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Fiche Tips: Increase Laserfiche Productivity in One Second Today, we want to show you how to increase productivity in one second! So, in the spirit of productivity, let's jump in! Today's topic is stars! No, not the kind in the sky. Little shimmers of glimmering efficiency right in Laserfiche. Did you know that you can add a star if you right-click on an entry? Well, you can! When you add a star, that entry shoots straight to the top. So, whether you frequently reference a folder, document, or collection for some special project. This will save you clicks and keystrokes. Have a great day, and we'll see you next time! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

Laserfiche Watermarks & Embedded Annotations Explained By Kyle Knebel February 2025 Consultants Corner For Laserfiche users that download, email, or print documents to send outside their organization, watermarks or embedded annotations on those documents can help provide a bit more “security.” Watermarks can be added when downloading or printing a document from the Laserfiche Web Client, Laserfiche Cloud, or Laserfiche Windows Client. If printing with Laserfiche Snapshot, embedded annotations on image files can accomplish the same idea as watermarking, but in a more permanent fashion. This month we’ll look at the customizable settings available for watermarking or embedding annotations. Watermark Watermarks can be assigned using three methods in Laserfiche “Optional watermarks”, “Group watermarks” or “Tag watermarks.” Optional Watermarks: Optional watermarks are configured individually by each user and apply only to that user. You can create and store multiple optional watermark configurations to be used at any time; however, Laserfiche will include only the currently selected watermark during export. You cannot place more than one optional watermark on an image. Optional watermarks can be configured for export, printing, or both. (In the Laserfiche web client, since printing is handled by first exporting the document and then printing the exported files, both types of watermarks are configured for exporting.) Windows Client: In the Windows Client you can set the optional watermark text that will be applied to all the downloaded pages. These are per-user settings and don’t impact other users. You can pre-set the value from the Tools>Options choice on the Laserfiche file menu. Or you can set it from the “Options” button on the image download dialog box. Scenario 1: From the File>Options menu. Use this method to preset all future watermark options Scenario 2: Downloading an image file using the File>Download>Images In either case, the Watermark properties can be set for this and future downloads, if so desired. Watermarks are only applied to exported or printed image pages, not electronic documents like MS Word files or text files. The created watermarks are saved for the user that created them, so they remain personal watermarks, not visible to any other user. In the example below, we’ve added the word Confidential along with the token for the name of the person logged into the client.  Even though the token is not selectable onscreen, you can enter it manually. The “%(username)” token will be replaced by the name of the user. Text, as well as standard Laserfiche tokens, can be used in the Watermark text box. Here are a few example tokens: %(username) %(Date) %(Time) %(DateTime) To set this same watermark to all future image file downloads, check the “Apply when downloading (and no other watermarks are present)” box. Below is an example of the watermark that results from the settings. Laserfiche Cloud or Web Client: In the Web Client (for On-Premise systems or Laserfiche Cloud) you can set up the watermark text that could be applied to all the downloaded pages. You can pre-set the values from the Options choice on the User’s Account properties. To create any watermarks in the web client, click on “Download” in the Options menu. Scroll down to “Optional Watermarks” and click the “Add” link.  The created watermarks are saved for the user that created them, so they remain personal watermarks, not visible to any other user. Below is a list of some sample watermarks available to this example user. In the example below, we’ve added the word Confidential along with the token for the name of the person logged into the client.  Even though the tokens are not selectable onscreen, you can enter it manually. The “%(username)” token will be replaced by the name of the user. Text, as well as standard Laserfiche tokens, can be used in the Watermark text box. Here are a few example tokens: %(username) – This is the logged in user’s name. %(Date) %(Time) %(DateTime) %(id) – this is the Laserfiche EntryID of the file When downloading a document, you can choose to apply an existing watermark from the Download dialog box. Choose any existing watermark from the “Optional Watermarks” list. Group Watermarks: For those Laserfiche systems licensed with Laserfiche Audit Trail,” Group Watermarks” are available. Here’s the rule regarding Group Watermarks: If watermarks have been assigned to a group to which a user belongs, the watermarks will be present on the image when that user prints or exports a document. No exceptions. A Watermark is applied automatically. Here’s how to set up the watermark definitions. We’ll show you how to do this on both the Windows Administration console and the Web Management console. You’ll need to have the “Manage Repository Configuration” privilege, at minimum, to accomplish this. Windows Administration Console Navigate to the Group in which you want to assign watermarks. Click the Watermarks tab, then enter the watermark text, including any tokens, and then press Add. To configure the defaults that Laserfiche uses to apply the watermarks to any exported documents by a group member, navigate to the “Repository Options” node and select “Group Watermark”, as shown in the image below. Double click on any of the properties seen on the right side of the screen, which will then pop open to display the options seen below.  