Revision as of 16:45, 19 October 2016

General Information

Next Upgrade Date

The next upgrade is scheduled for July 20 2023.

Quarterly Upgrades

Upgrades are now released on a quarterly basis.

Key reasons for changing to a quarterly upgrade approach include:

• This upgrade period will bring more enhancements that will make your SmartSimple system more robust with more and better features.
• We are well into the process of becoming Service Organization Control 2 (SOC 2) compliant. This process requires more in depth testing and review of our work to meet a higher level of compliance. Better security standards mean a more secure platform for all our users.

Upgrade Schedule

We regularly update the list of upgrade features and schedule for both the backup and production servers on this Wiki page.

This page will provide a general overview of each upgrade, with links to the Wiki articles describing the new or updated features and how to use them. You can also subscribe to the Technical Journal that is sent out prior to each upgrade on the Newsletter Signup Page. (Unsubscribe here).

System Upgrade Process

The objective of the System Upgrade Process is to ensure that customers have a chance to review, without compromising the integrity of their production system, how their applications and information will work following the upgrade. In order to take advantage of this you will need to know how to access your backup instance of SmartSimple. If you need assistance with this either refer to the Backup Server and Testing Instances Wiki article, or contact the SmartSimple support desk.

For clients on a Dedicated Server, please review the SmartSimple Upgrade Process – Dedicated Server page.

Upgrade Schedule Details

The following tables outline the detailed upgrade release cycle.

If you are part of our Key Release your SmartSimple Cloud system will be automatically upgraded according to the following schedule. Generally North American Clients are on the Key release.

If you are part of our Global Release your SmartSimple Cloud system will be automatically upgraded according to the following schedule. Generally clients in Europe, Middle East and Asia as well as Managed Dedicated clients are on the Global release.

If you are on dedicated environment that is client-managed your SmartSimple Cloud system is only upgraded manually by your system administrator or by submitting a request to SmartSimple. The upgrade package is made available for you according to the following schedule.

Backup Server Update

• Each backup server will be updated to the "release candidate" prior to the upgrade date.
• This update will provide for instance specific testing of release candidate, as you can log into your respective backup server and test the changes against your most current data and configuration.
• Internal staff will also be using these servers to perform instance specific testing.

Update Go/No-Go

• Subject to satisfactory testing on both the pre-production server and the production backup servers, the Go/No-Go decision will be made on Wednesday at 12:00pm.

Current Upgrade Package: October 2016

The Production SAAS server was last upgraded on May 24th 2018, between 10pm - 10:15pm EST.

Important: The upgrade will be applied to your backup server one week prior to the scheduled upgrade date for your production server.
You are encouraged to log into your backup server during this period to test the changes against your most recent data and configuration. 

If your organization has a dedicated SmartSimple server or you host in-house, the upgrade will be made available on November 10th.

General Details

Upgrade Dates

Public Cloud Production release date: October 27th 2016
Public Cloud Backup release date: October 13th 2016

Private Cloud Production (Managed Upgrades) release date: November 10th 2016
Private Cloud Backup (Managed Upgrades) release date: October 27th 2016

Global System Upgrades

The new features listed below are enhancements to the SmartSimple system and will be immediately available to SmartSimple users upon the application of the upgrade to their server:

Updated Menu Header

Updated the menu header for improved look and feel as well as greater screen real estate. For those using the Arcadia administrator menu, you'll find that the four standard menu options for Applications, Organizations, Tools, and Configuration have all been combined and moved into a single menu for easier navigation. The Arcadia X customised menus have now been moved up into the header and right-aligned to allow for greater vertical screen real estate. The logo image in the top left of the header now has its height restricted for greater screen real estate, and thus may appear smaller now as the size was previously unrestricted and determined by the size of the image uploaded.

Updated User Interface

Updated the overall user interface for better look and feel as well as greater screen real estate, and also updated certain lookup functionality to the current light box interface standard in Arcadia. The styling of the user interface has been updated for a more contemporary and streamlined look (you'll note the previous look was more constrained in horizontal real estate). Lookup pages for users and organizations have also been updated in line with Arcadia styles.

