automatically populated with data.

Reach out today to schedule a demo, or to get started integrating Docubee’s other powerful APIs into your product. For more advanced use-cases our Professional Services team would be more than happy to assist.

Check out more here.

Landon Lamb, Software Engineer III – Docubee Team

Landon started out as a Software Engineer in Support at Accusoft in July 2016. In April of 2017, he transitioned onto the Docubee team initially as a Workflow Developer.

Currently, Landon is a Software Engineer III and works on the front end site, the back end services, and the product’s build pipeline. He enjoys helping deliver new features to Docubee’s growing user base.

Long resistant to technological change, the insurance industry has made great strides over the last decade to implement innovative InsurTech solutions that upend longstanding market practices. As insurance providers explore new strategies for attracting a new generation of customers, they continue to rely heavily upon InsurTech developers to build the solutions that help them expand their customer base.

The Insurance Industry’s “Protection Gap”

Today’s insurance companies are offering more products and services than ever before, and yet at the same time, most people are carrying less insurance they need to protect themselves from risk. This “protection gap” is at least partially the result of large amounts of friction when it comes to purchasing insurance. People are either choosing to not buy insurance products, or they don’t know what options are available to them.

Part of this problem is the result of outdated models many organizations use to sell insurance. There’s an old adage that insurance is something that is “sold” rather than something that is “bought.” In this model, customers are expected to interact with an insurance agent who actively sells them a particular coverage.

Unfortunately, this model is becoming less and less effective in an increasingly digitized world, especially when it comes to younger generations of customers who expect the same level of frictionless convenience from insurers that they now get from many financial services (especially those powered by FinTech solutions).

What Is Embedded Insurance?

One potential solution to this challenge is a new strategy known as embedded insurance. This approach first identifies purchases or situations where insurance is required or would present clear added value. Some examples could include the purchase of an automobile, a vacation package, or even a potentially hazardous activity like skiing. An appropriately risk-adjusted insurance package is then offered to customers at the point of sale, or “embedded” within the customer experience.

There are tremendous advantages to this strategy. In the first place, it allows insurers to offer their products to customers who need them most at the precise point when they need them. Rather than having to go through the laborious process of contacting an insurance agent to get a quote for a new automotive policy after someone buys a new car, they can simply update their plan or add insurance services at the same time they’re purchasing the car itself. Customers are less likely to put off getting insurance (and then often forgetting to do so later), and the insurance provider has an opportunity to offer services to the people most likely to purchase them. For the provider, it’s a much more efficient approach than relying on outdated cold calling techniques to sell policies that may or may not meet the current needs of a customer.

Technical Challenges of Embedded Insurance

In order to embed insurance offerings effectively, however, providers first need to overcome a few technology challenges. From improved data capture tools that allow them to conduct faster, more customized underwriting to integrations that connect their applications to partner ecosystems, a new generation of InsurTech solutions will be needed to remake insurance business models.

Better Data Capture

Having accurate information is essential to insurance underwriting. This is even more important when it comes to embedded insurance because rates need to be calculated quickly so they can be provided along with other purchases. In many cases, form information may need to be processed quickly to obtain key data on the customer and the details of their purchase. When InsurTech applications are equipped with automated forms processing tools, they can quickly extract key information and use it to make faster, more data-driven decisions.

Versatile Viewing Capabilities

Whether an InsurTech application stands on its own or is integrated into another service offering, customers will often need to view information about their policy options in order to make an informed decision. On the firm’s end, insurance agents may need to review application details or bring up other resources to review when finalizing rates. By building viewing capabilities into their InsurTech applications with integrations like an HTML5 viewer, developers can ensure that their customers will never be caught depending upon external platforms for document viewing or sharing.

Expanded Contract Automation

Many insurance policies still require some form of contract, even if digital signature technology allows these forms to exist entirely in electronic format. Having the ability to rapidly assemble a contract as part of an embedded insurance solution can further enhance the streamlined customer experience. InsurTech developers can integrate automated document assembly tools to rapidly build contracts from pre-existing templates and quickly fill in the necessary details or add additional clauses.

