Release Notes for all 2022 Q2 Updates

All releases listed are deployed to all Symbee Connect Regions globally. Each release begins deployment in US Virginia (us-east-1) region first, and then progresses to all other regions globally over the course of approximately 48 hours.

The release dates below mark the date of the release deployment into the first region (us-east-1).

2022 / 06 / 22

What's Fixed

  1. Update to Symbee Connect Customer Facing Webchat to address issue where not all customer Form values were getting passed into the Contact Flow and to Agents, when the Pre-Chat form is disabled, and custom parameters are being populated via query-string parameters.
  2. Update to Symbee Connect Social Chat to address issue where customer-sent inbound messages were sometimes not being added to the conversation, for Twilio WhatsApp endpoints, when Delivery Provider is set to Amazon (i.e. using Amazon Connect chat).

What Else

  1. Additional updates to Symbee Connect Supervisor Monitor behavior to increase monitor setup reliability in Sydney region. (Update will assist in all Regions, but was particularly problematic in Sydney region).

2022 / 06 / 14

What's New

  1. Preview Campaign Realtime API [Beta] - additional API action added
    • A new deleteAndCreateCampaignRecord API action has been added to support an atomic single-request that deletes any previous campaign record/task referenced in the request, and recreates a new record/task with details supplied in the request.
    • Avoids having to make two separate API requests when wanting to change the system-level attributes on a campaign task/record (for example, if wanting to change the nextEarliestWorkTimeUTC).
  2. Additional Amazon Connect Advanced Setting added for Supervisor Monitoring
    • A new Agent Monitor Establish Buffer setting is added under the Amazon Connect Advanced Settings group within the Amazon Connect Integration page in the Symbee Connect Administration Portal
  3. Additional Contact Attribute loaded on to Amazon Connect Tasks generated via Symbee Connect Task Templates
    • All new tasks generated from the Symbee Connect User/Agent UI Create New Task tool now have an additional Contact Attribute automatically populated, named sc_user_id, with the value of the logged in User's user-id that created the task.

What's Fixed

  1. Update to address issue where not all Amazon Connect Routing Profiles were being listed in Admin Portal dropdowns when Connect Instance has very high number of Routing Profiles
  2. Fix for Symbee Social Chat and Webchat, when configuration is Amazon Delivered, receiving Access Denied errors when running in SNS Notifications mode
  3. Fix for Do Not Call functionality where entries in DNC Lists with an Expiry Period set were not always rolling off on the correct future day.
  4. Fix for Email Reply-All behavior to resolve issue where sometimes on a reply-all, the incoming intermediate From: address was being copied added to the To: address list for the reply-all.
  5. Update to Amazon Tasks generated from the Symbee Connect User/Agent UI using Symbee Connect Task Templates (the Create New Tasks tool) , to remove HTML-entities (for example ') from content loaded into the generated Amazon Connect Task Contact Attributes.
  6. For for Symbee Connect User/Agent UI Work Codes section, when selectable work codes is forced to 1-only, the count of currently selected work codes sometimes displayed 2 rather than 1.
  7. Preview Campaign Realtime API - fix for error sometimes being experienced on deleteRecordFromCampaign action requests

What Else

  1. An additional TaskId attribute is added to WorkCodes events sent on the Symbee Connect Reporting Kinesis Stream, to allow Work Codes to be exactly matched to their related Task when the same task gets worked by and agent more than once (can only happen in Preview Channel situations).

Feature Integration CloudFormation Updates available

2022 / 05 / 28

What's New

  1. Additional Flow Control Table Functionality
    • When importing Flow Table Content from an uploaded CSV (comma-separated-values) file, the import will automatically add the "+" character to any defined E.164 Phone Number type key or attribute value if the "+" is not already present within the row value of the imported file. This is to assist those building import files with Microsoft Excel, and saving the files as CSV and finding the leading "+" sign often being removed from phone numbers during the Excel "save as CSV" operation.
    • A new operation is added to the Flow Point Lambda deployed with the FlowPoint CloudFormation for use in Amazon Connect contact flows, to support retrieving defined rows from multiple different Flow Tables in a single Contact Flow Lambda Invoke. This can be used to speed up operation of Contact Flows that require multiple Flow Table lookups during contact setup, by avoiding consecutive Lamba Invoke blocks in your contact flows.

What's Fixed

  1. A fix for issue where Voicemail delivery was sometimes failing when Voicemail Transcriptions was enabled (sometimes the AWS transcribe response payloads were including language property, but not always).

