Microsoft Infopath. 24^th Aug 2006

It’s a Plugin for MS office . It comes with MS office 2003. professional edition.

The Info path acts as a central repository. Its path of MS Sharepoint services.

There are inbuilt templates.

Designing :

1. Adding fields. >> field name , data type, data validation, conditions, based on entries, the data can be defined in different colors, fonts , read only state etc.
2. The pages are locally editable by the user. The layout of the page can be modified by the local user. The database fields in the central server can be seen by the local user. But in case any data to be entered is changed, the data is stored locally only and not on the central machine.
3. Fields from a hyperlink can be extracted as per requirements. Hyperlinks and databases can be defined and attached to the user’s page.
4. In case a there is a user id / password for the database, that is embedded on the user’s page so they cannot be seen and hence modified by the local user. SQL functions of adding and running a query can be made and added on to the user’s page.
5. The fields in the database can be made editable or a new field can be added in the database.

Drawbacks:

1. open database access to the users from the main server.
2. no control of main user on the layout of the screen as it can be modified
3. CTI screen has a “details” button to get the data. This is not required as the data should appear just as a call matures.
4. The data on the screen from the previous call doesn’t get updated until the new call comes in
5. When a call gets transferred, screen doesn’t get transferred along with that.
6. Saying YES in the save password option in the data connection option creates a text file which has all the usernames and passwords. The data can be accessed by one knowing Info-path. But since the same form cannot be made again, the problem of accessing the earlier Database’s fields can be solved . CHECK

Addtionals :

1. Images for the CTI application screen. Copy images from outside and paste here in the screen.
2. adding the PDS Agent API to the info path screen and using the API for getting the events and data from the PDS onto the screen. The rest of the data comes from the xml link.

All the fields being sent to the PDS should be in the same format as we retrieve it . Fields can be hidden if required coz we need not display all the fields. Initially one field is retrieved from the xml file. Based on the change value, the other fields are retrieved on to the info-path screen from the xml file.

Hyperlinks can be incorporated.

We have seen the works so far and have been discussing the pros and cons of the application and the features available. Looks like security is a major concern here.