Accusoft InsurTech Solutions for Embedded Insurance

Accusoft’s collection of SDK and API integrations give InsurTech developers the tools they need to enhance the flexibility of their applications. Our software solutions provide proven, market-ready viewing and processing features so development teams can keep their focus on refining their platform’s innovative core functionality. Whether it’s the versatile forms processing features of FormSuite, the powerful HTML5 viewing capabilities of PrizmDoc Viewer, or the automated document assembly tools of PrizmDoc Editor, Accusoft integrations can help InsurTech developers get their applications to market faster and explore the possibilities of embedded insurance.

We’ve been working hard to design software integrations that meet the needs of the insurance industry and InsurTech developers. Download our InsurTech solutions fact sheet to see how our constantly evolving family of SDKs and APIs can improve your application’s capabilities and performance.

ISVs, corporations, and SaaS solutions all have the same immediate digital transformation needs in common; they all need to bring forth technologies that improve both the customer and employee experience. The challenge is building and launching these technologies quickly, efficiently, and within a scalable, sustainable model. Product managers and development teams are all evaluating options to assist with meeting stakeholder demands for quality, while also meeting the need for speed to market. Enter the hidden value of third-party software integrations.

The secret life of APIs

Digital transformation is an ever-increasing priority for all businesses as well as an initiative that is seeing a surge in funding. In a recent State of the API Economy 2021 report by Google, 56% of enterprise leaders say APIs help them to build better digital experiences and products. Leaders are also finding value in focusing on an API-driven strategy, and 52% say APIs accelerate innovation by enabling partners to leverage digital assets at scale. 

How API Integration Works

At a very simple level, an API consists of code that allows two separate technology systems to communicate and interact with one another. It functions as a translator and messenger; delivering user requests and data from one system to a completely separate system. This effectively allows an application to utilize the features and data of other applications without having to build out that functionality from scratch.

For example, the Uber ride-sharing app connects customers to available drivers within a specific area. It does this with a combination of smartphone geolocation and accurate maps, but the Uber app doesn’t have mapping capabilities. To get those features, it connects to Google Maps by way of an API that allows the Uber app to access the relevant navigational data and use it to connect customers to drivers.

Another key function of APIs is their ability to automate key processes and connect legacy infrastructure to newer technology systems. Data can be collected in one system, for instance, and “pushed” into another system automatically. This not only eliminates the complicated (and error-prone) task of manually transferring data between different systems, but also allows users to build a workflow in an application they’re already accustomed to, without having to learn an entirely new system. 

More importantly, since APIs allow newer technologies, devices, and legacy applications to talk to each other, they provide firms with substantial flexibility when it comes to adding new platforms. Purchasing new software doesn’t mean throwing out existing tools, which significantly reduces the risks associated with technology investments and upgrades.

The cost savings with API Integrations

When you purchase a third-party API integration you’re gaining more than additional functionality for your application. You also gain access to a team of developers and support specialists who are here to assist you from POC to deployment and beyond.  Leaning on the specialization of a third-party vendor allows your developers to focus on application enhancements and release your product to market faster. Ultimately saving your company valuable development time and realizing product revenue faster.

Interested in learning more?

Could your business benefit from an API led digital transformation strategy? Schedule a consultation today, to learn more about the document management API integration options available from Accusoft.

Effective document management is now a top priority for organizations, but for many, it remains a challenge. As noted by recent AIIM survey data, companies are struggling to handle both the documents they have and the rapid uptake of new information. In fact, 43 percent said their biggest priority is effectively leveraging the structured and unstructured content they already have, while 57 percent are focused on understanding the overwhelming big data.  Optical character recognition (OCR) is a critical component of document management.

For software development firms, this poses a particular challenge. Products are no longer feature complete without critical end-user functions such as advanced optical character recognition and powerful search. However, adding this functionality is not as easy as it sounds. Developers building out this comprehensive construct from the ground up requires both time, effort, and continued maintenance, which is a large undertaking for any company.

