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Hello everyone,

 

In today's fast-paced world, effective time management is crucial for staying organized and maximizing productivity. One of the key tools we rely on for managing our schedules is the calendar. With the advent of cloud-based services like Microsoft Graph, synchronizing calendar events across different platforms has become more accessible than ever. In this blog post we introduce new Thinkstore solutions that enables seamless synchronization between your Thinkwise application and Microsoft Graph, allowing you to add, update, delete, and receive resources effortlessly.

 

Microsoft Graph is a powerful API that provides access to a wide range of Microsoft 365 services and data. It allows developers to integrate their applications with Microsoft's suite of products, including Outlook, OneDrive, SharePoint, etc.

 

Old situation

Of course we already have the Thinkwise Exchange Connector which can synchronize the four resources maintained by Microsoft Outlook: emails, events, contacts and tasks. This connector uses the old Microsoft API (EWS) and requires considerable effort to install (stand alone service, assemblies on the database, etc.). In addition, complex issues such as missing emails or delayed synchronization were sometimes unsolvable because the connector uses streaming notifications that depend on subscriptions. These subscriptions can become invalid at some points, or Microsoft can decide to move an entire user group to another server without notice. We wanted to make these problems a thing of the past. We also wanted to simplify and modernize the way we offer synchronization between the Microsoft cloud.

 

New situation

With the new Thinkstore solutions we provide a way to do this using scheduled process flows that leverage standard Http Connectors and OAuth2 capabilities available to any application built on the Thinkwise Platform. For each resource that can be synchronized between the Microsoft Graph API, there is a separate solution, for example, for sending Microsoft events.

 

The first two solutions that are available in the Thinkstore are for sending and receiving Microsoft events, also known as calendar items or appointments. Whether you want to schedule an event for yourself or set up a meeting with multiple users, it is now possible. You can also schedule shifts for your staff, set up an appointment for your mechanic at a customer’s site in the mechanic's own calendar, or vice versa, keep track of changes in the mechanic's calendar and sync them back to your Thinkwise application.

 

We will be adding more resources later. Once emails, events, contacts and tasks are supported, the Thinkwise Exchange Connector can be replaced with these new solutions. The key benefits are that these solutions are provided in the Software Factory and use process flows with Http Connectors. There is no need to install any additional software to make it work.

 

Thinkstore

So if you are interested in synchronizing your Microsoft events with your Thinkwise application, check out these new solutions in the Thinkstore and let us know what you think! Documentation for the solutions can be found here.
 

 

Happy syncing!

Great news Roel, we will try this.


This is great. Is there a time schedule for releasing the additional resources?


This is great. Is there a time schedule for releasing the additional resources?

Hey Hugo,

 

No specific date is available yet but we are planning on continuing with the other resources within the near future, starting with emails and attachments. We are also looking into the possibility of using subscriptions which enables push updates from the Microsoft Cloud (same as streaming notifications) in stead of pulling every x minutes. 

 

When more resources become available this topic will be updated accordingly.

 

Kind Regards,
Roel


@Roel,

I try to download your solution form inside a blank 2023.2 Sandbox environment.

It does not work, nothing happens after entering username and password.

Will it be compatible with 2023.2?


@Roel,

I try to download your solution form inside a blank 2023.2 Sandbox environment.

It does not work, nothing happens after entering username and password.

Will it be compatible with 2023.2?


Hey Harm,

It should be working by now.

 

Kind Regards,

Roel


Hi Roel,

Sorry, but I still cannot download any Solution from the Thinkstore. 

Nothing happens after enter the credentials, no error messages, no nothing.

Are there any special requirements or browser settings needed?

Can you demo it to me?

BR,

Harm

 


Hi Harm,

Can you create a ticket of this problem and include the Debug information from the Windows GUI regarding the various OAuth steps?

Please also include at which step the interaction seems to stall or halt. I’ve tested this just now and it took a few seconds on the consent page before the ‘Allow’ button seemed to work.


Hi Anne,

I have made a ticket for this #7262S

In addition to this I like to mention that the 2 solutions 'MS Graph Receive Events’ and 'MS Graph Send Events’ are no longer visible in the Thinkstore. I am using SF 2023.2.

 


Today, I have the possibility to try it on a different machine and I am now 1 step further and able to enter credentials to download a solution, but the status of the solution remains 'Queued’.

As you can see, the desired solutions 'MS Graph Receive Events’ and 'MS Graph Send Events’ are not not available in SF 2023.2.

 


It took 11 days, but finally the cause for the failure to download solutions has been found.

Indicium was not running in the background :-(   Thanks @Mark Jongeling 

  1. Why was this not mentioned in the Thinkstore documentation?
  2. Why doesn't TSF give a warning?
  3. Why can't Indicium be launched from the GUI/TSF?

Hi Harm,

We have added clarification on the Docs that Indicium is a “...required component if you install the Software Factory and IAM.”. This automatically covers the Thinkstore part, as it is integrated in the Software Factory.

The Software Factory currently does not indicate that it stopped hearing from Indicium, we'll add this message to the available tasks in the Thinkstore screen and look into showing it on the screen too.

With the upcoming Windicium, both Indicium and the Windows GUI will work hand-in-hand and that will automatically indicate if Indicium would not be running or cannot be started. Currently, we do have this idea Open for voting to implement an indicator into the 2-tier GUI(s).

Indicium status indicator | Thinkwise Community (thinkwisesoftware.com)

I hope this answers your questions


Mark,

Nice work! I'm sure this will avoid some frustrations.


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