Booking Of Corporate Resouces In Outlook

A month ago I told you about the development of Calendar Browser for Outlook V8, and now this tool for booking of resources within an organization is coming together nicely.

Testing
The actual new development of Calendar Browser V8 is now finished, and the testing phase has begun. Our QA team is busy trying to book resources and use the new version in all thinkable ways and with different configurations and languages. and in that process they find a number of bugs. This is normal in all development and nothing to worry about.

Some of the bugs are major or even blockers, while other are minors or mere enhancements. All bugs are reported in a SharePoint list, where all details are easily filled out or selected.

The developers are just as busy fixing the bugs, so that not the users will be disturbed by them. Most of them are quickly corrected, but once in a while the testers find an issue that takes more time to solve.

In such cases our CEO Peter, who created this resource booking tool twelve years ago, and kalmstrom.com Lead Developer Jayant join forces, and with their combined knowledge and sharp minds they always find a way to avoid the problem. At least they have so far, and I have no doubts about the future!



Documentation
While the technicians are refining the build, I am updating the Calendar Browser documentation. The kalmstrom.com Sales and Relations Manager, Siret, is also helping with that, and as we are trying the new version we both report our findings to the technicians.

This is a good way to learn the products, and we can give useful input. You should not have to be at technician to book resources with Calendar Browser, and we are closer to the every day end user when it comes to technical know how.

I think this non-technical angle is an advantage when creating the documentation, because I have seen manuals written by developers that have been impossible to understand for "normal people". And the kalmstrom.com technicians are very patient and kindly answer all our questions about resource booking with Calendar Browser.

Layout
When you go into the Outlook Calendar to book resources you want to be met by a nice user interface. Outlook is pretty good, and Calendar Browser makes use of as much Outlook functionality as possible. But we also have our own dialogs, and for the new version kalmstrom.com Graphic Desginer Jitendra has given them a face-lift.

The new design can be seen in the V8 slideshow below. When the new version has been released it will be possible to download the slideshow from the kalmstrom.com website, but for now an Issuu presentation will have to do.

Jitendra has also re-designed the installer, but to see that you will have to wait for the release of Calendar Browser V8, which will hopefully happen in November. Then it will also be possible to download this slideshow from the kalmstrom.com website.



Testimonial
Many companies and organizations use Calendar Browser for booking of their resources, and some of them have been with us for a long time. The other day we got a testimonial from a Swedish organization: who actually sponsored version 4:  "Within Sensus we have been using Calendar Browser for more than 9 years, for booking of our classroms, and we appreciate the simplicity and stability of the software. We also like the possibility to generate different kinds of reports. The support is quick, efficient and positive", says Håkan Damberg, IT Coordinator, MCSE, at Sensus (translated from Swedish).

We are always grateful for testimonials from users of the kalmstrom.com applications. They are very encouraging and we remember them when we work to improve our products.