Accusoft’s ImageGear SDK offers a way to bridge the OCR gap with comprehensive image processing and manipulation capabilities that both streamline software development and deliver on end-user expectations.*

What is ImageGear?

ImageGear easily integrates into existing applications to deliver cutting-edge document management functionality at scale. Available for both .NET and C/C++ frameworks, ImageGear allows developers to quickly deploy and white-label key features including image processing, manipulation, conversion, and PDF and document search.

This add-on OCR functionality delivers highly-accurate optical character recognition to any .NET (C#) or C/C++ application. ImageGear’s OCR add-on provides full-page character recognition for more than 100 languages — including both Western and Asian languages such as Korean, Japanese, and Chinese character sets. It’s capable of recognizing multiple languages within a single image for enhanced document management. Other OCR features include:

• Automatic page segmentation into individual zones for processing
• Type assignment per zone based on defined flows, tables, or graphics
• Table detection with advanced technology to enhance data reconstruction output
• Entire page or individual region image processing
• Zone definition by user, existing files, or detected automatically by the OCR engine

In addition, software developers can enhance ImageGear OCR functionality by leveraging both predefined and customizable dictionaries to ensure validated results using regular expressions. 

Why Optical Character Recognition (OCR) Matters to End-Users

Advanced OCR integration makes it easier for end-users to find what they’re looking for, when they’re looking for it. Instead of forcing users to find additional apps that deliver specific services, in-app OCR delivers increased satisfaction by streamlining user search functionality.

Common use cases include:

• Legal eDiscovery — The eDiscovery process is a critical — and often complex — stage of legal case preparation. Firms need to quickly find key terms, phrases, and images within legal documents to ensure they meet both client expectations and compliance obligations. With many forms now scanned and stored in non-standard file formats that contain form fields, text boxes, and digital imagery, OCR is essential to help lawyers streamline the process of eDiscovery at scale.

• Financial Document Processing — Clients now expect loan applications and credit card applications to be processed at scale and speed. This is especially critical as firms embrace the idea of remote work — both staff at home and those in the office need end-to-end OCR functionality to deliver complete document management.

• Insurance Documentation Assessment — Insurance claims are both complex and comprehensive, requiring complete documentation from clients, contractors, and compliance agencies. As insurance firms move to tech-first frameworks to enhance document processing, speed, and accuracy, OCR makes it easy for staff to find specific data and ensure documentation is complete. 

Integrating OCR

Advanced OCR functionality won’t deliver expected outcomes if integration is cumbersome and complex. ImageGear streamlines this process with easy SDK implementation for both .NET and C/C++.

ImageGear .NET can be easily deployed on multiple platforms. These .NET deployments include ASP.NET functions such as image display, thumbnail display, annotation support, and cloud capture along with WPF printing and annotation support. ImageGear for C/C++, meanwhile, offers support for several platforms as well. Check out the developer resources section to see an updated list.

How Your Clients Use Optical Character Recognition (OCR)

PDFs remain the go-to file format for many industries, offering both standardized image and text conversion along with the ability to easily set or restrict document permissions. The problem? PDFs are notoriously difficult to search, making it hard for end-users to quickly find the text or data they need.

ImageGear makes it easy to OCR PDFs using the ImGearRecPage.Recognize Method, which leverages the zone list of the image to deliver accurate OCR — or, if this list is empty, automatically calls the page-layout decomposition process (auto-zoning) to complete the OCR process.