  2. Update for Symbee Connect Async Screen Pop Fusion to allow an listed Contact Attribute to be used in multiple places/times within the Ajax payload body.

What Else

  1. Performance updates for Symbee Connect Email Channel, for Email Ruleset processing, to cater for customers with larger numbers of Email Routing rules.

  2. Reorganization of Preview Campaign significant Reporting Attributes in the Symbee Connect Administration Portal.

  3. Performance improvements for Flow Control Table data access.

  4. Usability improvements to the main Flow Table Content view in the Symbee Connect Administration Portal.

  5. Performance Improvements for Amazon Delivered Chats when using SNS Topic conversation message routing.

Feature Integration CloudFormation Updates available

2022 / 05 / 13

What's New

  1. New Campaign Reportable Attributes section added to Symbee Connect Preview Campaigns

    • A new Campaign Reportable Attributes section is added to the Preview and Progressive Campaign screen in the Administration Portal
    • New section allows you to nominate up to 5 attributes present on your Preview Task data (either received through Preview Campaign Intake file, or via the Preview Campaign Realtime API) that you want to be included as filtering fields for reporting in Symbee Connect Analytics and Reporting.
    • This allows visibility to the specifically selected set of Preview Task attributes within reporting, without breaking the security model of your sensitive/private Customer Information residing only in your AWS Account.
    • The addition of these reportable attributes is intended to allow you to get better reporting of your Preview Campaign activity using some of your grouping or categorization metadata (such as Product Group, Brand, Department, etc). It is the customer's responsibility to not nominate Preview Task Attributes that might contain sensitive customer information.

  2. New Flow Control Table support for Importing and Exporting Table definitions and Table Content

    • Import and Export action buttons have been added to the Flow Table Definitions administration screen in the Symbee Connect Administration Portal. A Flow Table definition export generates a downloaded JSON-based file describing all the details of the Table, including Table Keys and Table Attributes. Note that a Flow Table Definition export does not export any table content.
    • An Exported Flow Table definition can then be used to recreate (via Import) the Flow Table in the same environment using a different Table Name, or can be imported into another Company or Environment. If importing into a new/different environment, any Flow Table Attribute definitions used in the Table Definition need to already be present defined in the target Environment first.
    • Import and Export action buttons have been added to the Flow Table Content administration screen. Flow Table Content exports generate a downloaded UTF-8 formatted CSV (comma-separated-values) file containing all the rows defined in the table.
    • Flow Table content Import can be used to quickly upload data into your defined Flow Tables from UTF-8 formatted CSV files. File Imports will ignore/error any rows that already exist in the target table (based on the Key columns), and add any rows from the file that don't already exist in the table (meaning, you can also use import to to "append" additional rows into an existing table). Field validation is performed on all imported rows, using the same rules as when data is input through the Add New Table Entry dialog.

  3. New Duplicate Row action added to Flow Control Table Content Screen

    • An additional Duplicate Row action has been added to the main Flow Control Table Content Management screen in the Symbee Connect Admin Portal
    • Allows the details of an existing row to be easily copied as a new row, specifying just the keys for the new table row.

What's Fixed

  1. Fix to address Supervisor Admin Portal Role access to Hours of Operation tables.

  2. Numbered list of Fixes or updates to address issues - Number list but un-bolded.

  3. Fix to address issue in Flow Control Tables Content view, where some Flow table rows were not able to be maintained if the Flow Table structure had been changed after data had already been added to the Flow Table.

  4. Fix for Symbee Connect Webchat (Amazon Delivered) getting into a state where a customer could not initiate a new Webchat.

What Else

  1. Symbee Connect Webchat update for Idle Timeout to give a more timely indication to the agent that a Chat conversation has been ended due to the conversation Idle timeout.
  2. Performance improvement updates related to Agent/User administration.
  3. Performance improvement updates related to Symbee Connect Users Skill Queue Assignments administration.
  4. Update to Flow Control Table Definitions administration to block a Table Key's label from being the same as a Table Attribute's label, and vice-versa.

Feature Integration CloudFormation Updates available

2022 / 04 / 11

What's New

  1. New Symbee Connect Agent/User UI Pop-out to Frameless Browser Window (app-mode style) feature

    • A new button/icon is added to the initial pre-login page of the Symbee Connect Agent/User UI to optionally allow a user to pop the Symbee Connect UI out from a browser tab, to an external frameless, resizable window (app-mode style) that can be location outside and beside the browser.

