Progress report

Import Engine

The point of focus over the past week has been the user import engine. I have already posted, this is a complete re-write of the function and to say it was not easy is a massive understatement. The principle idea behind the new import wizard is to allow any CSV of any structure be imported. This means, it doesn't matter how many columns you import or which order they are in, they the required data is imported.

The interesting thing with the user import tool, is that it only needs four fields. First name, Last Name, Username and Password. Anything else is ignored. However, what this new engine allows you to do, is create the login name based on any other field. This means your login name can consist of the users year group, class, name and anything else you want to use. This makes a more dynamic and flexible importer than we previously had.

Help Window

At the same time, we have also been working hard on the help window. With the previous version of Manager, we had one treeview and one help panel. This meant there was a lot of wasted white space. The problem is that Manager is a naturally simple tool, so we were keen not to make it overly complicated for no reason. We therefore decided, we would include a welcome page which is actually live on the web. It means we can update it with information and this is available to you straight away.

The content is still being written, but it allows us to alert you to issues, or advise you of updates that may be available. It's a great communication tool.


Screenshot

I'm please to be able to finally give a sneak preview to the new look EISNet Manager application.

It's a pre-release version so things may change. You will also notice some icons are missing or simply don't look right. This is constantly being improved and the minor aspects of the interface change every day.

Click here it for a larger version

Do let us know what you think.