The August 2020 release was the biggest yet for ExtendSync. We’ve spent hundreds of hours listening to our customers, dissecting support conversations, and reviewing feature requests. We not only added new features; we improved existing features. Our team also completed the massive infrastructure updates that lay the groundwork for our next major update: Autopilot. 

Faster

Put simply, users do not want to wait for more than a second or so for an email to attach. In our previous approach, users would first send the request to NetSuite. Then they  would wait for NetSuite to provide a confirmation back to the CloudExtend app before they could move on with their work. With the August ExtendSync for Outlook release, we moved to a more modern asynchronous approach. This allows users to get back to work in just a second or so. 

More Record Types

We now support attaching to 20 different record types. With the ExtendSync for Outlook August release, users can attach to customer RMAs, vendor RMAs, customer deposits, and expense reports in addition to 16 other record types. 

Massive Improvements to File Attachments

We’ve eliminated many of the technical complexities and prerequisites that led to past issues. We also leveraged newer Microsoft APIs for further improvements. The previous 4MB size limit is now 10MB (the most allowed by NetSuite). For those who need to add even larger files, Enterprise users can include attachments up to 150MB in size using our SharePoint or OneDrive integration. 

We have also moved to storing files where you would expect, in the “Attachments Received” folder under the name of the user who attached them. This will eliminate many of the previous permission issues that drove us all a little crazy. 

Restrictions on the number of files that can be attached at once (no limit!) and restrictions on the length of the file name are also gone. 

UI Improvements

Many of you may not know exactly what changed, but the app will feel different and perform better. Here are just a few of the changes: 

• Records already attached to NetSuite now show at the top of the add-in. 
• The login flow now has context-sensitive help (such as how to find your NetSuite account number).
• Eliminating the lightning bolt that used to show a bundle connection. We now display an error icon at the top of the add-in if a user is not connected to the bundle freeing up valuable real estate.
  

Shared Mailbox Improvements

With this update, users can now attach files from shared mailboxes.  

We’ve also consolidated everything we’ve learned about working with shared mailboxes into one concise article. Did you know you should not manually add a shared mailbox to your Outlook profile? Instead, ask your Exchange Admin to add you. 

Outlook on the Web Users

A couple of years ago, it was hard to find Outlook on the web users. This segment is growing fast, and ExtendSync fully supports Outlook on the web. In prior versions, however, users were logged out of ExtendSync randomly during the day. This update solves that problem. 

Next Up

The ExtendSync Outlook August 2020 release included the back end and infrastructure updates required for Autopilot, which is the focus of our next release.  

Autopilot is an Enterprise Edition feature that will allow users to attach an email to the NetSuite record(s) and then have every back-and-forth reply in the entire thread attached to NetSuite automatically. We’ve been using a pre-release version internally and we’re loving it. End-users still maintain full control over which emails make it into NetSuite, but now have the luxury of having the entire thread added without taking up any of their time. 

We expect to make this available in the very near future (weeks, not months). If you’re an Enterprise Edition customer and you want to be the first to try Autopilot, send an email to [email protected].