      • The new icon is labelled: If you want to run in a frameless size-adjustable window separate from the browser, click below

    • New option is intentionally not displayed when the Symbee Connect UI is running embedded in an Iframe (for example, when embedded in Salesforce, Zendesk, ServiceNow, etc).

    • The new option is enabled by default, but can be disabled by an administrator through the Symbee Connect Admin Portal, from the Company Environments menu option, by selecting your environment settings. The new setting is under the User Interface settings group, and is named: Pre-Login UI Pop-out Option Enabled

    • The new option is also available when already running in Chrome App Mode, to address the Chrome restriction that stops the app-mode window width from being reduced thinner than 500 pixels. When in this mode, clicking the pop-out icon will relaunch a new window (still in app-mode) and close the previous window. The new window is properly sizable again.

    • New option is supported in both Chrome and Firefox.

    • New option is available in all application modes - Unison, Engagement, and Supervisor

  2. New Symbee Connect Browser Notifications feature in the Agent/User UI

    • When enabled, Browser Notifications are emitted for new inbound calls, chats, and tasks, if the Symbee Connect Agent/User UI is minimized, hidden, or in the background.
    • Browser Notifications are intentionally only raised for new inbound calls, chats, and tasks, and only when the Symbee Connect Agent/User UI is not already visible or in focus.
    • Clicking the browser notification will cause the Agent/User UI to become focused in the foreground.
    • Feature is disabled by default, and controlled by a new setting added to User profile and User Templates under the General => User Interface settings group, and is named: Browser Notifications for Inbound Interactions
    • Important Note: Before enabling this feature, Disable Notifications in your browser for your backing Amazon Connect domain URL (for example: https://yourinstance.my.connect.aws), and then ensure you Enable Notifications in your Browser for your Symbee Connect Agent/User UI domain URL. If notifications are left enabled for your Amazon Connect domain, the default CCP notification will override and block the Symbee Connect notification from being raised.

  3. Flow Control Point Input Validation features added

    • Flow Control Point definitions have been enhanced to support declaring the type of value expected, to support user input validation when a Flow Point value is being updated. Types include:
      • String (with options to control minimum and maximum length)
      • Number
      • Range (a number, with bounded minimum and maximum value)
      • Picklists (with options for required, optional, and suggested)
      • Prompt Text (allows SSML input if needed)
      • E.164 Phone Number
    • Related to these changes, Flow Points access control has been updated:
      • Only Admin Portal users with a role of Company Administrator can add, delete, and maintain Flow Points (in terms of updating the Value Type criteria).
      • All lower level Admin Portal roles can only view existing Flow Points and modify their values.

  4. Existing Flow Point screen has been reworked

    • Flow Points updates are now performed through a modal Dialog to better support environments that have many Flow Points configured.
    • Sorting and Search filtering has been added to the Flow Points screen.

  5. New Flow Control Tables Feature set

    • A new concept of Flow Control Tables is added.
    • Flow Control Tables are customizable data lookup tables intended to hold configuration data for use in Amazon Connect Contact Flows to simplify Contact Flow development. An example might be, creating a Brand or Client table, with a key of a Dialed Number - then based on an incoming call's Dialed Number, perform a table lookup to return the values for the row associated with the Dialed Number (e.g. Client-specific greeting prompt text, an associated Client Code, an associated Branding Code, etc.).
    • Previously you may have addressed this need with custom DynamoDB tables or custom Lambda's containing lookup tables. Flow Control Tables lets you securely control administration of this type of lookup table configuration data through the Symbee Connect Administration Portal, without the need to administer Dynamo Tables and develop custom Lambdas.

  6. New Admin Portal Flow Table Attributes, Flow Table Definitions, and Flow Table Content screens

    • Three new screens are added under the Flow Controls section of the Administration Portal, to support creation, maintenance, and data input of the new Flow Control Tables.
    • The same field validation added to Flow Points is also available in Flow Control Tables, through the definition of Flow Control Table Attributes.

  7. New Flow Points Lambda Operation

    • A new operation is added to the existing Symbee Connect FlowPoint Lambda to perform Flow Control Table Lookups from Contact Flows.
    • The new operation is named getFlowTableRow that requires input parameters of FlowPointTableName (the table you are wanting to query) and FlowPointValue1/2/3 for the key(s) to use for the table lookup. The operation returns string/string key/value map of each of the column values of the table row queried.

