Reservations Plug-In for Microsoft Outlook: Installation

ARCHIBUS users setting up meetings and appointments in Microsoft Outlook may wish to integrate the ARCHIBUS Reservation features so that they can reserve rooms right from Outlook at the time that they establish their meetings. To meet this need, ARCHIBUS provides the Reservations Plug-In for Microsoft Outlook. The Plug-In screens are available from Outlook's default Appointment view. By means of Web Services, the Plug-In queries available rooms from ARCHIBUS Web Central, requests reservations for rooms, and updates and deletes reservations.

You can deploy the Reservations application using the ARCHIBUS Outlook Plug-in and Exchange integration. When having both the Outlook Plug-in and also Exchange integration configured, there's no direct interaction from Web Central to Exchange when creating reservations with the Outlook Plug-In. Rather, Outlook connects to Exchange directly to save the meeting. See Configuring the Reservations Application with Exchange Integration.

Supported Languages

The ARCHIBUS Plug-In for Outlook ships with resource DLLs compiled for French, German, Spanish, Dutch, Italian, Simplified Chinese, and English. The Plug-In loads the appropriate DLL based on the workstation operating system.

Deployment Requirements

Plug-In Compatibility with Operating Systems and Outlook Program

• The Plug-In works with
  • Outlook 2007 with Service Pack 3. Older versions (RTM, SP1, SP2) are not supported.
  • Outlook 2010 on Windows 7 x86 and x64 systems.

Client Prerequisites

• Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5
• Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Tools for Office Runtime

ARCHIBUS Web Central Configurations - Outlook Plug-In Prerequisite

When using the Plug-In for Microsoft Outlook, Web Central must use one of the single sign-on configurations. See SSO Authentication.

If Web Central is configured to use Remote User with IIS authentication, the OutlookPlugin.dll.config needs to be modified adding AuthenticationType=”Windows”, as per below.

<Settings DefaultAppServerLocation="http://servername/archibus/" 
DefaultProject="HQ-Sybase" 
RememberCredentials="false" >
  <AppServerLocationHistory>   
   <add AppServerLocation="http://servername/archibus/">  
    <Authentication AuthenticationType="Windows" />                                    
   </add>
  </AppServerLocationHistory>
</Settings>

Note: The trailing slash after /archibus/ is required for both attribute values in this configuration.

Client Deployment

The System Administrator sends out a link to the setup.exe program for the Plug-In on the network (e.g. \\fileshare\tools\archibus\room reservations\setup.exe). The URL to the ARCHIBUS WebC program and project ID are set by Admin in the room-reservation.install.properties file, see Layout of the room-reservation.install.properties File.

Setup.exe reads the room-reservation.install.properties file and updates the ARCHIBUS\xx.x\Outlook Plugin\OutlookPlugin.dll.config file.

Before the installation starts, the room-reservation.install.properties file must be located in the same folder as setup.exe . The internal customer runs the installation.

As the Admin, you have two options for deploying the client application over the network:

• Create a deployment package out of the setup.exe by using the deployment tools at your disposal.

• Use \remote-client-install\msi-install\*.msi

  Note: The URL to the ARCHIBUS Web Central application and the Project ID can also be changed by editing the OutlookPlugin.dll.config file available in the Outlook Plugin installation directory.
  Set “DefaultAppServerLocation” to your ARCHIBUS server address
  Set “DefaultProject” to the ARCHIBUS Project you want to connect to
  

  Note 2: The ARCHIBUS Outlook Plugin log is available at: C:\Users\”Username”\AppData\Roaming\ARCHIBUS\21.2\OutlookPlugin.

Client Deployment over the Network

The Administrator has two options:

• Deploy through the command line.
• Deploy through Active Directory. In this case, the client installation requirement must be met prior to starting the deployment. See the above section Deployment Requirements.

Command Line

Note: For information on forming the Command Line, see How to Form the Command Line and below examples of Silent Install/Uninstall through command line

Set the following properties:

WEBC_URL=”http://<serverName>:<port>/archibus/” , PROJECT_ID=” HQ-Sybase”.

REM INSTALL - To install, run the following command:

msiexec /I "<FileName>.msi" WEBC_URL="http://<serverName>:<port>/archibus/" PROJECT_ID=”HQ-Sybase” ADDLOCAL=ALL ./l*v ".\<LogFileName>

REM DE-INSTALL - To uninstall,run the following command:

msiexec /X <Product Code>

where Product Code is the Product Code for the release you are uninstalling. You can find the Product Code in the Windows Registry after installation, under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\.

Active Directory

Before deployment, open the provided msi db and manually set the above properties (for instance, use Orca to edit the msi db).

Upgrade Procedures

Upgrades within the same product version

The System Administrator distributes them in the same way as for Installation. Only version signed deliverables are being updated; the preferences files are preserved. See the Minor Upgrades discussion below.

Version upgrades

The major version upgrade installation and the parallel deployment are not supported. To upgrade to a new version, the Admin has to uninstall the previous one and install the new one.

Minor upgrades

Minor upgrades are fixes within the same version.There are two situations:

• The program is installed on a user’s system. In this case, the Administrator deploys the update without uninstalling the existing application.
• First-time installation. The Admin deploys the update as the first time, as per the standard installation above.