C# supports OCR to PDF.

using System.IO;
using ImageGear.Core;
using ImageGear.Formats;
using ImageGear.Evaluation;
using ImageGear.Recognition;

namespace ImageGearTest
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            // Initialize evaluation license.
            ImGearEvaluationManager.Initialize();
            ImGearEvaluationManager.Mode = ImGearEvaluationMode.Watermark;

            // Initialize the Recognition Engine.
            ImGearRecognition igRecognition = new ImGearRecognition();

            // ImageGear assemblies require explicit initialization at application startup.
            ImGearCommonFormats.Initialize();

            // Open a FileStream for our output document.
            using (FileStream outputStream = new FileStream(@"c:\temp\outputDoc.txt", FileMode.OpenOrCreate, FileAccess.ReadWrite))
            {
                // Open a FileStream for our source multi-page image.
                using (FileStream multiPageDocument = new FileStream(@"c:\temp\test.tif", FileMode.Open))
                {

                    // Load every page of the multi-page document. Starting at page 0 and loading the range of spaces specified.    
                    // Since the range is -1, that specifies that all pages shall be loaded.     
                    ImGearDocument doc = ImGearFileFormats.LoadDocument(multiPageDocument, 0, -1);

                    // Determine the amount of pages in the multi-page image.
                    int numPages = ImGearFileFormats.GetPageCount(multiPageDocument, ImGearFormats.UNKNOWN);

                    // Recognize each page of the multi-page document and add the results to outputStream.
                    for (int pageNumber = 0; pageNumber < numPages; pageNumber++)
                    {

                        // Cast the current page to a raster page and import that page.
                        using (ImGearRecPage igRecPage = igRecognition.ImportPage((ImGearRasterPage)doc.Pages[pageNumber]))
                        {

                            // Preprocess the page.
                            igRecPage.Image.Preprocess();

                            // Perform recognition.
                            igRecPage.Recognize();

                            // Add OCR results to the outputStream.
                            igRecognition.OutputManager.WriteDirectText(igRecPage, outputStream);

                        }
                    }
                }

            }
            // Dispose of objects we are no longer using.
            igRecognition.Dispose();
        }
    }
}

OCR Access and Analysis

Advanced OCR isn’t enough in isolation — developers must also empower end-users to quickly access and analyze OCR output. ImageGear offers multiple options to help streamline this process, such as:

• Storage of Output as Code Pages
• Export to Text Format
• Export to PDF
• Export to MRC PDF
• Export to a Formatted Document

Find Your Best Fit

ImageGear OCR makes it easy for end-users to quickly search critical documents, find the data they need, and analyze optical character recognition output, but don’t take our word for it. Seeing is believing. Test ImageGear in your own environment and discover the difference of advanced OCR. 

*Optical character recognition is an ImageGear add-on and must be requested upon purchase of a license.

Post-secondary schools look very different this year as colleges and universities embrace both blended learning and online-only approaches to content delivery and engagement. But this isn’t a one-off operation. Even as pandemic pressures ease, the shift to distance learning as the de facto solution for many students won’t disappear.  As a result, it’s critical for schools to develop and deploy learning management systems (LMSs) that both meet current needs and ensure they’re capable of keeping up with educational evolution. But what does this look like in practice? How do developers and team leaders build fully-functional LMS solutions that empower student success without breaking the bank?

Learning Management Systems (LMS) Challenges

When schools first made the shift to distance learning directives, speed was of the essence. While students were barred from campus for safety reasons, they’d paid for a full semester of instruction, and schools needed to deliver. As a result, patchwork programs became commonplace. Colleges and universities combined existing education software with video conferencing and collaboration tools to create “good enough” learning models that got them through to summer break. Despite best educational efforts, however, some students still went after schools with lawsuits, alleging that the quality of instruction didn’t align with tuition totals.

So it’s no surprise that as fall semesters kick off, students aren’t willing to put up with learning management systems that barely make the grade. They want full-featured distance learning that helps them engage with instructors and connect with new content no matter how, where, or when they access campus networks. 

As a result, development teams can’t simply correct for current COVID conditions. Instead, they need to create systems that deliver both blended and purely online interactions, and have the power to ensure students that choose to continue with digital-first learning can still stay connected even after returns to campus become commonplace.

How to Create a Functional LMS Framework

So what does a fully-functional LMS framework look like in practice? Six features are critical for ongoing success. Let’s explore how these features can enhance your learning management system and set your end-users up for success in the classroom and at home:

Diverse Document Viewing

As schools make the shift to distance learning, the ability to view multiple document types is critical for long-term LMS success. From standard Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, and PowerPoint presentations to more diverse image types — such as those used in medical educational programming or manufacturing courses — students and instructors need the ability to both send and view diverse document types on-demand. 

