User Support Plugin 1.3

[Paul]

Hello PC Monitor Users,

I would like to present my first plugin for the community. It's main purpose is to allow IT Administrators to deploy a User Support client on their computer in order to receive notifications when someone requires technical support. Main features are:

• Send notifications to all devices connected to the PC Monitor account with a text long as 4000 characters.
  
• Organise support requests by departments and priority all dinamically loaded from a xml file.
  
• Easy to deploy in Active Directory using Group Policy Objects.
  
• Easy to configure through registry to support multiple connections on the same PC Monitor service.
  
• Uses modern and secure tehnologies for communication (WCF).
  
• Easy to customize all strings using xml files.
  

I also attached an example version to show everyone how you can create your own plugins for this great app. Please take your time and read the 'readme.txt' file as it explains everything you need to know about installing, using and customizing the application.

My release is open-source bound by no license. That being said you can freely modify, distribute, claim as your work, sell and / or include in your copyrighted material as long as it doesn't breach PC Monitor's license or terms and conditions.

Download Link: Click (Version 1.3)

Changes since 1.2:

• Changed registry reading and writing with api calls for plugin and removed registry writes for application with hardcoded defaults.
  

Any feedback and plugin ideas will be appreciated.

Edit: New version is scheduled at 05/03/2012.

Screenshots:

Edited March 8, 2012 by Marius

[Marius]

This is great, thank you Paul. Very useful.

[hfuentes]

Hi

I have tested this plugin and works great! this is much better and faster than a user sends a sms or email

Just a little thing I found: To send at message you say we need a minimum of 10 characters, but in fact we need to type 11 characters to send a message :-)

I think this is the first step to begin with an incident/ticket support system that works with PCM

Thank you!

[Paul]

Just a little thing I found: To send at message you say we need a minimum of 10 characters, but in fact we need to type 11 characters to send a message :-)

Hello,

Thank you for your feedback.

You are correct, this is a mistake that will be fixed in the upcoming version. Please let me know if there is anything you would like me to add or any other bugs you will find.

I estimate that 1.1 will be released by the end of the following week, so if you have any ideas they are welcomed .

Paul.

[JHimmelbauer]

good idea and great job Paul!

[AustinKnight]

Great Job!

[IvanPavlinić]

thank you paul ! bdw. when i delete notification sent from user support aplication (priority normal) , i can't send another ? i only can do this when i close user support app from my pc and start it again. is this bug or i'm not configured good something in xml file.

[Paul]

Hello Ivan,

Thank you for using my plugin! I can tell you that because of PC Monitor's restriction plugins can only send one notification. You can send another one when the first one gets deleted. This is the main reason I disable the submit button after a successful send. This is normal behavior. However in the upcoming version I plan on adding checks to the service and client so that the client will know if he is allowed to send another notification without having to open and close the application. Any faulty changes to the xml will trigger default settings so if you can see your changes that means you modified the xml correctly.

Paul.

If anyone wants to help me I would really apreciate xml files translated into your language. They will be included in the next release and credited!

[Marius]

Just to mention that you can have one active notification per plugin. This will change in the future to allow multiple active notifications for each plugin - once the Cloud API will be released.

[IvanPavlinić]

@paul no problem to translate if you want

[Paul]

@paul no problem to translate if you want

Just modify the xml file and submit to www.pastebin.com with it's contents. I will continue from there. Thank you.

Don't forget to post here the link.

[IvanPavlinić]

here is the link

http://pastebin.com/Qv9T4Faj

[gareth25]

This is an interesting plugin which I'm going to watch over the coming months. I've always had a problem with monitoring software in the past losing the goal post by developing ticket systems into their products (take Kaseya or Labtech for example - often a feature never used because it's over complex and ends up getting in the way of the monitoring software design). I like to see PC monitor stick to the core of what the product is all about and have all this functionality additionally available through a plugin, so I think you've done an amazing job here! Well done.

[Cesar Lacerda]

Olá, Paul !

Estou ansioso pela versão 1.1.

[Paul]

I am sorry about the release delay. You can expect version 1.1 today.

Paul.

Edit: 1.1 got released, check the first post for the download link.

Any feedback is welcomed, feature requests are welcomed too

[damian73]

Hello Paul,

still facing Problems while opening UserSupportApplication, it won't open on Windows 7 x64 . What about a translation into German? Are there anybody already translating?

