Technical FAQs

Question

Why do I get a “File Format Unrecognized” exception when trying to load a PDF document in ImageGear .NET?

Answer

You will need to set up your project to include PDF support if you want to work with PDF documents. Add a reference to ImageGear24.Formats.Pdf (if you’re using another version of ImageGear, make sure you’re adding the correct reference). Add the following line of code where you specify other resources:

using ImageGear.Formats.PDF;

Add the following lines of code before you begin working with PDFs:

ImGearFileFormats.Filters.Insert(0, ImGearPDF.CreatePDFFormat());
ImGearPDF.Initialize();

The documentation page linked here shows how to add PDF support to a project.

Processing and archiving massive volumes of paper mail was historically a major challenge for ARAG. When ARAG updated their records system to a newer version, they reevaluated their processing and archiving software and decided to migrate their C/C++ document conversion solution, the VB indexing application, and client application to Java. This move would enable them to support infrastructure growth independent of hardware and operating system requirements. With more than 200 users and 20,000 pages scanned daily, ARAG sought a reliable Java SDK and Library to facilitate the process.

Video playback has become a fundamental feature in today’s applications, mirroring the shift in user tastes and the widespread presence of multimedia in our digital era. As the appetite for video content rises—spanning tutorials, entertainment, online lessons, marketing assets, and content created by users—applications that provide seamless and adaptive video playback resonate with these needs, boosting user engagement and loyalty.

Additionally, video conveys intricate concepts effectively, resonates with those who are visual learners, and often elevates the user journey with a deeper, more engaging medium. Embedding powerful video playback capabilities can help applications stand out from the crowd, ensuring that they align with modern user demands and stay relevant in a video-driven digital environment.

Introducing PrizmDoc Video Playback

Recognizing the significance of video, the Accusoft engineering team has enhanced PrizmDoc with video playback capabilities. While PrizmDoc already smoothly integrates document viewing features into web applications, this latest addition empowers developers to seamlessly incorporate video features into their software. With PrizmDoc’s video playback, the days of hosting videos on external platforms or depending on poorly secured software plugins to embed videos are gone.

The new video playback feature augments PrizmDoc’s reputation for efficiency and top-tier performance, ensuring the delivery of premium video content with barely any processing delays and supporting a variety of file formats. Developers can effortlessly embed video playback using a straightforward API call, bypassing the need to construct intricate video functionality from the ground up.

Video Playback Benefits for Government Applications

Government agencies stand to gain substantially by integrating video playback capabilities into their applications’ document viewing systems. Here’s an in-depth look at the advantages this integration can bring:

Improved Communication and Collaboration

Incorporating video playback allows government agencies to revolutionize their documentation techniques, creating content that is not only captivating but also densely packed with essential information. This multimedia integration is advantageous in many ways: from presentations that need to capture the audience’s attention, to training modules that benefit from visual aids to ensure clearer understanding, to public service announcements where visuals can often communicate more effectively than words alone.

But the utility of videos extends beyond just the content. They serve as a dynamic conduit for enhanced communication, promoting more profound interactions. When government staff use videos, they open doors to a more direct and interactive dialogue with citizens and various stakeholders. This interactive platform, fostered by video content, encourages shared understanding and insights, catalyzing cooperative ventures. Moreover, it ensures that the core message of the agency is transmitted with clarity, reducing ambiguities and fostering trust between the government and its constituents. Videos are not just tools for information delivery but also instruments for building bridges and fostering collaborations.

Better Transparency and Oversight 

Government agencies can greatly enhance transparency and accountability in their operations by leveraging video playback in their applications. Recording committee sessions and admissible meetings ensures that even nuanced details of discussions are captured for future reference. For independent software vendors (ISVs) supporting the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), integrating video playback into their applications provides an invaluable tool for their government customers. Agencies can monitor access to videos, ensuring that the integrity of video files is maintained while still making them available in accordance with FOIA requirements. 

More importantly, constituents who may not have the opportunity to attend meetings in person can still remain informed by viewing these video recordings. This fosters an environment of inclusivity and ensures that all citizens can be privy to government proceedings. Additionally, video integrations provide government agencies with detailed logs, allowing them to track file accesses, view detailed histories, and maintain a comprehensive understanding of the data’s interactions. This systematic organization not only aids in efficient operations but also upholds the tenets of transparency and accountability.

Enhanced Control

Providing access to recorded video content, though seemingly straightforward, brings with it a set of challenges, especially for government agencies. Unauthorized downloading or sharing of these recordings can jeopardize the integrity and security of the content. By embedding video playback functionalities directly within their applications, agencies gain a robust mechanism to regulate access, ensuring that only authorized users can view the content. The option to download files can be removed entirely, making it much easier to control how videos are viewed and shared.