While both free and paid solutions for viewing exist outside LMS ecosystems, choosing this route creates two potential problems. Students with diverse technological and economic backgrounds may face challenges in finding and using these tools, and data security may be compromised. This is especially critical as schools handle greater volumes of students’ personal and financial information. If document viewing happens outside internal systems, private concerns become paramount.

In-Depth Annotations

With students now submitting assignments and exams via educational software, viewing isn’t enough. Staff also need the ability to annotate assets as they arrive. Here, professors and teaching assistants are best-served by built-in tools that allow them to quickly redline papers or projects, add comments, highlight key passages, and quickly markup documents with specific instructions or corrections. 

Without this ability, staff have two equally unappealing choices. They can either print out, manually correct, and then re-scan documents, or send all comments as separate email attachments. Both are problematic, since they limit the ability of students and teachers to easily interact with the same document.

Comprehensive Conversion

File conversion is critical for effective learning management systems (LMSs). Specifically, schools need ways to quickly convert multiple document types into single, searchable PDFs. Not only do PDFs offer the ability to control who can edit, view, or comment on papers or exams, they make it easy for teachers to quickly find specific content. The permissions-based nature of PDFs makes them ideal for post-secondary applications and a must-have for any education software solution. 

Cutting-Edge OCR and ICR

Optical character recognition and intelligent character recognition also forms a key part of distance learning directives. With some students still more comfortable with hand-written hard copies and some classes that require students to show specific work, OCR can help bridge the gap between form and function. By integrating tools with the ability to recognize and convert multiple character types and sets, schools are better equipped to deal with any document type. Search is also bolstered by cutting-edge OCR; instead of forcing staff to manually examine documents for key data, OCR empowers digital discovery.

Complete Data Capture

Forms are a fundamental part of university and college life — but the myriad of digital documents can quickly overwhelm legacy education software. Integrating tools with robust form-field detection allow schools and staff to streamline the process of complete data capture, both increasing the speed of information processing and reducing the potential for human error.

Barcode Benefits

As campuses shift to hybrid learning models, students occupy two worlds, both physical and digital. But this duality introduces complexity when it comes to tracking who’s on campus, when, and why. These are currently key metrics for schools looking to keep students safe in the era of social distancing. 

By deploying full-featured barcode scanning solutions as part of LMS frameworks, colleges and universities can get ahead of this complexity curve. From scanning ID cards to take attendance and track resource use to using barcodes as no-contact purchase points or metric measurements for ongoing analytics, barcode solutions are an integral part of LMS solutions.

Automation Advantages

The sheer volume of digital documents now generated and handled by post-secondary schools poses the problem of practicality. Teachers and administrators simply don’t have time to evaluate and enter data at scale and speed while also ensuring accuracy. By automating key processes including document conversion, capture, and character recognition, schools can reduce the time required to process documents, leaving more room for student engagement.

Building an LMS Product for Teachers & Students

The bottom line for LMS solutions? If they don’t work for end-users, they won’t work for the broader school system as a whole. Gone are the days of invisible IT infrastructure. Now, students and staff alike are school stakeholders with evolving expectations around technology.

By deploying distance learning solutions that prioritize end-user outcomes with enhanced document viewing, editing, data capture, and automation, developers can create LMS tools capable of both solving immediate issues and offering sustained student success over time. Learn more about these functionality integrations for your learning management system at accusoft.com/products. 

Accusoft’s FormSuite for Structured Forms is a powerful SDK that allows you to integrate character recognition, form identification, document cleanup, and data capture capabilities into your software applications. You can set up unique form templates based on your processing needs and then design customized output architecture to extract data for delivery to a database or other downstream applications, helping you get to production faster or bring a new level of functionality to your legacy systems.

