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TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)

In preparation to support Agape Europe's emphasis on team fund development this coming year, TntConnect 3.2 is being introduced.  Although, TntConnect has been significantly enhanced to improve the experience of support raising in teams, the features added to TntConnect 3.2 will help all users.

Here is a highlight of what's new and improved:

1.  Groups.  Groups can now contains subgroups of unlimited levels.  You can define an "Exclusive Group" with subgroups which means that a contact can only appear in one of the subgroups (or the group itself).  This is helpful if you are managing a strategy with groups, and you don't want a contact showing up in multiple workflows.  You can make a group appear like a contact field, so you can import, export and make it visible above the notes, and do lookups with it.

2.  Change Log.  All changes to a contact are logged in their history.  So now you can see an audit trail of what happened.  Adding and removing a contact from a group is also logged.  Changes to the pledge amount/frequency are logged as well.  You can link these pledge change histories to a "Campaign" (new name of Appeal), and have a record of how much new monthly support associated with any given campaign.

3.  Campaigns (super-sized version of Appeals).  Campaigns can have a monthly goal and a special (one-time) goal.  You can associated a group with a campaign for "target contacts".  TntConnect Pro users can track a donor's "Promise" to give a certain amount by a certain date within the context of a campaign.  You can follow up with donors who pledged a one-time gift, but haven't followed through yet.  A new "Campaign Builder" tool will help you segment your list of contacts and put people into an appropriate marketing plan.

4.  The ability to add user password from TntMPD 2.1 has been added back in.  This helps protect your database from accidental loss of privacy.  (But to stop hackers, you need hard drive encryption.)  If you forget your password, you can send TntWare a copy of your database to get it "unlocked".  Also, you can inactive users or delete them, and TntConnect will handle existing records associated with the inactive users.

5.  You can now track Weekly and Fortnightly (every two weeks) pledges.

6.  In addition to "Mass Change Field", you can now "Mass Append" to many text fields.

Over the Christmas break, this new version will be in preview.  We'll start the official beta in the new year.  What this means is that the only way to download this new version will be through this link (DOWNLOAD HERE):  Even though this is "preview", if you get stuck, we'll still support you as if it were an official beta.  :)

Enjoy this Christmas gift!

--Troy

P.S.  Here's the release log for all the details of what's new:

  FEATURE - Saved Groups now support unlimited levels of hierarchy.
  FEATURE - Saved Groups support Exclusive Groups.
  FEATURE - Groups View, Saved Groups can now be edited in place. 
  FEATURE - Groups View, Duplicating a group duplicates all sub-groups as well.
  FEATURE - Saved Groups now have option to appear as Contact field (can display above notes, be exported/imported into).
  FEATURE - Group membership changes are logged as "Data Change" history items which can be reverted.
  FEATURE - A history is logged when a new contact is added.
  FEATURE - A history is logged when changes are made to a contact.
  FEATURE - A history is logged when a contact's pledge is changed, along with the change to the pledge.
  FEATURE - A history is logged when a contact's notes are changed, showing each line added or removed.
  FEATURE - Added the ability to right-click on "Data Change" history items to "Revert Data Changes".
  FEATURE - Added "Hide Change Journals" check box next to "Hide Mass Mailings".
  FEATURE - Added Weekly and Fortnightly pledge frequencies.
  FEATURE - Added Contact fields: Fund Rep, Next Ask Amount and Estimated Annual Capacity, and four more user fields.
  FEATURE - Mass Change a Field, added ability to add/remove from a comma separated list for certain fields.
  FEATURE - Campaign feature (new name of "Appeal") significantly enhanced, supports goals, and linked to saved group.
  FEATURE - Campaign Builder tool added to help kick start a fundraising campaign.
  FEATURE - TntConnect Pro, Added support for Promise tracking. 
  FEATURE - TntConnect Pro, Added ability to split a gift towards multiple campaigns.
  FEATURE - Added support for user passwords (restored functionality from TntMPD 2.1).
  FEATURE - When Removing a user with related records, a prompt is provided to reassign items or delete anyway.
  FEATURE - Added the ability to inactivate a user.
  FIXED - Manual Gift Entry Form - Issue where entering an invalid year cause an error message to popup repeatedly.
  FIXED - Excel export issue where a missing font might cause export to fail.
  FIXED - Issue where you couldn't delete or combine currencies.
  FIXED - Display issue on Windows when program started maximized, but it was off  by a few pixels until database opened.
  CHANGE - TntConnect Pro, Campaign box is more prominent when scheduling a task or logging a history.
  CHANGE - Removed unused TranslatedBy label from About box.
  CHANGE - Redesigned the Welcome dialog to not use an embedded web browser to make it faster.
  CHANGE - Added links to Donate and Facebook on the About box.
  CHANGE - Mapping fields are considered internal, so as to not create false conflicts in TntSync.
  CHANGE - Improved security of storing api keys in database.
  CHANGE - Improved "Export Database to XML" to provide more information about data portability.
  NOTE - A "promise" is a commitment to give a certain amount by a certain date.
  NOTE - Improved performance of loading task list with a large number of tasks.
  NOTE - Improved general performance.
  NOTE - Improved the appearance when a dialog is dismissed and a progress message was behind it.
  NOTE - Updated TntExcelExport to version 1.0.1.4.

Posted 24 Dec 2016 5:37 PM by Troy Wolbrink

Comments

Bob Mac Leod wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 24 Dec 2016 11:57 PM

Looking forward to testing out the new Exclusive Saved Groups. Need to wrap my arms around how it works. At first I created some new groups, *then* tried to make them exclusive. Discovered that did not work. Also discovered I could add an exclusive group *within* a non-exclusive 'group of groups'.