More importantly, these integrations allow agencies to generate comprehensive audit trails, documenting every instance of access, and guaranteeing that the sanctity and confidentiality of the content are preserved. Many of these video files could hold sensitive or classified information, the distribution of which, without proper authorization, could have legal repercussions. Through strict controls on how these video files are accessed, viewed, and shared, government applications are better positioned to adhere to legal and regulatory stipulations, reinforcing data security and public trust.

Boosting Efficiency and Productivity

Video content can provide government personnel with a streamlined means to access crucial information. By offering data in an easily digestible visual and auditory format, videos facilitate quicker comprehension and thereby expedite decision-making processes. This ensures that government functions remain nimble and responsive in an ever-evolving landscape.

Beyond information dissemination, video playback can revolutionize operational tasks. Specifically, when it comes to onboarding new employees, standardized video training modules offer a consistent and efficient approach. These modules allow newcomers to familiarize themselves with institutional practices at their own pace, ensuring uniformity in training. Additionally, updates to reflect new policies or insights can be seamlessly integrated, making the training process both adaptable and up-to-date.

Augmented Transparency and Accountability

Videos provide a concrete and unambiguous record of governmental actions and decisions. This visual documentation brings greater clarity to operations, reducing misunderstandings and ensuring that agencies are held accountable for their actions. Providing video evidence helps to build trust, reinforcing that government agencies are operating transparently and in good faith.

Furthermore, modern video platforms offer more than just passive viewing experiences; they are interactive hubs that enable direct communication between the government and its citizens. Through these platforms, agencies can actively seek feedback, opinions, and suggestions from the public, ensuring that their policies and initiatives resonate with and address the genuine concerns of citizens. Video-enabled GovTech applications can also serve as continuous channels of information, allowing agencies to keep constituents regularly informed about new programs, updates, and changes, further solidifying the commitment to transparency and open governance.

Enhance GovTech Applications with PrizmDoc Video Playback

PrizmDoc’s new video playback feature offers numerous advantages for government applications. With this new capability, GovTech developers can help government agencies seamlessly integrate and access video content directly within their applications, removing the reliance on third-party platforms or external tools. Users ultimately benefit from a streamlined and integrated workflow, especially when drawing connections between official documents and relevant videos. By centralizing these functions and reducing associated expenses, GovTech software developers can focus their efforts and resources on other features, ensuring that their applications stay ahead in a continuously modernizing administrative environment.

To learn more about how PrizmDoc’s video playback feature can benefit your GovTech application, talk to one of Accusoft’s PrizmDoc specialists today.

Question

What’s the difference between a Viewing Session and a Viewing Package?

Answer

Viewing sessions require source information for the document that you want to view. There are 3 types of sources to choose from: File, URL, and viewing package.

A viewing package is a file you want to view that is stored in its already “converted state”, which we call “pre-conversion”. This is different than a file or URL because these sources are converted and set in a temporary cache folder for use until the cache is cleared out.

Viewing package information can be set to never expire which is useful if you have documents that will be viewed over and over again by many clients. This allows the server not to have to convert the file every time and increases performance.

TOTVS Fluig, a leading business management systems provider, improved document viewing by integrating Accusoft’s PrizmDoc solution, addressing challenges with Microsoft Office files. PrizmDoc offered advanced features like text search and annotation. Transitioning to an Accusoft cloud environment ensured scalability and compliance. With PrizmDoc, TOTVS Fluig efficiently handles millions of viewing requests, focusing on core products while relying on Accusoft. Their partnership promises future growth and innovation.

Question

In PrizmDoc Viewer, when viewing Excel documents that have pictures on certain spreadsheets within that document, the pictures are not displayed.

This appears to happen only if PrizmDoc has the Microsoft Office Conversion (MSO) feature enabled. This issue does not occur if PrizmDoc is using LibreOffice.

Why is this happening?

Answer

The issue is related to an Excel “Page Setup” option called “Black and white”. The option is located in Excel under File, Print, Page Setup and is only respected when PrizmDoc has the MSO feature enabled.

When using LibreOffice, this setting does not exist and is ignored, which is why you can see the pictures.

By default, this option is disabled in Excel, so that specific option would have to be manually set by the creator of the document.

As a workaround, ensure that the “Page Setup” option for “Black and white” is not checked on any spreadsheets in an Excel document that has pictures.

Question

We are in the process of converting multiple Microsoft Office documents to PDF files and noticed a few PowerPoint files are returning the following:

“errorCode”: “CouldNotConvert”.

What could be causing this issue?

Answer

This issue can occur specifically with PowerPoint files when using PrizmDoc’s MSO feature or PrizmDoc Cloud. When a document is marked as final, it becomes non-editable and the MS Office API does not allow the document to be edited and returns “errorCode”: “CouldNotConvert”.

Currently the only work around is to open the PowerPoint file in its native application and remove the Mark as Final flag and save the file.

At the time of writing, there exists a pending feature request for the ability to remove this flag automatically. The feature request can be seen here.