Configure the layout as you desire. There are two tabs, one for the Location and the other for Headers/Footers. Watermark Headers and Footers can be used to show different text than the watermark text. This text will display when the user opens an image document in the Laserfiche document viewer. Web Management screen: In your web browser, navigate from the top-right corner under your user account that has Administrator privileges and choose “Management” (“Administration” if using version 12 web client).  As mentioned earlier, you’ll need to have the “Manage Repository Configuration” privilege, at minimum, to accomplish this. Then select “General” on the left side, then click on the “Group Watermarks” tab as shown below. Next, you’ll want to configure any Groups with the Watermark text you would like to appear on exported or printed documents. Tag Watermarks: Web Management screen Tag watermarks in Laserfiche are watermarks that are automatically associated with specific tags configured by an administrator. When a tag with a configured watermark is applied to a document, the watermark will automatically be included as a document is exported. If a document has multiple tag watermarks all of them will be included during export. As an Administrator, navigate to the Tags tab under the Metadata node. Open or add a tag, then use the “Watermark” tab to apply the text of the watermark. Below is an example of watermark text being added to the “Info Tag” properties. Windows Administration Console screen Here’s an example of the Tag Watermark properties in the Windows Administration console shown below. Navigate to the tag, then select the Watermark tab to set the text to be used. Embedded Annotations: Embedded Annotations can be generated on Imaged documents as they are being stored to Laserfiche. This will typically only be accomplished using the Laserfiche Snapshot printer, which is only available when the Laserfiche Windows Client is installed.  The Snapshot printer creates TIFF image file documents in a Laserfiche repository. Laserfiche Snaptshot Configuration Each user can configure the Snapshot printer to embed annotations.  In Windows, launch the Snapshot Configuration (Current User) application. Then click on the “Preferences” button to open the Printing Preferences dialog box. Finally, click the Embed Annotation tab. Annotation settings can be easily customized for each page. There is a preview box to show the image and text that will result from your settings. Click OK to save the settings. Note: You can also set watermarks in your Snapshot printing preferences, however, these can only be images, not text. The image would become an overlay on the page. You can only use .JPG, .TIFF or .BMP formatted images. This concludes this month’s review of Watermarks and Embedded Annotations available in Laserfiche. We hope you found it informative and useful! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel April 2025 Consultants Corner Laserfiche Administrators will love this month’s blog post. We’re going to dive into a couple of settings that you will find very useful. Let’s take a look! Redaction Reasons Exporting documents out of a Laserfiche repository is easy.  However, sometimes, those documents contain sensitive information that you may want to obscure or hide by using redactions. Laserfiche image documents can be redacted using the built-in document editing in the Laserfiche Desktop client or Web client. Note : Document editing within the Laserfiche document viewer is not available for electronic documents like PDF’s and MS Office documents, which need to be edited or redacted using their own editing tools outside of Laserfiche. In addition, Laserfiche administrators can add redaction reasons to the system for end users to select when applying a redaction. Here’s how to setup Redaction Reasons. In the Laserfiche Management console, navigate to the “Redaction Reason” tab under the General section to create a list of reasons.  We’ve created a few examples here, but you can create your own. Once created, they will be available in the Laserfiche client application when using the redaction tool. Once the redaction is applied, a window immediately pops up with the Reason dialog box. Choose the reason, if needed. If you double click on the applied redaction in the Client, it will show the Reason value in the Metadata tab, as seen below. In the Desktop client, you can right-click and choose properties, as well as double clicking on the redaction. Password Policy Another bonus setting is the Repository Password Policy. This is found in either the Windows Administration Console or the Web Management page, depending on your preference. For repository only users, not  LFDS or Windows users, you could enable a password policy.  This allows you to enforce periodic password changes, password complexity levels or a password history rule. Work carefully here, though, since requiring a repository user to change passwords on a periodic basis will affect all of them. For example, the “Admin” user and possibly other “service” accounts you have in place, like a workflow trustee, will need to have the password changed.  And for the Workflow service trustee, it can stop workflows from running if you update the password, requiring editing of all workflows that use the account. Below is a screenshot of the dialog box in the Windows Administration console. The safest use of these settings would be to enforce Password history and complexity, but to leave the enforcement of periodic password changes off. This would be due to the possible issue, as already mentioned, of stopping your workflows because they are possibly using a repository only account. If you have a corporate policy on security, the complexity levels allow for preset options, or you can customize the password requirements as needed.  These same settings are available on the Web Management page. Navigate to the Users section, then click on the “key” icon for Password Policy settings at the top right of the page. Bonus> Bonus: Did you know that a repository only user can manually change their own password? They can open the Options  dialog box under Tools>Options  from the file menu, then navigate to the “Password” section to change their current password. In the Web client, choose the Options selection under your login name at the top right corner. And there are this month’s Bonus settings you may have missed in Laserfiche repository administration. Have a great month! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel March 2025 Consultants Corner What's the reason to use Laserfiche Users, Windows Accounts and LDAP Accounts? When it comes to signing into a Laserfiche repository, a user can be authenticated using three methods. For this article, “Authentication” is the process of verifying your login credentials when connecting to a Laserfiche repository or Laserfiche Web Application like Laserfiche Forms. Our user account is configured to use a particular method of authentication. The three types of authentication we typically see are: Laserfiche User (password) authentication Windows authentication LDAP authentication  And out of those, we rarely see LDAP authentication, which supports other “Lightweight Directory Access Protocol” systems that implement the X.500 telecommunications standard. Because LDAP protocols have not been widely adopted by the industry, one rarely sees LDAP implementations outside the network “firewall.” This just means that we mainly see Windows Active Directory (AD) authentication (along with Single Sign-On) or Laserfiche Password authentication in most scenarios. If your organization uses Microsoft Active Directory, then Laserfiche Windows Users are preferred, as it enhances security and makes administration easier. Many years ago, prior to the existence of Laserfiche Directory Server (LFDS), formerly known as “License Manager”, users were created for each unique repository. And these users would authenticate directly to the repository.  You could create Laserfiche Repository Users or map a Windows account to have access to and authenticate to the repository. These users were also connected to Forms, for authentication purposes, but had to exist as users in the specified repository. Laserfiche Forms then was configured to authenticate users in a specified repository. With the advent of several new products and newer licensing models, it became clear that a single, over-arching authentication system was needed. LFDS now provides user authentication across many Laserfiche applications. Here is a summary of the key differences between the two common user types, “Laserfiche only user” and “Windows Active Directory user”. For user authentication to a Laserfiche repository, you could accomplish this in two places.  They could be set up in the Laserfiche Administration Console, or they could be set up in LFDS. The advantage of using LFDS is that the user now could be given access to more than one repository and even access to other Laserfiche applications like Laserfiche Forms. For example, in LFDS we can create a Laserfiche User or a Windows Active Directory user.  For Windows users, LFDS can even synchronize with Active Directory to obtain new users when they are added to monitored AD Groups, although we will not cover this in this post. Note : LFDS also supports Single-Sign-on (SSO) with SAML authentication, which is not covered in this blog post. Let’s look at a few different methods to set up user authentication in Laserfiche. Adding a Windows User in LFDS Navigate to the Accounts tab, then add a user. A) Here we’ll begin by adding a Windows account, having chosen the “Windows Active Directory User” option as pictured above. B) Search for Users or Groups in your Active Directory domain. If you search for an AD Group, you can add all those members, then selectively remove some of the members, if you won’t need all of them accessing Laserfiche, prior to finishing the process. C) For Users or Groups, click on a single entry in the Search results pane to add it to the list of added users. Or search for all the required users and groups, and then press Add All. This will add that user or set of users to the Added Users list. D) Press OK at the bottom when ready to add them to LFDS. E) Note : Registering a user in Directory Server does not automatically add that account to your Laserfiche repository. If a Windows Active Directory user has been registered in a Directory Server licensing site (LFDS), but has not been granted access to the repository, they will not be able to sign in. You will also need to grant the user access to your Laserfiche repository(s) in each LF Admin Console to which the user will have access. Adding a Windows User in the Laserfiche Administration Console or Web Management Console A Windows User can be added to a single repository, regardless of whether they were added in LFDS, or not. However, if they WERE added in LFDS, and you DO want them to be able to authenticate in a repository, add them as a Windows Account using either the Windows Admin Console or Web Management Console. In the Laserfiche Windows Administration Console , navigate to the “Users and Groups” node, then right-click on the “Windows Accounts” node to create a new Windows Account  user. Set the username, password and license type, then assign Feature Rights to the account in the “Rights” tab. End users will not need any “Assigned Privileges”, since these are advanced management capabilities best reserved for Laserfiche administrators. Or, in the Web Management Console  navigate to the Users tab and on the top-right corner press the “Add user” icon (plus symbol) to create a new Windows user. In the pop-up dialog box, press the search magnifying glass icon to bring up the Windows Trustee search dialog box. Here you can scroll or search for the Windows Active Directory account you are looking to find. Once added, now select the User from the list. Then, on the right-side panel, set the General and Rights properties as desired. Configuring a Laserfiche User in LFDS In LFDS, a Laserfiche user can be created and assigned a username, password and license type. This user is a global Laserfiche user, meaning they can be set up to authenticate in multiple repositories and other Laserfiche applications like Forms. Once you’ve created the Laserfiche user in LFDS, set their License type and add them to any LFDS groups needed for