Our 15.0 release focuses on the back-end components responsible for running our intranet software. The reason for this is to improve performance, functionality, and security. The following are the components that were improved which include the previous version they were on and what they will be upgraded to:
- Upgrade ElasticSearch from version 1.3.2 to 6.6.2
- Upgrade Lucee Application server from version 4.5.x to 5.3.x
- Upgrade Tomcat Servlet engine to version 9.0.x
- Using Java 11 (which has LTS to 2026) with the next several releases
Site Search Screen Changes
With the update to ElasticSearch, we've updated the Admin Site Search page. This change enables the Admins to schedule how frequently the re-indexing process will occur and the type of log level of their bulk keyword re-indexing process. This screen will also show the results of the last successful bulk re-index which will include the date and time the re-index ran, its duration, and breaking down the number of indexed items (not keywords) indexed per application.
Setting the Bulk Re-index Frequency
After upgrading, navigate to the Admin > Site Search page. If your intranet has not been indexed on the new version of ElasticSearch, you'll see the following:
In the Search Indexing Configuration Panel with the following fields:
- Recur: dropdown where the admin can set the unit of time in Minute, Hour or Day
- Interval: the actual number of minutes, hours or days as set in the Recur field
- Start: the date and time the Re-index will be executed for the first time
- Log Level: dropdown with the options Debug, Warning, Information, or Error. This will be used for troubleshooting purposes
By default, the search bulk re-index is set to occur every 30 minutes.
After the first bulk re-index runs, the page will look like the image below:
Push Messaging (Formerly Reach) Integration
We have added a Push Messaging Extension to our software to enable our customers to promote intranet content in other internal channels and more efficiently message their employees. Contacts can be fed into the extension directly from Active Directory, your intranet user data, or via CSV. This allows you to target messaging to existing Active Directory or Intranet groups.
Super Admins on the intranet will be able to navigate to Admin > Setup tab > Reach Integration to connect to their Reach instance as shown below:
Once you've entered a valid Reach instance path (Tenant) and click Configure, you'll see additional options provided as shown below:
This information is provided in Reach.
Once Reach Integration has been enabled, the ability to enable/disable the Department Security Group Synchronization will be locked. These groups will be included as Distribution Lists within Reach.
For each user brought over from source, you'll see an indication in Reach of where they were pulled from as shown below:
Like with our integration for Active Directory, the information is synced one-way and can't update the user's profile information in Source. The scheduled task process is run every 5 mins and will push any new users into Reach during this process.
If a user is disabled within the intranet, this action is done automatically within Reach and doesn't wait until the next scheduled task process.