Upcoming Floria App Manager Improvements

Firstly, we would like to extend our thoughts and compassion to all of you who have been affected by the pandemic and other unrest during these troubled times. We know that many of you have shown extreme resilience and adaptability to the new situation and feel very fortunate and grateful that we have been able to assist the community in our small way during this period.

The new situation has also changed the role of how technology can help institutions adapt now that being able to work outside the office walls is more important than ever. Thank you for all the positive feedback we have received from our App and Cloud service users. As people increasingly install software on their own computers, we have unfortunately seen more issues of users unintentionally installing new upgrades, causing compatibility issues and extra work.

For users of IrisBG and Floria we have to ensure that you have access to a version of Floria App Manager that is compatible with your IrisBG Desktop version. This has historically not been a big issue, but due to an increased frequency of IrisBG Desktop versions with breaking changes, the situation has become more confusing for our community. We currently support 5 different versions of the IrisBG Desktop.

To make this situation more manageable for our users, we have decided to change the method of synchronizing data into IrisBG by using the IrisBG Data Import feature instead of the current approach, which uses the IrisBG inbox.

The benefit of switching to this approach is: 

• We will remove binary compatibility requirements between the two products which will make it much easier for you to install upgrades of the different products at your own convenience. 
• We are still constrained by breaking changes in the IrisBG data import capabilities, however, historically, the data import feature has consistently been backward compatible in new versions of IrisBG desktop.
• We will add reconciliation capabilities inside the App Manager which should make the processing easier.

The downside is that you will be required to have a licence for the IrisBG data import module. Although many clients already have this licence, we have decided to offer some compensation for this extra burden.

• All Floria App customers will be offered one extra free app licence, including a one year free support subscription for that extra licence. This offer will be extended to all customers who have been provided with a quote for a purchase. You can decide whether you wish to continue using this extra licence after the year has expired. 
• If you do not wish to upgrade, you can still use the current version of App Manager which supports up to IrisBG Desktop version 4.2.3. 

We expect to have the new version of the Floria App Manager and the Floria App available before the end of August.

Wishing you all a safe and happy summer or winter break 💚