application access and security. For example, if you need to add this new Laserfiche LFDS user to a repository, you can add them as a “Laserfiche Directory Account” using the Laserfiche Windows Administration Console or Web Management Console. Configuring a Laserfiche LFDS User in the Laserfiche Administration Console or Web Management Console In the Windows Admin Console, you can add the LFDS Laserfiche User   in the following manner In the first box, click the ellipsis button then query for the username you are adding. Set their Authentication to “Trust”, then assign Rights as desired in the Rights tab. In the Web Management Console, use the + symbol at the top-right corner and choose to add a “Laserfiche” user. Press the magnifying glass icon to search for the LFDS account you want to add. You should find a list of one or more LFDS Laserfiche users available to choose from. Once added, select the User from the list. Then, on the right-side panel, set the General and Rights properties as desired. Configuring a non- LFDS Laserfiche User in the Laserfiche Administration Console or Web Management Console If you’re not using Laserfiche Directory Server (LFDS), but need to add non-windows users to a repository, follow the instructions below. In the Laserfiche Windows Administration Console, navigate to the “Users and Groups” node, then right-click on the “Repository Users” node to create a New User… Set the username, password and license type, then assign Feature Rights to the account in the “Rights” tab. End users will not need any “Assigned Privileges” since these are advanced management capabilities best reserved for Laserfiche administrators. Or, in the Web Management Console navigate to the Users tab and on the top-right corner press the “Add user” icon to create a new Repository  user. Assign the username and all relevant properties, including Password settings.  Do not assign a user without  a password (unless the “User must change password at next sign-in” option is checked). Once you have entered the basic user information, click OK, then select the new account to view its properties and modify the General and Rights settings in their respective tabs. As we have seen, there are several methods available to set up User Authentication in Laserfiche. We hope you found it informative and useful! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel January 2025 Consultants Corner Customizing your scanned document’s name and metadata For Laserfiche users that scan documents to the repository, you can automate the naming, metadata, and filing folder path using tokens! This month we’ll look at the customizable settings available in the Scan module. We’ll look at both Basic and Standard scanning modules. Both are available whether you use the Windows Client or Web Client. Note : If you are using the Web Client or Laserfiche Cloud, you’ll need to download and install the Laserfiche Scanning module first, before using it. Basic scanning: Tokens and Naming The default document name can be modified to use built-in Laserfiche tokens, like today’s date  or the user’s login name . As you can see in the screenshot below, the token selector has been pressed next to the document name field, and it is displaying the available standard tokens. If you choose to assign a Template to documents, the “Fields” selector now becomes part of the listed tokens, as shown in the following screenshot. (In the example below, the General template was chosen, and its fields are listed.) A document name can be created using both static text and tokens to create a useful name with consistent and automated values. The entered values with replace the tokens when the document is stored in the repository. Note : You still must manually enter the field values on the template.  These values can be applied to the default (tan) template properties, or to the just scanned document’s (blue) template properties. Standard Scanning: Tokens, Naming, and Folder Path: Just like in the example above, document names can be modified to use the built in Laserfiche tokens, like today’s date  or the user’s login name or others. In addition, you can set a dynamic folder path for document storage using tokens. Just navigate to the Settings tab in the default properties (tan) box. As you can see in the screenshot below, the token selector has been pressed next to the folder Path field (Settings tab), where it displays the available standard tokens and it displays the Fields token with the assigned template’s fields. The Count Token: The “Count” token is a sequential number from the scanning session that can be used in document naming for contracts, for example, or in fields. The previous starting count will be remembered the next time you launch the scanning session. The count token is available for document naming, Fields and folder paths. Note : Only available in Standard scanning mode, The count value can be manually reset. 1) The top toolbar 2) Under the File>Options>General area. There are two count tokens. 1) A Repository Count is incremented every time an entry is imported or created into a Laserfiche Server. This is the number you see when you look at the Entry ID number. Its token is %(GCount ) but is not in the drop-down list of tokens. 2) A Session Count is the scanning count for the current scan session.  It usually resets to 1, but you can manually change the beginning number to anything you prefer. If you close and re-launch Standard Scanning, the number will reset back to the initial value configured.   All the available scanning tokens are available online on the Laserfiche support site.  Here’s the link if you are interested. https://doc.laserfiche.com/laserfiche.documentation/11/userguide/en-us/Default.htm#../Subsystems/client_wa/Content/Scanning/Tokens.htm This concludes this month’s review of the Tokens available in Laserfiche Scanning. We hope you found it informative and useful! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel December 2024 Consultants Corner A look at how to compare documents in the Laserfiche Web Client or Desktop Client When it comes to versions of MS Word documents in Laserfiche, the Laserfiche client provides the ability to compare a document’s versions. It’s a feature that is found in the metadata view of the document. Please note, it is limited to the document’s versions and would not be able to compare against another separate document, unless it is uploaded and attached to the document. To take advantage of this comparison feature, the document needs to be placed under version control.  This can be done with both Image documents and Electronic (ie. MS Word) documents. To set version control on a document: In the Windows client highlight the document, then right-click on it and on the pop-up, choose “Version Tracking > Start Tracking Versions” In the Web Client select the document, then on the Details pane click the “Start tracking versions” link. Here’s the steps to compare versions in the Windows client   1.) Select a document, then open the  Version History  dialog box in one of the following ways: Open the Metadata dialog box or Metadata Pane for any document. Select the  Versions  tab. Open the  Tasks  menu and point to  Version Tracking , then select  Version History . 2.) The version history tab will open. Select one of the versions you want to compare, then hold down CTRL and select the other version you want to compare. If you select only one version, it will be compared to the version immediately prior to it. (For instance, if you select Version 2, the dialog box will compare Version 1 and 2.) 3.) Right-click and select  Compare Changes... , or click the  Compare Changes  button. This will open the  Compare Versions  dialog box. 4.) Review the version comparison: For Electronic documents:  If the electronic file portion of the document was modified between these two versions, the electronic document will be listed as  Changed . If it was not, or if there is not electronic file portion to this document, it will say  No change . For Pages:  If pages were added or removed between the two versions, the pages will be listed as  Changed . Click the  +  (expand) to display the number of pages added and/or removed. For Text:  If text was modified on text pages on the two versions, the text will be listed as  Changed .  Click the  +  (expand) button to display the pages on which text was changed. Annotations:  If annotations were added, deleted, or modified, the annotations will be listed as  Changed . Click the  +  (expand) button to display the changes. Changes will be listed separately for annotations added, removed or modified.  Click the  +  (expand) button for each type to see which pages contain annotations that were added, removed or modified. Fields and Templates:  If the fields and templates were modified, fields and templates will be listed as  Changed . Click the  +  (expand) button to display whether fields and templates were added, removed, and/or modified. If one of the changed elements of the version is a Microsoft Word electronic document, the  Changed  option for the  Electronic Document  component will be a clickable link.  Click the link to open the document. The document will open with changes tracked, allowing you to review the changes made to the document between the two versions. When you click on the “Changed” hyperlink, the document will open in MS Word and show edits, including deletions, as blue lines (even if you have MS Word “Redlining” turned on (Tracking changes for Everyone and showing All Markup). Web Client Differences To compare versions in the web client   1.) Select only two versions you want to compare in the  version history . 2.) Click the  More  button and select  Compare versions  to view a summary of the differences between the two versions. When comparing changed electronic files like MS Word docs, you’ll see the “Compare Changes” button when using the “Compare Versions” choice. The displayed MS Word comparison document looks the same as when launched from the Windows Client: This concludes our review of the built-in document comparison features!  Happy Holidays! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel December 2024 Consultants Corner A Look at Three Awesome Workflows for Which You May Give Thanks This November! Laserfiche’s built-in Workflow engine allows administrators to build automation into their Laserfiche environments. In this month’s article, we are going to review three workflow ideas that we think deserve some thanks for making our lives easier. Hopefully, you’ll learn something new as well! Let’s look at the details of each of these workflows, and we’ll discuss some best practices for each, as well. 1) Auto-filing workflows One of the most common workflows used for managing documents in a Laserfiche repository are the filing and naming workflows.  In this example, we keep it simple.  But in that simplicity lies great power. By automating the movement of a document to the correct location every time and then renaming the document saves users significant time and effort. With just three simple steps a document would be quickly filed and named, all happening in under one second! In the image below, we can see there are three simple activities running.  Usually the activities run against the “starting entry”, in other words on the entry that triggered the start rule for the workflow. Using the information on the document, like field information, can help with automatic filing and renaming. 2) Workflows that Start a Form submission automatically Here’s an activity in Laserfiche Workflow that can start a Forms business process and feed the fields on the starting form with information. It’s called “Invoke Business Process”. This workflow activity can be pointed to a Starting form in a Forms Business Process and insert data into the available form fields. The workflow submits the form as part of the action, such that the form proceeds to the next step in the business process. In other words, it will behave as if someone filled out and submitted the form. Except Workflow did it, not a person! You’ll need to define the fields (aka Variables) that you will be filling out on the form. You might not use all of them, so pick what you need. Once you have selected the Fields, you’ll need to set the values on those fields.  