MacroView has developed software add-ins that provide an excellent user experience for saving, searching for and viewing Outlook emails and attachments in Microsoft SharePoint (Online or on-premises). See this YouTube playlist. Now we are looking to provide the same great experience for users wanting to manage their Outlook emails and attachments in BOX.com.
BOX.com is rapidly emerging as an Enterprise-grade Electronic Content Management (ECM) platform. With BOX all content is stored in the cloud, which facilitates access from anywhere, from any device. During 2017 BOX has added 15,000 new customers and their business revenues have also grown substantially. Their customers come from large and heavily regulated enterprises in Financial Services, Healthcare and Government. Among the new customers added in 2017 are Volkswagen Group of America, Discovery Communications, Spotify, Hertz, HULU, Southwest Airlines, and the U.S. Department of the Treasury, GE, P&G, The GAP and AstraZeneca.
“BOX is a leader in Enterprise Content Management” Forrester Research April 2017
From the viewpoint of most business users, one of the most frequent and important ECM needs is around the effective management of emails, particularly Outlook emails. Business users need an easy way to manage their Outlook emails and attachments in an ECM store. While they work in Microsoft Outlook on their Windows desktop they need to be able to drag and drop to save emails and attachments to the ECM store. They also need to be able to search for and view emails and other files in that ECM store, including ones that have been saved by someone else.
MacroView for BOX
The initial version of MacroView for BOX already enables the following for a user working in Microsoft Outlook on their Windows desktop:
- New MacroView pane located on the right-hand side of the Outlook Mail window, which displays the structure of the BOX.com store for which the user has access permission.
- Click on a folder in that pane to view the emails and other files that are stored in that area of BOX.com.
- Any metadata that has been recorded for the saved emails and attachments is displayed.
- Drag and drop saving of an Outlook email from an Outlook folder (e.g. InBox, Sent Items, a public folder or a private folder) to BOX.
- When you drop the email on a folder in the new MacroView pane the email is saved to the corresponding area in BOX as a MSG file.
- MacroView for BOX automatically names the new MSG file in BOX so as to prevent duplicate copies of any one email in any area of the BOX store.
- Support for background bulk-saving of emails – when you drag and drop multiple emails they are saved to BOX in the background, so that you can go on working in Outlook while the save proceeds.
Further Development
The current version of MacroView for BOX already compares very favourably with other available Outlook-to-BOX integrations. Going forward MacroView is looking to further develop MacroView for BOX so that it provides the advanced ease-of-use, functionality and volume handling that are already features of MacroView when it is working with Microsoft SharePoint. These features include:
- Automatically record all the non-personal attributes of the email as metadata for the new MSG file in BOX.
- Drag and drop saving of an attachment to an Outlook email from Outlook folder to BOX. When you drop the attachment on a folder in the new MacroView pane and the attachment is saved to the corresponding area in BOX.
- Provide a formatted preview of the files stored in BOX.
- Automatic filing to BOX of incoming and outgoing emails based on Email Filing Rules and Filing Tags, together with suggested filing locations for emails that have not previously been saved.
- Prompt for and capture metadata for attachments and optional metadata for emails as they are being stored in BOX.
- Comprehensive menu of actions displayed when you right-click on a file that is already stored in BOX, including retrieving the file from BOX and inserting it as an attachment or link in a newly created email message.
- Provide a similarly good user experience when you work with files in BOX from other Microsoft Office desktop applications – Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
- Ability to search for emails and other files in BOX based on their content and / or metadata, while you work in Outlook.
- Support for navigating around a large email and document store that has been implemented in BOX, so that you can find the area where you want to view and manage emails and other files.
- Ability to create new and manage existing storage areas in BOX by right-clicking in the new MacroView pane – e.g. Create New Project Area, Archive Matter Area, etc.
More Information
For more information about MacroView for BOX or if you are interested in joining our early adopter program contact MacroView Services
