My only other issue with the help file is that it is not user centric. That is to say, the help file includes install
and configure options, but this is true even if you log in under a non administrator account. I can say
from previous experience that when a normal user looks for help, they do not care how you installed
it. Or how the administrator needs to configure it. Really. They do not care if you had to drive to
New Orleans and perform an ancient voodoo ritual in the cemetery at midnight to get the software running,
they just want user specific help with item "A" that they can not get to work they way they want it to.
The install and configuration portion of the on line help should be moved to a different location or made user centric.
And this should be done after it has been corrected so that on line help and the INSTALL file agree. One last note on
the on line help, the module list in the on line help does not match up with the modules which are
installed in Group-Office. For users this could be a major point of confusion, for instance, the help
for "Calendar" is under "Scheduler". Time and time again in the on line help file I ran into this
naming convention mismatch, or other major errors such as locations of objects in the window. For instance,
the "Application" menu that the help file describes is at the bottom of the page, and it is not labeled
"Applications" anywhere, however, in the help file this bar is supposed to be at the top, and labeled.
OK, back to installation. You are first instructed to move the directory tree under your web server directory tree (where you want it) and then you need to edit the PHP initialization file. The defaults are sensible, but it is nice to be able to customize it, and I applaud their good use of many comments and instructions in the PHP file itself. You need not know PHP to edit this to your liking. After this step you are instructed to create a new SQL database, create a home directory for the administrator account and then fire up a web browser and login. After logging in for the first time you will be presented with a series of steps to perform (through the web browser) and it is mostly setting up the look and feel and global configuration of the system. (email for new users, default languages, GO or LDAP database as authentication technique, you can also enable system accounts or local Group-Office accounts, etc) I would rate the web based install portion of Group-Office very good, and I note here that on almost every portion they gave actual command line examples of how to perform actions if you needed to drop to a command line to do something (like set permissions on the Group-Office home directory if not using system accounts for instance). Overall, with the exception of the conflicting install notes, installation was easy and hassle free.
After initial installation and setup, users are created. Groups can also be added at this time. The system should be ready for normal users to login. On the login page are fields for user-name, password, language, and an option to keep the user logged in until the press the logout button. After login they are greeted with the Group-Office basic layout. Here is a screen shot using the default theme.
Options available to the user are:
On the top we have: configuration, help, logout
And at the bottom we have: Addressbook, Bookmarks, Calendar, Websites, E-mail, Files, Notes, Projects and Search.
It is interesting to note here that search can is also linked into Google to search the web. I will not go over every last detail of all of the sections that are available, but I will hit the highlights
and give a general overview.
Addressbook is reminiscent of many others that I have seen, in a way the setup is a little bit nicer than others in that contacts and company contacts are already broken up for you. Mailing groups can be created so that you can put contacts of your choosing into mailing groups. The user can also create multiple address books to suit their needs. Basically a contact is pretty straightforward containing the usual elements (name, address, email, phone, etc). You can also search through all of your contacts on pretty much any important field.
Bookmarks are for holding web addresses. It could be tedious for someone who has tons of bookmarks, and an improvement would be an import function to import from a text file. The bookmark feature may seen trivial, but it could come in handy as the user can set read permissions on their bookmarks on a per group basis, so that others could just see some or all of the users bookmarks.
Calendar is where you can schedule events. It is pretty much like most calendar programs, and other people in groups can be added to events. Events can also be setup as recurring, so one could setup and event on say a Monday morning and check it off as recurring and it would occur every Monday. The user can also setup a reoccur to-from date so that it can occur say every Monday for the next two months. Events can also be exported into a .ics format for using them on another platform.
- "Group Office 2.2 Pro, Page 1/3"
- "Group Office 2.2 Pro, Page 2/3"
- "Group Office 2.2 Pro, Page 3/3"