This is done in the “Starting Variable Values” box. Add the selected variables and enter static text or tokens after the equal sign. The fields can be listed vertically as seen in the image below. On the Date variable, we’ve set a token for today’s date. On the Employee Name variable, we’ve set a static text for the name. 3) Workflows that Set Security on Folders Did you know the Laserfiche Workflow includes the ability to set security on entries in the repository?  This capability allows you to assign groups (and users) access rights to folders or documents.  Of course, Best Practices tells us to assign groups  access rights to folders , right?! As you can see in the image below, the “Assign Rights” activity has been added to the workflow canvas, although it’s been renamed slightly. For example, we would like to have the workflow find a folder (using the “Find Entry” activity), then give the “Demo Group” specified Rights, Inheritance and Scope on that folder. The Assign Rights activity allows you to set the Trustee (a trustee is just a Group or User) who will be assigned access to the associated entry.  The entry could be a starting entry or, in this case, the entry from the Find Entry activity before it. Also, Inheritance and Scope can also be set. Be aware that each activity can only set one Trustee’s access, so you may need to use multiple Assign Rights activities to accomplish your needs. For example, if you need to assign access to the folder for two groups, you’d have two  Assign Rights activities, respectively, in the workflow. After adding the activity to the canvas, go to the Rights Options section on the right-side properties box and click on the “No Trustee has been set” link. A pop-up dialog box appears when you click on the required trustee setting option, as seen in the image below. In the image below, we can see the Trustee, Rights, Inheritance and Scope properties being applied to the selected trustee, in this example to the “Demo Group” group. Once all the appropriate Rights Options properties are selected, click OK. Now you can Assign the rights to the Starting Entry or to a selected “Other Entry”, in this example to the Output Entry of the “Find Entry” activity in the previous step.  This concludes our review of the three workflows that we are most thankful for this November!  Happy Holidays! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel October 2024 Consultants Corner Is there a ghost in the machine? Are you seeing apparitions in your applications? Do ghouls haunt your processes? Do your workflows harbor dark mysteries? In this month’s article, we will learn to purge those possessed programs of their ghastly ghoulishness! Let’s look at some problem areas where we might see a frightful poltergeist or two. And we’ll learn how to nix these naughty nightmares, too! Suspenseful Forms When it comes to Laserfiche Forms Business Processes, you may come across a “suspenseful” suspended task or two. Many times, a process will get stuck at a task in the process flow. Normally these issues appear in an activity other than a user task, like a task that calls a Workflow or a Save to Repository task that needs to connect to the repository. Where do you find these suspicious process items? You’ll find them in the Monitor tab on the Forms website. If you don’t see it, you’ll need the “System Administrator” role assigned to your account. In the Monitor screen, you can filter events on the left frame, choosing Suspended or Terminated status or other status. With a process filtered and selected, you’ll be able to see which submissions are having issues. Right-click on the submission and choose “View error log” to see if the message guides you to a solution. In some cases, the error message won’t outright tell you what the real problem is, but you can usually sleuth your way to a solution. In some cases, you may have built a process that calls for a workflow to run, and the process doesn’t wait to hear back from the Workflow. What if your workflow feeds information back to the form for the next user to review, yet that information is not there for the user to see? In this case, the best practice is to set the workflow task to “Wait for the workflow to finish before proceeding.” With this setting, you can get the Forms process to suspend, giving you a way to catch the problem. Once workflow is fixed, you can retry the process in Forms. Application Apparitions When it comes to apparitions in your applications, Laserfiche Workflow can be a terrific hiding place for dark mysteries that terrorize your normal operations. Terminations, Errors and Warnings can wreck your peaceful workflows like a demonic character from your favorite scary movie. What if the workflow doesn’t start at all? It can seem like a walk through a haunted maze! For workflows that don’t start, you can use the Monitoring tool in the Workflow Administration Console. You can find the entry’s event type, like Entry Created, and when highlighted, the Starting rule Evaluation results can be viewed. This helps to show why the workflow did or did not start. For Workflows that run but have errors, you can use the Workflow Designer’s search functions to look for instances that need review. Enable the Workflow Search panels from the “View” option on the Menu bar. The “Common Searches” panel gives you pre-built options and will show any matching results. These are great to use when you want to look at the overall health of workflows that are running, but they aren’t very specific. Once you see an instance of workflow running on an entry, opening up the instance will show more information about what may have occurred as workflow tried to act on the selected entry. The “Search” panel is where you can run very specific searches on workflows using multiple criteria. It’s really an “Advanced” search for workflow instances. Using the Workflow Status and Entry ID is a great way to find out exactly what happened to a document or folder in the repository. Lurking Locked Entries Lurking in your Laserfiche repository could be a locked  document or folder. Usually these are documents being edited by a user, so they will normally release the lock when the user is done editing the document. But what if there is a folder that has a lock, and nobody can get into that folder to browse the files? To release locked entries, we use the Laserfiche Administration Console utility. In the “Activity” node, there is the Locked Entries node from which we can right click on the entry to “release lock.” Possessed Agents Laserfiche’s Import Agent utility, if you have it, could seem to behave like it’s possessed. The good news is that files that fail to import are not  from gremlins or ghosts in the machine!   