What I did:

•       Pressed the New Group button and created the new parent group

•       Pressed the New Group and created a subordinate group

•       Pressed the New Group and created a second subordinate group

I then tried to figure out how to make them exclusive… only to discover that I had to do that to start, by right-clicking and selecting “New Exclusive Group”.

Bob Mac Leod wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 25 Dec 2016 12:01 AM

Encountered an obstacle with deleting a user. In a local fund development environment, it is common to have multiple users. Our current team database, for example, has nine users, three of whom are in the database every day.

Obstacle: Deleting a user from the list also deletes that user from the logged *history*. This is not as helpful, because he's leaving the team for *future* activity, not *past* activity.

I added Bruce Wayne as a user, then logged group history from him. Then I deleted Bruce as a user. The problem is that I am only given two options:

1. Delete “Bruce” from all of the logged history user (leaving the User blank), or

2. Reassign the task to someone else (e.g., Clark or Lois).

The problem is that in an FD environment, people will come and go. We do not want to reassign the history, only the tasks. The history should stay as Bruce because Bruce did it. But we don’t want to leave Bruce in there forever because he’s not on the team anymore. So removing Bruce as a User should prevent current and future tasks being assigned to him, but we want to retain the history of completed tasks that he performed.

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 25 Dec 2016 12:30 AM

Hi Bob,

I'm so glad to get some real world testing on Christmas Eve!  :)  

You cannot convert an existing group into an exclusive group.  I didn’t want to deal with the “what to do” questions of an existing non-exclusive group having contacts in multiple subgroups.

You can only create a make a group exclusive when you create it.  Any subgroups of an exclusive group can only be exclusive as well (logically).

Maybe instead of deleting a user, you should mark them as inactive.  This will effectively hide them, with the exception of existing records still linked to them.  For tasks, you could find all the Tasks in the Tasks view and change who they are assigned to.  Perhaps this should be part of the "mark user as inactive" workflow where TntConnect asks if you want to reassign their tasks or contacts (if they're the fund rep) to an active user.  Send me an email to remind me of this if you like that ideal.  :)

Merry Christmas!

--Troy

--Troy

Bob Mac Leod wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 25 Dec 2016 12:36 AM

Ah, did not see the "Active" checkbox on the Users! In my experience, when someone leaves a local FD team, they never come back. So I'm not sure when I might use the Inactive option.

Regarding changing the tasks, I suppose that could be a good workflow to reassign tasks at the moment the user is deleted. It is easy to change it otherwise (using the mass edit feature on all tasks), but not all users would know to do that.

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 25 Dec 2016 7:35 AM

If you downloaded TntConnect 3.2 prior to when I posted this comment, you should download it again and reinstall it.  I fixed an issue preventing TntSync from working.  This is needed for Dropbox Conflict resolution as well.

Michael Drackley wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 3 Jan 2017 5:02 AM

Not sure if I can have a voice on the improvements... I'll mention some things I've experienced.

FEATURE - Saved Groups support Exclusive Groups.

LOVE this! Learning a lot about how to do better strategies on support letters and responses.  This version came about 3 weeks too late for me because responses are coming in after the fact and I'm trying to work from my old method and now the new Exclusive Groups method.  ONE IMPORTANT thing I wish could be included in the Exclusive Groups is the ability to insert with-in a "Tree" a group that would then include sub groups OR a drag and drop feature that could bring other groups under an inserted group.  Sometimes "a plan" can be put in motion and then you'll realize a better way - but it would be too late without a lot of reworking the groups.

FEATURE - Group membership changes are logged as "Data Change" history items which can be reverted: This is very helpful... I'd request an addition/modification that is similar to "Combine History Logged as a Group".  When working in Group and "bunches" of people from one idea or another sometimes "Hundreds" of people are being added or moved... it would be nice to have the idea "shrinked" to one line in history much like a mass letter or email combines when the option of "Combine History Logged as a Group" is selected.

All in all - wow!  What a helpful tool this will be in the Exclusive Groups.  Just adding my two cents of ideas.

Thanks for listening.

Bob Mac Leod wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 3 Jan 2017 5:13 AM

Michael--

Don't have 3.2 open in front of me, but I believe that there is a "Hide Data Changes" in the history. :)

Michael Drackley wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 3 Jan 2017 5:26 AM

Hey Bob--

Yes, I see the "Hide Data Changes" - but if I want to see the "bulk" data changes in one line amongst other changes OR if I want to save a step and right click on a history Group Data Changes entry for a lookup OR multiples of these history Groups Data changes that could be very helpful.

Just my motivation for asking.

Troy Wolbrink wrote re: TntConnect 3.2 (Preview)
on 5 Jan 2017 1:46 AM

Michael, that was a great suggestion on grouping together history for mass group changes.  That not only makes things more tidy, it speeds things up.  As a bonus, this history grouping works for any similar group changes, when it's the same from and to group, as long as the changes are made within 5 minutes of the last.  But as soon as you change the from or to group, you start a new history grouping.  (This will be in TntConnect 3.2.1)

As far as the drag-n-drop idea, my concern is that it might be too easy to make unexpected changes by an inadvertent mouse movement by a novice user.  You can edit a group and change the parent (in the "Edit Group" dialog).  Also, you can easily clone groups by making a duplicate.  So the same effect can still be accomplished, in a more intentional way.

--Troy

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