Question

We are using PrizmDoc and may be adding more end users, so we wanted to verify whether there is a limit to the number of viewing sessions that can be active at one time.

Answer

PrizmDoc does not specifically limit the number of viewing sessions that can be active at any given time. However, when opening a viewing session with a document, a conversion does take place. The number of conversions that can be handled simultaneously is based on the hardware constraints of your server.

Various factors, such as the size of documents, the number of conversions, and the hardware being utilized may impact the performance of your PrizmDoc server.

We provide server sizing and performance documentation that is designed to provide guidance and approximate server size based on the number of conversions you plan to do per minute.

Please refer to our documentation page:

https://help.accusoft.com/PrizmDoc/latest/HTML/webframe.html#prizmdoc-server-sizing-servers.html

Question

When loading PDF documents into PrizmDoc that contain embedded highlights, rather than appearing translucent, the highlights are appearing opaque and are covering the underlying text. Why is this happening?

Answer

Prior to version 13.4 of PrizmDoc, this was occurring due to limitations in web browsers. The SVG attribute comp-op="multiply" was not widely supported in modern browsers.

With PrizmDoc version 13.4, the way highlights were rendered was changed to resolve this issue.

Forms are a critical part of business processes, no matter what type of organization you’re running. Whether you’re dealing with employees requesting PTO or prospect requesting more information, forms enable you to collect the data you need quickly organize the information in an efficient way.

There’s a process for everything, and many organizations are figuring out that forms require a very systematic approach. If you don’t have a system in place, data can easily be lost or misplaced. What is the real issue here? Paper isn’t cutting it and neither is email.

The Trouble with Paper Forms

The problem arises when there’s too much data to structure. Manual processes take forever. Just think about all the printing, scanning, and faxing you have to do with paper forms. It’s inefficient and the cost adds up. Not to mention the time it takes to manually process that data.

In addition, emailing forms back and forth for manual or digital entry can get complicated as well. Whether the recipient is printing the form or needs to have a PDF editor installed on their device, the fact of the matter is that it’s just not efficient enough for business. Consistency is key to a streamlined workflow, and the rapid growth of unstructured and inconsistent data collection is creating process challenges.

The Problem at Scale

As companies grow, business processes naturally become more complex. Quickly scaling can be difficult without the help of a process automation tool. Without one, you need a larger headcount, and even then, mistakes will inevitably happen. Teams spend too much time and valuable resources on cumbersome, repetitive processes that are often stalled, derailed, or completely forgotten.

Manual forms and digital forms just don’t make sense when there isn’t a streamlined workflow process around collecting the data. Just think about all the forms you currently use that either contain missing or illegible information. If you’re thinking we are about to suggest a bulky document management system, think again. While we see the value of adding expensive solutions to manage content, it’s not for everyone and it’s especially not suitable for small businesses.

A Solution with Style

With Docubee, forms don’t have to be a hassle. The fast form creator helps you create reusable digital forms in minutes by automatically finding and placing fields on documents. Just imagine… eliminating manual processes and streamlining your document-based workflows. It’s not a dream. It’s reality.

With the click of a button, you can turn your static document templates into online fillable forms. Now you have a simple and powerful way to collect data from your employees and clients without all the back and forth. We help growing businesses transform tedious email and paper-based functions into efficient digital processes. Take automation to the next level with Docubee. Ready to explore more of our cloud-based, mobile-ready features? Learn more about Docubee and our features now.

Docubee

 

Docubee on its own is an incredibly powerful workflow engine that offers the ability to route your documents and data around for just about any business use case. The problem is that many business processes involve systems that are outside of Docubee. Webhook integration is the answer.

Integrating with each individual outside system on it’s own would be incredibly costly and time consuming, but Docubee does offer another solution to this problem. We now offer webhook integration for routing data through workflows to external systems.


What is a webhook?

That may all sound very complex, but the most basic explanation of a webhook in developer talk is an API call that is made out to a URL provided by the user containing some type of data they are listening for. 

For non-developers, this process almost seems magical if you are used to setting up complex integrations that take a lot of time. The possibilities seem endless for ways to connect your data to different apps with the help of websites like Zapier.

 


Webhooks for Non-Developers

Zapier basically takes the need for developer knowledge out of using webhooks. They will provide you with a URL and then let you build out your process by connecting any of the 1,500+ apps they offer. 

This means that without writing any code, you can configure information from a Docubee workflow to be put places like a Google Sheet, Slack room, or Trello board just to list some popular ones. 

For example, if you had a contract that needed to be signed by several people but didn’t want to rely on email and still wanted to keep track of it, this would be the perfect solution. 

You could add a webhook step after every signing step that would send a notification to a Slack room letting you know exactly where it was in the process in real-time.

Even without Zapier, many systems still offer easy webhook integrations. Using Docubee’s data collecting abilities paired with any webhook makes the possibilities endless for moving your data around to wherever you need it to go. Learn more at www.docubee.com.