If files fail to import, they are normally found in the “IAError” subfolder of the monitored folder. To import the file again, just move the file back up into the folder above (the Monitored folder).  If the issue has been resolved, moving the file back to the monitored folder will result in the file being imported normally.  Error messages are found in the MS Windows Event Viewer application in the Laserfiche node under “Applications and Services Logs.” This concludes our review of some of the possible hauntings that can be found this Halloween season in Laserfiche applications and how to knock those nightmares back to where they came from. We hope you find this post informative, useful, and not too scary!  Happy Halloween! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel September 2024 Consultants Corner In this month’s article we will examine the way to add Holidays to the Work Schedules used by Workflows. When you build a workflow in Cloud, you may have a need to put a Delay, Escalation or Deadline in the flow of the process. When doing so, it’s easy to skip weekends and holidays.  But what Holidays does it skip? Let’s take a look at how you can define your organization’s Holidays. Before you build your workflows, you’ll want to navigate to the “Process Automation” area of Laserfiche Cloud, and then click on the “Settings” button at the bottom right of the screen. This is where you’ll configure the Holidays. Select “Holidays” from the list.  If any have already been added, you’ll see them listed on the right.  If no Holidays are listed, click the “Import” button.  Check all the Holidays that you want to import, or click the check box next to Name to select all at once. Press the Import button at the bottom. To add a new Holiday that is not in the Import list, press the green “New” button and then enter the properties for the Holiday you are adding. Some holidays have weekend exceptions where the holiday is observed on the Friday before or the Monday after if the hoiday occurs on a weekend. If that is the case, use the “Exceptions” option at the bottom of the dialog box. Once you have created and imported your Holidays, the list will be shown on screen. Now, once you begin building your Workflows, the following three activities can now use the holiday schedule: Delay , Escalation  and Deadline .  Just check the “Exclude weekends and holidays” check box on the activity. This will cause the activity to not count that day in its calculations. Delay: Escalation: Deadline: This concludes our review of the holiday schedule available in Laserfiche Cloud. We hope you found this post informative and useful! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel August 2024 Consultants Corner In this month’s article we will examine the great learning and training resources available to Laserfiche users. We’ll take a tour of the Aspire training center and show you how to register and sign up for classes, or even get certified as a Laserfiche expert. Let’s take a look! If you navigate to https://support.laserfiche.com/  you can access Laserfiche Aspire content. Aspire is Laserfiche’s education, training and certification portal.   If you don’t have a Support Site account, you can sign up for free. Click the “register New Account” link at the bottom of the Sign In page. You’ll just need your Laserfiche serial number and Company Name as assigned with the serial number.  Then just enter your work email address and other required information. Once verified, you’ll have immediate access to the Laserfiche Support Site and Aspire training links. The main Aspire Welcome page provides links and navigation options.  Click on the “Learning” tab, then choose “Learning Search”.  This area provides some great options, like a search feature and filters. For example, if you were interested in getting a Laserfiche Gold Cloud certification, type the word “gold” or “certification” in the Learning Search box and you’ll get a list of curricula, classes or videos related to the keyword. Searching by Filters is super simple and an easy way to find content. I use the Type and Subject filters, since these provide more effective results. You can even combine the checked items to get a custom results list. For example, if you were looking for Free Online Classes, you could select “Online Class” in the type section, and “Free” in the Subject section. Here’s the results list of online classes using the filter.  Selecting one opens the details about that item. The details about the selected topic are displayed and you can then press the “Launch” button to view the content. Another example, as shown in the next image, is the list of certification tests. If you use the “Cost-Associated” Subject filter, you’ll see all the certifications currently available. Take these classes to become a recognized and Certified expert in Laserfiche software! Finally, here’s an example of Empower 2024 content currently available online, for those who couldn’t attend in person this year.  As you can see, Laserfiche has Empower content from previous years, as well. This concludes our review of the learning resources available from Laserfiche. We hope you found this post informative and useful! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