When not I would like to translate it.

regards

Damian

[Paul]

Hello,

Please confirm that you are have .Net Framework 4.0 FULL installed on your computer, if not you can download it from here: http://www.filehippo.com/download_dotnet_framework_4 .

Also what do you mean that it's not opening is it making an error? Please show me a screenshot. Also for the translation you only need to edit the .xml file located in the /locale folder, it's very easy.

Paul.

[damian73]

Hi Paul,

I checked that .Net 4 is installed and also made an Repair installation, with no success.

When try to start it's throwing only an exception in Eventlog.

See the exception:

.Net runtime:

-

<

Event

xmlns

="

http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event

">

-

<

System

>

<

Provider

Name

="

.NET Runtime

" />

<

EventID Qualifiers

="

0

">

1026

</

EventID

>

<

Level

>

2

</

Level

>

<

Task

>

0

</

Task

>

<

Keywords

>

0x80000000000000

</

Keywords

>

<

TimeCreated

SystemTime

="

2012-02-05T18:07:37.000000000Z

" />

<

EventRecordID

>

56361

</

EventRecordID

>

<

Channel

>

Application

</

Channel

>

<

Computer

>

damian-0815.vir-net.local

</

Computer

>

<

Security

/>

</System>

-

<

EventData

>

<

Data

>

Anwendung: UserSupportApplication.exe Frameworkversion: v4.0.30319 Beschreibung: Der Prozess wurde aufgrund einer unbehandelten Ausnahme beendet. Ausnahmeinformationen: System.IO.FileNotFoundException Stapel: bei UserSupportApplication.MainForm..ctor() bei UserSupportApplication.Program.Main()

</

Data

>

</EventData>

</Event>

Application Error:

-

<

Event

xmlns

="

http://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event

">

-

<

System

>

<

Provider

Name

="

Application Error

" />

<

EventID Qualifiers

="

0

">

1000

</

EventID

>

<

Level

>

2

</

Level

>

<

Task

>

100

</

Task

>

<

Keywords

>

0x80000000000000

</

Keywords

>

<

TimeCreated

SystemTime

="

2012-02-05T18:07:37.000000000Z

" />

<

EventRecordID

>

56362

</

EventRecordID

>

<

Channel

>

Application

</

Channel

>

<

Computer

>

damian-0815.vir-net.local

</

Computer

>

<

Security

/>

</System>

-

<

EventData

>

<

Data

>

UserSupportApplication.exe

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

1.1.0.0

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

4f16848c

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

KERNELBASE.dll

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

6.1.7601.17651

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

4e211319

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

e0434352

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

0000b9bc

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

2394

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

01cce4310ab7bc36

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

D:\MobilePC\PlugIn\UserSupport\UserSupportApplication.exe

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

C:\Windows\syswow64\KERNELBASE.dll

</

Data

>

<

Data

>

48719ff7-5024-11e1-811d-8c89a56f691d

</

Data

>

</EventData>

</Event>

regards

Daniel

[Paul]

Hello,

You are corect. It seems to be a problem with the application. I am sorry about this. Tomorrow you will have a fixed version.

Thank you for reporting the problem.

Paul.

[damian73]

You're very welcome.

Thx in advance for your great work.

Hopefully you will develop more great Plugins...

Daniel

[Paul]

Hello,

The problem is now fixed, please redownload my archive from the first post.

Note: The application requires that the plugin (UserSupportPlugin.dll) to be in the same folder with the application otherwise it will crash just like it did before.

Thank you for considering my plugin.

Paul.

Edited February 6, 2012 by Paul

[damian73]

Hello Paul,

that sounds good.

I will test it, as soon as I'm at home.

regards

Daniel

[damian73]

Hi Paul,

now it works.

But some Problems which I recognized.

Runs only, when started as Administrator, any possibilty to start with normal rights?

The registry key is not written, so I can't change the locale Setting. What is the name of the Key?

regards

Daniel

[Paul]

Hello,

The application run only as an administrator because he needs to write registry keys. It's very abnormal not to write them, are you sure he has administrative rights. The values should be in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\UserSupport.

Please confirm that the application does not write the values to registry.

I will make an update soon that uses INI settings, which don't require administrative rights.

Paul.

[damian73]

Hi again,

the only key, which is written, is "Endpoint"

Nothing about the locales.

regards

Daniel