Enhanced Tool Tip Display

Enhanced the display of tool tips with the use of a more prominent icon. Tool tips will now be indicated by a question mark icon to the right of a field instead of with an underline highlight of the field label. By default tool tips will be shown on the edit mode of an object and hidden on view mode for a more streamlined interface, however there will be an option within Global Settings to re-enable classic tool tips to restore the tool tips on view mode.

Updated Report Builder Neo with Added Record Sets

Updated the Report Builder Neo with more record sets and fields made available for you to extract. New data sets include user/company events and activities, notes, field change audit logs, object read audit logs, and the standard invoicing module.

Enhanced Report Sorting for Dates and Numbers

Enhanced report sorting will now correctly sort columns that are based on fields with date or number validation. Previously, the sorting would depend on the calculated value transformation set on the column within the report builder, but now the report sorting will apply to the stored data value (the date/number) regardless of any configured formatting.

New Status History Chart

Enhanced the status history of an object with the addition of a visual chart. You can now more easily see and compare the amount of time that an object spends in each status. This chart has been added directly into the status history list.

Enhanced List View Filter Editing

Enhanced the process for editing List View filters to make it easier for you to do so. Admins with the ability to edit system filters will now see them listed in the List View search panel in addition to the personal filters that are currently listed. This allows you to access filters and update them directly in the List View without having to navigate to the Global Settings configuration page. After editing a filter you can choose to re-save that same filter or save it as a new filter.

New List View Icons for Blank Images

Enhanced List Views that contain the user or company profile image to display a coloured initial icon instead of the blank image icon when a user or company profile does not have a profile image.

Updated Language Selector

Updated the personal language selector within a portal to now display the different language options written in each respective language as opposed to in your current language.

Updated HCAI Invoice Submissions for Bulk Submissions

Updated the HCAI invoice submission functionality to allow you to submit invoices in bulk. This can be done through the invoice List View.

On-Demand System Upgrades

The following features are available immediately with the application of the upgrade, but must first be enabled or configured by a System Administrator:

New US County Lookup

New ability to reference the county that a US address falls under. This is done through a Variable Processor reference to translate the county of a US address. The Variable Processor syntax used to reference this will be @addresstype.region.uscounty.name@ and @addresstype.region.uscounty.id@

New Amortization Schedule Calculator

New amortization schedule calculator builds upon the current payment schedule calculator to allow you to create a series of loan re-payments as well now. This allows you to easily create a loan re-payment schedule with variable principal and interest periods as well as balloon payments.

New Note Entry Mode for Text Box - Multiple Lines Custom Fields

New option for Text Box - Multiple Lines custom fields to function as a note entry log. This will allow you to easily create a field that can function as a log or communication message thread.

New Custom Field Type Special - In-Line Data Grid

New custom field type Special - In-Line Data Grid allows you to make a simple data sheet in-line on your screen. It's a simplified version of the Special - XML Data field that doesn't open up in a pop-up light box.

Enhanced Privacy and Security Policy with User Agreement

Enhanced the privacy and security policies with functionality for enforcing end user acknowledgement and agreement to the policies. This second phase of this feature now allows you to enforce and verify that users have acknowledged your terms of service and other such policies.

New Phone Number Formatting for Custom Fields

Enhanced the formatting options available to custom fields to now include formatting for phone numbers.

Enhanced IRS Integration Configuration on Signup Pages

Enhanced the IRS database integration within organization signup pages with the ability to exclude specific sub-categories of organizations from search results, as well as the ability to retrieve additional fields. You can now configure the IRS lookup to be even more granular than just the top level organization categories. New fields that you can pick up include Foundation Type, Foundation Code, Organization Type, Status, NTEE.