Setting all of that functionality up, however, can be a daunting task, especially if you’re working with a wide variety of form types. That’s why our FormSuite enablement services team is available to help you implement the features you need to ensure lasting results. Whether you’re facing bandwidth constraints or lack the resources to build expertise quickly, our FormSuite experts bridge the gap to make your project a success. Our enablement services team takes a five step approach to every engagement.

The Accusoft Approach to Enablement Services

Step 1: Thorough Architecture Review

We start by conducting a top to bottom analysis of your production or operational environment. Our review not only evaluates your system architecture and data workflow, but also breaks down the details of your potential use cases and existing work samples. 

Step 2: Identifying the Right Fit

Next, we determine the best FormSuite options based on your unique requirements and build you a custom enablement plan that will equip you with the instruction and assistance you need for a successful implementation.

Step 3: Training Your Team

Armed with information about your application’s specific requirements, we develop a customized training program to give your team a solid foundation for future development and ongoing maintenance. From guidance on form template creation and image enhancement to working with the forms API, we provide you with targeted guidance designed to help you solve potential challenges unique to your application environment.

Step 4: Implementation Support

Once the training is complete, you’ll have the foundational knowledge required to build the forms processing workflows your application requires. Our FormSuite experts remain on call to answer your questions so you can achieve your integration faster and ensure that you’re processing forms accurately.

Step 5: Preparing for Long-Term Success

Our enablement services prepare you to manage your implementation over the long term. We not only show you how to maintain the current environment, but also identify potential opportunities to deploy new features as your application scales in the future.

Keep the Partnership Going

Following your integration, we also provide ongoing support options to our customers whether or not they’ve utilized our enablement services. You get free Upgrade Support for 90 days after initial purchase, which includes email support and product upgrades. After that period, you can extend Upgrade Support, or elect to transition to our Standard Support or Priority Support annual plans.

To learn more about FormSuite for Structured Forms enablement services, talk to one of our solutions engineers. We’re ready to help you get your integration started!

Here at Accusoft, we’re always looking for new ways of connecting people with progress to improve productivity and drive innovation. It’s why we put so much work into our standards-based APIs and SDKs. We understand that developers need mature integrations that are ready to enhance their applications from day one and will be supported by extensive, accurate documentation. From the onset of 2020, we had a strategy in place to help us focus on making it easier for our customers to solve their business problems.

And then, well, 2020 happened…

As this challenging year finally comes to a close, we wanted to take a look back at how we adapted to stay focused on our enduring mission to deliver better products and services to our customers.

2020 Customer Advisory Board Meetings

Since most of our products are delivered through APIs and SDKs, we often encounter situations where our customers and partners independently purchase, download, and extend applications with minimal interaction. Historically, this made it difficult to gain insight into how our clients utilized many of our solutions and what features they would like to see from them in the future.

That’s why we hosted our first Board of Connectors (BoC) meeting in 2019 to bring customers and product managers together in an ongoing dialogue about business needs and product strategy. These meetings also had the benefit of allowing our customers to build relationships with our internal teams, provide feedback on product features, share their business challenges, and discuss key development trends impacting their respective industries.

We had the good fortune to hold our first BoC meeting in-person before the COVID-19 pandemic forced us to adopt rigorous social distance and work-from-home protocols for the safety of our employees and customers. Our second meeting took place in virtual format later in the year, which allowed us to learn first-hand how our customers were dealing with pandemic pressures and how we could adjust our product strategies to meet their rapidly shifting needs.

An Eventful 2020 for PrizmDoc Viewer

One of the principal beneficiaries of these meetings was our popular PrizmDoc Viewer solution. As a best-in-class HTML5 viewer, PrizmDoc Viewer was already a powerful and versatile viewing integration capable of enhancing a variety of applications. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned over the years, it’s that there’s always room for improvement.

That’s why we made it a point of emphasis to implement the top five requests we heard at the first BoC meeting of 2020. Despite all the disruption of COVID-19, we’re incredibly pleased that we were able to deliver on every one of these requests. We also rolled out a host of new product features and continued to optimize PrizmDoc Viewer for improved performance.