  8. New Symbee Connect Task Templates Feature set

    • You can now define Task Templates within the Symbee Connect Admin Portal that allow your users/agents to create new Amazon Connect Tasks from within the Symbee Connect User/Agent UI.
    • Once Task Templates have been configured, a user/agent can be configured with the new Create Tasks tool on their Tools bar, which allows them to select a Task Template, and create a new Amazon Connect Task by completing a form defined by the Task Template.
    • Each Task Template is configured with an Initial Contact Flow - this is the Contact Flow that receives the new Tasks when they are submitted by the agent.
    • The Initial Contact Flow can then use the attributes on the Task to invoke Lambda's to create objects in external systems (e.g. create a new Case in a CRM, add notes to an existing object in a CRM, etc.) or invoke any other external systems as needed.
    • The Initial Contact Flow can also re-queue created tasks back into queues and have them delivered back to other agents for handling. If an Amazon Task delivered back to an agent was created via a Symbee Connect Task Template, the same Task Template used to create the Task is also used when presenting the inbound Task to the next agent (in terms of which attributes are displayed, and their associated Labels).

  9. New Admin Portal Task Templates maintenance screen

    • A new Task Templates screen is added to Tasks Integration, accessed under Channel Configuration on the main Function menu.
    • Each new Template defined has a configurable Initial Contact Flow
    • Each Template has its list of configured fields - each field represents a Contact Attribute on the resulting Amazon Connect Task created from the template.
    • Each field is configured with the following:
      • Display Label
      • Contact Attribute Name
      • Display order (controls the structure of the form presented to the user)
      • Controls for: Visible, Editable, and Required
      • Default Value
      • Value Type (determines the type of input field used in the form presented to the user) - types include:
        • String input (with options for length)
        • Multiline Text Box
        • Number
        • Range (number with a bounding range)
        • Picklist
        • URL
        • E.164 Phone Number

  10. Symbee Connect User/Agent UI Amazon Connect Tasks handling updates

    • A new setting is added to the User profile and User Templates under the General => Toolbar settings group, named: Create Tasks Enabled
    • When enabled, the user gets a new Create Tasks tool added to their Tools bar
    • The Create Tasks tool can be used to any work state - whether currently servicing an interaction (of any type), or when Available or Unavailable.
    • When creating new Tasks, the user picks from the list of Task Templates configured in your environment.
    • When completing Task form entry, the user can optionally use any pre-configured AutoText entries in Multiline Text Box fields (based on the template definition).

  11. Amazon Delivered Chat Channel Implementation upgrade

    • (includes all channels: Webchat, Amazon Pinpoint SMS, Other SMS implementations, Social Messaging)
    • Transition away from previous Amazon Chat Connect WebSocket API messaging implementation, over to the new Amazon Connect SNS Topic driven chat messaging delivery
    • Update is backwards compatible - all existing chat deployments will continue to use the older WebSocket API based message delivery until you run an update on your Symbee Connect Amazon Chat CloudFormation
    • Updated Chat CloudFormation automatically creates the new SNS topic and respective SQS Queues in your environment
    • Amazon Delivered Chat configurations will automatically start using SNS notifications for chat message delivery once the respective SNS Topics and SQS Queues (created with the CloudFormation update) are detected in your environment
    • Updates provide better scalability and reliability

What's Fixed

  1. Email update to address issue where if an inbound Email is first Forwarded, and then Replied to, the reply content was not always formed correctly to the customer.

  2. Update to address issue seen occasionally in Amazon Connect User Management within the Symbee Connect Admin Portal, causing User maintenance to fail if a customer's temporary STS Authentication token expires early.

  3. Flow Control Points Lambda Fix to address issue where retrieving a Flow Point named using an E.164 Phone Number would drop the leading '+' when performing the Flow Point lookup. A CloudFormation update is required to receive this update - see further below.

  4. Update to alphabetically sort Routing Profiles, Security Profiles, and User Templates in the dropdown lists in User maintenance screens.

  5. Update to Chat channels (all chat types) Idle Timeout behavior to reduce the delta between the earliest time a conversation becomes a candidate for idle timeout, and the time after which a conversation is ended.

What Else

  1. Updates to Symbee Connect Agent/User UI connection recovery to be more lenient in network conditions where Symbee Connect heartbeat signaling messages are sometimes getting dropped in the network. Now waits longer before concluding a session has expired and starting background session recovery.

  2. Symbee Connect Admin Portal performance improvements to User related listing and maintenance screens, and to User Skill Queue assignment screens.

  3. Updates to the Salesforce Integration Lambda attached to CTR and ITR streams in your Connect account, to add additional logging for easier troubleshooting.

  4. Additional Service Limits added to control the usage of the new Flow Control Tables and Task Templates related features.

Feature Integration CloudFormation Updates available