Enhanced Stripe Integration Configuration

Enhanced the integration with Stripe to make payments within SmartSimple. This second phase of development introduces Stripe integration into the UTA and made available through configuration to make payments through a Level 2 invoice that then generates a Level 3 receipt after payment.

Beta Previews

New Media Library Feature

New media library functionality to upload and render media in line. This feature will allow you to enhance file upload fields into rich media libraries that will automatically compress uploaded content and present a new interface for viewing the uploaded content inline in your browser. This option is available within the configuration of a Link - Multiple Files custom field to enable the media library interface.

New Data Categorization and Policies

New data categorization feature. This gives you the ability to create data categories and assign them to custom fields across your instance. This first phase will allow you to create security policies and attach them to data classes in order to control the visibility of field data across the entire instance. This makes it easy for you to apply data access policies at a global level, for example if you have data sensitivity classes that apply across entire field sets. These policies apply at the lowest level of security such that no matter where data is accessed from whether it's the object itself, a list view, or a report the visibility of data will be controlled according to each fields categorization and policy and the end user's access level. The idea is to apply this on top of the existing security permissions to help you confidently secure your data no matter how your system may get configured.

Notes for Admins

New Custom Field Dependency Indicator

New configuration feature that will allow an administrator to help determine which areas a custom field is being referenced. This can be used to determine the potential impact of any change to custom fields. When configuring a custom field you'll notice a new action button that allows you to determine other areas in the system that the field is referenced.

Enhanced List View Filters with Variable Processing

Enhanced the List View search and filters to allow for dynamic variable processing in the search filter. This allows you to create a single filter that will return different results for different end users depending on the users' attributes.

Enhanced Language Support for List Views

Enhanced List Views with ability to configure language settings. You may now translate your list view column headers with explicit translations rather than using the language library.

Enhanced Title Bar Custom Field with Fixed Column Widths

Enhanced the Title Bar custom field configured with multiple columns with the option to set fixed and equal column widths. Currently multiple column Title Bars will layout the column widths dynamically according to the content, but this new option will allow you to fix the column widths with equal spacing.

Updated Radio Button Custom Field with More Formatting Options

Updated the Select One - Combo Box custom field with more formatting options when the radio button option is enabled.

Updated XML Data Custom Field Can Now Limit Max Rows

Updated the XML Data custom field to allow you to set a maximum number of rows that a user can create within a dynamic section.

Updated Currency Formats for XML Data Custom Field

Updated the options for currency formatting within the Special - XML Data custom field to include more currency options.

Updated Variable Processor with Percent and Currency Formatting for XML Data

Updated the Variable Processor with the ability to display the different percent and currency formats of data within a Special - XML Data custom field. Since percent values can be stored as a decimal percent (e.g. 0.5) or as a whole number (e.g. 50) you can now display whichever format you wish with the Variable Processor with syntax such as ~percent(node.nodevalue)~ and ~percentdisplay(node.nodevalue)~. Different currency formats can also be displayed with syntax such as ~currency(node.nodevalue)~, and ~currency_eur(node.nodevalue)~.

Updated Variable Processor for Country Code Reference

Updated the Variable Processor to allow you to retrieve the 2 letter country code of a country. The Variable Processor syntax to reference this will be @countrycode@.

Updated Controls for Organization Contacts and Transactions Tabs

Updated the settings for organization standard fields to also include the contacts and transactions lists. This allows you more granular control over the visibility and permissions around those two tabs within an organization profile.

Updated System Calls for User-to-Company Associations

Updated the System Call module with new calls to be able to add/remove user-to-company associations.

Updated SmartConnect API with Notes Functions

Updated the SmartConnect API with functions to interact with notes.

Updated Transaction Attribution Window with Status Filter

Updated the Transaction Attribution Window with support for a parameter to filter the listed transactions by their status. The new parameter 'statuslimit' can now be used for the URL '/ucif/in/uc_attribute.jsp' to do this.

Previous Upgrades

See the Previous Upgrades page for a list of previously-implemented upgrade features.

Future Upgrades

Click here for a listing of future upgrade dates.