Here’s a quick rundown of the five big PrizmDoc Viewer upgrades of 2020:

v.13.11: February 2020 

For the first release of the year, we focused on improving performance when viewing large raster images. We also wanted to make PrizmDoc Viewer easier to install and upgrade.

What we did:

• Improved the PrizmDoc Viewer Raster Conversion Service to significantly reduce memory consumption and reduce the time it takes to generate raster tiles when viewing large image files.
• In addition to our traditional installers for Windows and Linux, we released new PrizmDoc Server and PrizmDoc Application Services (PAS) Docker images for production deployments, making the setting up of the PrizmDoc Viewer backend dramatically easier.
• Released a new .NET SDK for PrizmDoc Server – for .NET developers doing backend document processing with PrizmDoc Server this wrapper around the PrizmDoc Server REST APIs makes it easy to use PrizmDoc Server functionality in .NET.
• Upgraded the PrizmDoc Server installer to allow for in-place upgrades so users no longer need to uninstall the previous version before installing the newest version.

v.13.12: April 2020 

For the second release of the year, we expanded our use of Docker technology to make PrizmDoc Viewer easier to evaluate. We also worked to improve the performance and stability of PrizmDoc Server.

What we did:

• Released a new evaluation Docker image that provides a demo web application to explore the viewer and its features, and start a complete PrizmDoc Viewer backend to begin using for local development.
• Updated online help with a new look and feel for easier navigation. Added a new getting started topic for streamlined evaluation, and initial integration topic for an easy transition after evaluation. 
• Improved performance and stability of PrizmDoc Server when viewing complex PDF documents.

v.13.13: June 2020 

This release saw the rollout of a new redaction feature along with myriad performance improvements.

What we did:

• Provided support for multiple redaction reasons via our client API so users can apply more than one reason, selected from a customizable list, to any redaction reason. Reasons appear on top of the black box of redacted content and can be burned into a downloadable PDF along with the rest of the redacted content. Developers can also import a pre-built set of redaction reasons from an existing JSON file for streamlined end-user application.
• Improved conversion times and memory consumption when viewing multi-page DWF documents.
• Improved performance when retrieving revision data and scrolling through results when comparing two versions of a Word document.

v.13.14: September 2020

The fall release saw new support for viewing email attachments, more redaction features, and continued improvements to the upgrade process.

What we did:

• Added support for opening email attachments in the same viewer window where the original email is being viewed. Improved the client UI to show email attachments in a compact dropdown menu.
• Added server-side support for multiple redaction reasons using the Redaction Creators API.
• Released the ability to draft redactions without obscuring the content, allowing users to produce PDF documents with transparent redactions that display the document content underneath the redaction rectangles.
• Added the ability to retain configuration setting when upgrading PrizmDoc Server and PAS.

v.13.1: December 2020

The final update of 2020 focused primarily on reducing resource strain, but also saw the release of new sample code and added new Java Virtual Machine (JVM) controls.

What we did:

• Optimized log entries for the PrizmDoc PDF processing service to dramatically reduce log file size and storage needs.
• Enhanced PrizmDoc service health detection to automatically return to healthy status as soon as a failed backend service returns to normal operation, eliminating a potential need to restart PrizmDoc Server.
• Released two new Angular samples on GitHub: a .NET backend sample and a Java backend sample.
• Added new parameters in central configuration that provide controls for JVM settings when starting PrizmDoc Server Java-based services.

What’s Next for 2021?

Following our virtual BoC meeting in Q3, our product teams have been hard at work developing new features for the upcoming year that will continue to meet the diverse use case needs of our clients’ applications. We want to build on our successes in 2020 when it comes to engaging our customers and using their direct feedback to make beneficial and lasting improvements to our family of SDK and API solutions.

If you’re currently using our products and would like to participate in one of our upcoming BoC meetings for 2021 to submit feedback or learn about future releases, contact us today! We’re looking forward to working with you in the new year!