Alert: Appirio Cloud Storage Notification - 10/28/08

Our AppExchange package updates to address the issue between the recent Shockwave Flash v10.0 r12 upgrade and Salesforce's Winter '09 API are now available here:

• Appirio Cloud Storage v1.31
• Appirio Cloud Storage for Professional Edition v1.0.7

As with any new package, the upgrade is seamless-- you can update the package without having to redo any security settings, page layouts, custom object configurations, and without affecting any of your existing attachments. Please also note that this package update will work with any previous version of Flash, along with Flash 10 (unaffected users will not be adversely affected by this update).

The technical details on the issue are as follows: There is a problem with the Force.com toolkit when running in Flash 10 if the SWF file is not hosted on Salesforce. It's undetermined whether it's an Adobe issue or a Salesforce issue with the Force.com toolkit. To fix, we are now hosting the SWF file within Salesforce.

Please contact support@appirio.com if you have any questions.

Alert: Appirio Cloud Storage Notification - 10/24/08

Please note that there is a current issue with the recent Shockwave Flash v10.0 r12 upgrade (and its interaction with the Salesforce API) that has disabled the ability to upload documents within Appirio Cloud Storage.

We are working with high-priority on a package update to address this issue. The updated Appirio Cloud Storage package is slated for release today or early Monday. Any current Appirio Cloud Storage customers should expect a follow-up email with the new package details and updated information as soon as it's available.

Please contact support@appirio.com if you have any questions.

Appirio Cloud Storage 1.19: Featuring Local Backup, Data Loader, Storage Cleanup, and Easy Administration

We're pleased to announce the availability of the Appirio Cloud Storage release 1.19. This upgrade focuses on ease of setup and ongoing administration.

All customers are required to upgrade their existing Appirio Cloud Storage from AppExchange. The upgrade is seamless-- you can update the package without having to redo any security settings, page layouts, custom object configurations, and without affecting any of your existing attachments.

Here's some more information about the new package... more details can be found in our updated administrative guide:

• Data Loader: Appirio has launched a Cloud Storage data loader similar what Salesforce offers-- a client application that takes a .csv file as input, and will load local files into Appirio Cloud Storage as attachments.
  
• Storage Cleanup: The Storage Cleanup utility allows you to search the Cloud Storage repository for files that are no longer referenced by objects in your Salesforce org. Files can become unreferenced when a parent object is deleted which will in turn delete the attachment objects (but not the files) automatically. Unreferenced files will not cause any problems or impact performance but do count against your storage space. Therefore, you can run the utility periodically or as you reach your storage limit.
• Easy Administration: Redesigned the "About Appirio Cloud Storage" tab to include access to all ACS utilities-- migrate new attachments, create a local backup for existing attachments, or cleanup existing attachments all in one location.
  
• Contract Attachments: Added support for Contract attachments without the need to create a custom object.

Appirio Cloud Storage Local Backup Utility

Appirio already ensures the security of your attachmetns by offering the built-in redundency of Amazon S3 + an incremental backup we maintain on S3 in case of accidental user deletion.

Starting today, Appirio Cloud Storage now provides a backup utility to enable you to download your content to your own local storage if you so choose. The utility provides incremental backup so that you only need to download new content that has been added since your last download.

The utility is simple - it collects all of your files into 5 GB zip files for you to download. Each time you run the utility, it will start a new backup from the time of your last successful backup.

Note that the backup files remain in a special storage area and count against your storage total. You may delete the backup files from this storage area at any time.

For security, only a single authorized Salesforce.com user is allowed to perform the backups. By default, this is the user that performed the initial installation of Appirio Cloud Storage. If you need to change the authorized user, please contact Appirio Support.

Appirio Cloud Storage Update: Security, Encryption and Performance

We're pleased to announce a new version of Appirio Cloud Storage, featuring at-rest encryption of attachments, improved performance and reliability, and enhanced functionality, especially for Professional Edition customers.

All customers are required to upgrade their existing Appirio Cloud Storage from AppExchange. The upgrade is seamless-- you can update the package without having to redo any security settings, page layouts, custom object configurations, and without affecting any of your existing attachments.

New Features

• On disk encryption availability. AES 128-bit encryption for files stored on Amazon S3.
  
• Load balancing for increased performance and redunancy
• A new s-control named "Adjust Notes & Attachments List" that can be used to remove the "Attach File" button from the standard Notes & Attachments related list. This is useful if you still want to use standard Notes functionality. Simply add the s-control anywhere on the page layout, double click to edit it and set the height and width to 0 so it is invisible.
• Improved help instructions regarding custom object setup
• Now available for Professional Edition Customers, with improved help instructions
  

Issues Fixed

• Better error handling and clean up if an error occurs during upload
• Uploading while in console mode is fixed
• Removed Clone button from Case Attachment page layout
• Updated the View formula field to include the current version of the Salesforce server URL
  

Appirio Cloud Storage Update - Automatic Backup

We're pleased to announce a new version of Appirio Cloud Storage that features automatic backup of attachments and the resolution of several issues experienced by some customers. This is an automatic update - no AppExchange upgrade is required.

New Features:

• Automatic backup - we retain a backup of all files stored in Cloud Storage. We can restore files that you have deleted by contacting Appirio support. If you do not want your files backed up automatically for retention reasons, please contact Appirio support.
  

Issues Fixed:

• Microsoft excel files opened from IE now open properly
• A problem with incomplete downloading of large files (>15 MB) has been fixed
• Fixed a problem with opening migrated attachments that were given an incorrect mime type by Salesforce

Launching Appirio Cloud Storage

We're pleased to announce the launch of Appirio Cloud Storage. You can read the press release here, and our blog post on the implications of the product here. You can also get started by going to our product page, or our Appexchange listing to install a free trial.

This post will go into additional detail regarding the features and functionality features of the product, giving you a "behind-the-scenes" glimpse of what's behind Appirio Cloud Storage.

The value proposition of Appirio Cloud Storage is simple: we allow an organization to use salesforce.com as the central access point for all sales, marketing and support information

• Works exactly the same for the end user
• Work with files larger than the 5MB limit (up to 1GB)
• Virtually unlimited document storage at a fraction of the cost
• Easy for Admins - No administrative overhead

Appirio Cloud Storage is powered by Amazon S3-- this allows us to take advantage of the security and reliability of the same storage solution that power's Amazon's global infrastructure.

Here's how it works
Appirio Cloud Storage is designed to be easy for an admin to setup , and transparent for end-users-- they shouldn't need to know where their attachments are being stored... just that file size limitations are a thing of the past!

But here's what's going on behind the scenes:

When users add a file

• User selects one or more files to add
• Files are uploaded via a secure web service to Amazon S3
• Programmatic confirmation that the user submitting the files is who they say and the organization is licensed for the service
• File Object is created inside of salesforce.com that points to the newly created url on S3 (contains information on owner, file type, size, name and description – all searachable attributes from within salesforce)
  
  

When users retreive a file:

• A formula field creates a link that contains the file location and secure session ID
• When the user clicks on this link there is programmatic confirmation that the user requesting the files is who they say and the organization is licensed for the service
• File is downloaded and handled like any other (open in new window, save, etc.)