Release Notes

What's new in version 8.5

January 2020

Version 8.5 supports integration with Zapier, drops support for Internet Explorer and older browsers, and provides a number of new features and enhancements over previous releases.

Integrate Alloy Navigator with other apps

Our API module has been improved to provide the ability to integrate Alloy Navigator with other apps using API connectors. For example, you can use Zapier to:

  • Send a message to your Slack channel when an Incident is submitted in Alloy Navigator.

  • Create a Trello card when a new Change Request is approved.

  • Trigger an Alloy Navigator Incident when a CloudWatch Alarm state changes.

  • Integrate a chat solution into the Self Service Portal and automatically create Incident tickets from chat session transcripts.

For detailed instructions, see Integrations: Zapier Integration.

Keep up with the latest software and hardware

Alloy Audit Tools has been updated to version 6.2.3 The new version includes these changes:

  • Added support for macOS Catalina (version 10.15).

  • Implemented proper detection of disk size and free space on macOS High Sierra (version 10.13) and later.

  • The speed of 10-gigabit or faster network adapters is reported correctly.

  • Added detection of installation keys and serial numbers for the latest Microsoft products:

    • Microsoft Windows 10 2019 LTSC (Long-Term Servicing Channel)

    • Microsoft Visio 2019

View more data on dashboards

Tables on dashboards now have a more compact single-line view. Instead of wrapping, table cell content is now trimmed to better utilize dashboard real estate.

Eliminate redundancy

In order to eliminate redundancy, parent objects no longer track changes of their child objects in the history.

Manage your mobile devices from the Web App

Mobile App users now can view their registered mobile devices in the Web App and unregister the devices that are no longer in use.

Meet our Mobile App Service

The Mobile Portal has been renamed Mobile App Service to better reflect the intended purpose of the module.

Support for Internet Explorer and older browsers

We maintain and develop the Alloy Navigator platform to support the latest, most stable, and most secure web browser versions. We highly recommend updating your browser to the latest version to have the best and most secure user experience across our services.

As of January 4th, 2020, we dropped support for Microsoft Internet Explorer 11 (IE11) and older versions. Product updates and new features are no longer being tested on Internet Explorer, and we no longer provide fixes to bugs that occur exclusively on Internet Explorer.

Other enhancements and resolved issues

API module

In order to support integration with API connectors (like Zapier), our API module has been extended and improved. The new version introduces these changes:

  • Added the ability to retrieve:
    • Lists of object Activities.
    • Lookup values of reference fields, such as Incident statuses or Computer types.
    • Data from all available object fields when listing objects.
    • The Person record for the currently logged in user.
  • For a better adherence with ISO 8601 Date and Time Format, the API module now recognizes Z as the timezone designator for the zero UTC offset.

  • Filtering conditions now support additional comparison operators for numeric and date values and short date formats.

  • Filtering conditions for POST requests retrieving lists of objects now support:
    • Using additional comparison operators for numeric and date values, such as >, >=, <, <=.
    • Short date formats, such as YYYY (e.g. 1997), YYYY-MM (e.g. 1997-07), YYYY-MM-DD (e.g. 1997-07-16).
Web App
  • Now new workflow icons will be available for Web App users within 5 minutes after they are changed by the Alloy Navigator administrator.

  • The Select Relationship Type dialog box now properly displays names of parent-child relationship types. Previously it could display child-parent names instead of parent-child ones.

  • Fixed the issue when Web App users could accidentally submit the same workflow action many times.

  • Fixed issues preventing the submission of Action forms containing an empty read-only Date/Time field.

  • Fixed the issue with the automatic distribution of grid column widths, which in some cases produced extremely narrow columns with text characters stacked vertically.

  • Fixed the issue with dashboard charts unexpectedly opening multiple tabs when clicking on a chart segment.

  • Fixed the issue with some widget values not refreshing correctly when a data reload is triggered manually.

  • Added support for date formats that use abbreviated month names, such as "Nov" in English (US).

Self Service Portal
  • Corrected the label for the Attachments section of Knowledge Base articles.

Integration with email and sending notifications
  • Outgoing notifications no longer fail when the recipient address contains the display name, as per RFC2822.

  • The Mail Connector no longer loses attachments and inline images from digitally signed email messages received via the EWS protocol.

  • The folder where the Mail Connector stores cached images and files now is automatically cleared once a day.

  • Added support for long usernames (up to 200 characters) and passwords (up to 45 characters) in Mail Connector and Archiving jobs.

Desktop App
  • Fixed the Person Merge feature in the Desktop App.

  • Fixed the issue with displaying workflow action forms containing Text elements. Previously such forms could appear cropped in the Desktop App.

Reports
  • Report Viewer: Reloading a report with new parameters no longer unexpectedly resets the report's end date to the beginning of the day thus excluding all data collected during the day.

Alloy Discovery
  • Errors that could occur in the Network Diagram no longer lock up the Alloy Discovery app.

Alloy Installer
  • The Alloy Installer has been revised to provide a better-organized user interface for choosing advanced installation options.