[appsuite-announce] Open-Xchange releases OX App Suite v7.8.4, OX Documents v7.8.4 and OX Guard v2.8.0

[Open-Xchange App Suite Maintenance Announcements]

Dear Open-Xchange Customers and Partners,

Open-Xchange is pleased to announce the release of OX App Suite v7.8.4, OX Documents v7.8.4 and OX Guard v2.8.0.

As always, Open-Xchange works hard to improve the usability and functionality of its products, and this release is no exception. In addition to new features and functionality this release cycle includes usability updates based on ongoing usability testing.

OX App Suite v7.8.4

OX App Suite is a modular platform designed for Telcos, Hosters, and other Service Providers and delivers a wide range of cloud-based services. These include email, file sharing, collaborative document editing, document management, time management, cloud storage and metrics for monitoring end-user behavior. 

Enhancements to the OX App Suite platform in this release include:

- The ability to collect and export User Feedback with Star-Ratings and Comments
- Improved 3rd Party Account Wizards and Settings
- Client Onboarding Wizard on Mobile Devices
- Support for IMAP \Flagged in addition to, or as a replacement for, Color Flags
- The ability to trigger OX Presentation from OX Mail
- Improved Mail Filter Support with more Conditions and Actions
- An alternative to IMAP master authentication based on OAuth 2.0
- An OX Drive Image/Photo Slideshow
- A new Email Unread Folder
- Custom Default Fonts for emails
- Improved Sharing Dialog in OX Drive

OX Documents v7.8.4

For service providers looking to attract customers, OX Documents is the perfect hook. Fully integrated into OX App Suite, OX Documents now includes the following new features:

- Support for Encrypted Documents - Improved workflows for creating secure documents
- Work with Shapes - Insert and edit all shapes from OX Presentation in OX Text and OX Spreadsheet
- OX Text: Table of Content Support
- OX Spreadsheet: New Formula Toolbar
- OX Presentation: Support for OpenOffice / LibreOffice

OX Guard v2.8.0

With this new release, Open-Xchange integrates OX Guard even more closely with OX App Suite, particularly when composing and reading emails. OX Guard now makes use of the native OX App Suite functions for viewing and composing emails, thus creating a seamless experience between encrypted and non-encrypted messages.

What’s New in General and Feature Overviews

Open-Xchange now provides more detailed overviews and Feature Overview documents relating to new product releases. These can be found at 
https://www.open-xchange.com/portfolio/whats-new/

General information

Open-Xchange encourages administrators to regularly update to the latest available release. To ensure a stable and up to date environment please note the different versions supported. An overview of the latest supported Major, Minor and Public Patch Releases can be found in the Knowledgebase at:
http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:Version_Support_Committment

Important - Please Note

- There is a major Hazelcast library update to OX App Suite v7.8.4. This means that when updating from an earlier backend version, due to the upgraded library, it is not possible to form a cluster of nodes that run previous version of Hazelcast (i.e. exiting volatile data in the cluster will be lost during the update). A consistent Hazelcast cluster is needed for cluster-wide cache invalidation. To circumvent problems with database update tasks that need to perform cache invalidation, please follow the steps described here: http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:Running_a_cluster#Upgrades_of_the_Hazelcast_library
Please also note that session migration is not possible between versions. This usually affects all user sessions that are stored in a distributed map, and will require the users to re-login after the update. Running incompatible versions of Hazelcast within a cluster will result in log entries showing the conflicting node and version information.

- During the upgrade to 7.8.4 the existing JAVA_XTRAOPTS configuration property of the middleware stack in the file ox-scriptconf.sh will automatically be split up and migrated to a new categories approach. Please review the JVM command line options here: (http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:MiddlewareStartup#Evaluate_JVM_commandline_options) and review the automatically upgraded configuration file.

- In accordance with the supported platform policy, Open-Xchange will discontinue maintenance and support for Connector for Microsoft Outlook, Open-Xchange Updater with the next major release (planned beginning of 2018). Existing customers with Connector for Microsoft Outlook in their portfolio, will receive full maintenance and support until beginning 2018.

To support the discontinuation, we are happy to announce that Open-Xchange will provide releases of all native apps including OX Mail App, OX Drive App, eM client for OX App Suite and OX Sync App over the coming months. This has the advantage of providing a similar user experience on all devices, to all clients, and allows us to take a holistic approach to the development of our product portfolio.

- Please note: to ensure a stable and up to date environment, starting with OX App Suite v7.8.4, Open-Xchange will support Suse Linux Enterprise Server 12 together with OpenJDK 7 instead of IBM Java 7. For details of all supported platforms and databases please refer to the requirements page at: http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:OX_System_Requirements#Server_Platforms

- As started with OX App Suite v7.8.3 Open-Xchange deprecates its munin monitoring scripts that are based on parsing the output of command-line tools like 'showruntimestats'. In the past, two versions of every monitoring script have been maintained, one based on such output and the other based on direct HTTP communication with the OX middleware. From OX App Suite v7.8.4, only the HTTP-based versions will be available, using Jolokia (https://jolokia.org/) under the hood. Details regarding Jolokia-based monitoring can be found here: http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=OX_munin_scripts and http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=Jolokia.

Shipped packages and versions

- Open-Xchange App Suite Middleware 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange OX6 Middleware 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange App Suite frontend 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange USM 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange EAS 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Updater 7.8.4-rev3 (6.18.34)
- Open-Xchange Drive Restricted 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Documents 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Documents Frontend 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Readerengine 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Documentconverter 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Documentconverter API 7.8.4-rev3
- Open-Xchange Connector for Microsoft Outlook 7.2.23
- Open-Xchange Notifier 1.0.6
- Open-Xchange Guard v2.8.0-rev3

Complete Release Notes 

- Open-Xchange App Suite / OX 6 Middleware v7.8.4:
http://software.open-xchange.com/products/appsuite/doc/Release_Notes_for_Release_7.8.4_2017-05-23.pdf

- OX Guard v2.8.0 for OX App Suite v7.8.4:
http://software.open-xchange.com/products/guard/doc/Release_Notes_for_Release_2.8.0_2017-05-23.pdf

Download and Installation

For details of how to install and update OX App Suite, please refer to the instructions provided at:
http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:UpdatingOXPackages

For the Open-Xchange Server 6 update, please follow the instructions provided at:
http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=UpdatingOXPackages#Updating_Open-Xchange_Server_Packages_6.22.x

For details of how to install and update OX Documents, please refer to the instructions provided at:
http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:Documents_Installation_Guide

For details of how to install and update OX Guard, please refer to the instructions provided at:
http://oxpedia.org/wiki/index.php?title=AppSuite:OX_Guard

Best regards,
Your Open-Xchange Team

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Open-Xchange AG, Rollnerstr. 14, 90408 Nuremberg, District Court Nuremberg HRB 24738
Managing Board: Rafael Laguna de la Vera, Carsten Dirks, Uwe Reumuth 
Chairman of the Board: Richard Seibt
  
European Office: 
Open-Xchange GmbH, Olper Huette 5f, D-57462 Olpe, Germany, District Court Siegen, HRB 8718 
Managing Directors: Frank Hoberg, Martin Kauss
 
US Office: 
Open-Xchange. Inc., 530 Lytton Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94301, USA 
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