By Kyle Knebel July 2024 Consultants Corner The Laserfiche API is a set of “RESTful Web APIs” that allow for interaction with the Laserfiche repository and can even interact with LF Cloud Lookup tables. It works in both Cloud and Self-hosted environments. For Self-hosted environments, the API is part of the Server licensing, and for Laserfiche Cloud the API is part of your subscription. With custom integrations using the API, you can extend the Laserfiche platform into other areas of your business with ease. The Laserfiche API lends itself to building “Image Enablement” solutions like viewing or adding documents to the repository or viewing or modifying metadata on entries. In this month’s article we will examine how to download, license and start using the API.  We won’t be teaching coding skills, just getting you to the point to begin your coding adventure. Let’s take a look! For Self-Hosted environments, download and install the Laserfiche API server. Note: If you only have a Cloud subscription this step is not necessary. On Laserfiche’s Developer website you’ll find links and instructions to download, install and configure the API server. The links are here: https://developer.laserfiche.com/docs/api/server/ After extracting the installer files, run “Autorun.exe” to find the Documentation and installation menu. The current version of the API is 1.1 (July 2024). The locally installed Laserfiche API Server includes a Swagger Playground site for testing the various API calls available. To begin, you’ll need to obtain an access token. Expand the Token section, and then press” the “Try it out" button on the right side. Enter the parameters, which include a repository ID (name of your repository), login name and password. Finally, press the blue “Execute” button, which (if successful) will return the access token in the response body. A successful response looks like this: Copy this token, scroll to the top of the page, click the Authorize button, and paste into the Bearer field: You can now test API calls, authenticated to your self-hosted repository. For LF Cloud solutions, there is no installation needed. However, you will need an application to be registered in the Cloud Developer console. There are three options: Service App: runs as a service principal Web App: prompts for user credentials Single page app: a web application that runs entirely in a web browser Please review the documentation carefully (https://developer.laserfiche.com/docs/api/authentication/) and consider the best approach for your intended use and capabilities. Your own LF Cloud account needs the Developer Privilege to build apps in the Developer console. Log in with your Cloud account and navigate to the Laserfiche Developer Console in LF Cloud. On the top left, select Applications, then press the green New button at the top right side of the screen. Select the type of application you are going to build. Service apps need a “Service Principal Account”, which takes the place of user credentials. The other two app types will collect the user’s credentials when they run. To create a Service Principal, if building a service-based app, navigate to the Accounts section of the Admin section. Select “Add Service Principal”, give it a Username, then under Access rights Allow Access to the Repository. Next, go to the Developer Console, and in the Applications area, press the green New button at the top right to begin creating your new application. Select the app type. In this example we would choose “Service”, and then down in the Name box we would enter the name of the new application. Finally, press the green “Create application” button. The next screen is App Configuration page where you will define the App’s name and set the Service Account you just created in the previous steps and set the Authentication properties. In the Authentication tab, you’ll set two properties. The Access Key and the OAuth 2.0 properties. A single key should be necessary. Create the key here. For a Service-based app that doesn’t prompt for end-user credentials, it’s typical to select the first Access Key option. Make sure the OAuth 2.0 Scopes are set appropriately for the application you will be coding and update the scopes with the green “Update scopes” button at the bottom of the screen. Since the Authorization approach will vary depending on which application type you’ve chosen in Laserfiche Cloud, we recommend reviewing the documentation (https://developer.laserfiche.com/docs/api/authentication/) to familiarize yourself with the procedure for acquiring an access token. So now, whether you are using a local API Server or using the LF Cloud API, you will be ready to build custom integrations with Laserfiche. We recommend using the Swagger site to explore and test the various API calls available, and consider using client libraries (which can be found here: https://developer.laserfiche.com/docs/api/libraries/) to aid in development. More information can be found on the Laserfiche Developer website here: https://developer.laserfiche.com/ Also, CDI recently posted an excellent tutorial video and tour of the Laserfiche API on our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3z9fFr0iUNs\ This concludes this month’s review of where to begin configuring the Laserfiche AI for use when building custom integrations.  We hope you found this post informative and useful! CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok

Fiche Tips: How to Create and Save a Custom Quick Search (Laserfiche Cloud) In this Fiche Tip you will learn how to create and save a custom quick search in Laserfiche Cloud. Let's take a look! First, navigate to your repository if you haven't done so already and in the quick search area go ahead and type in a search and run that quick search. In order to create the custom quick search you can either click the ad filter link or in the more actions button click on the view search syntax. You will see there is a search syntax and there is a link in the search syntax popup that allows users to navigate to the creation area for custom quick search. You want to use something in the future, and to do that, you will need to use the search term token below: %(SearchTerm) The token will replace what's inside the double quotes. Apply the token and hit save. Now, if you go back to the folder view, you will then have a custom quick search. You will notice the new search is now listed under "Custom Quick Search." CDI NEWSLETTER Stay updated with all the latest Laserfiche news, CDI webinars, blogs, and more! Facebook | Instagram | Twitter | LinkedIn | YouTube | TikTok