Version 4.0.0 – 4.0.9

Written by Ian Landsman · 02.12.2021

Upgrade Documentation – Note upgrading requires you be on HelpSpot 3.2.12 first.

Major Features:

  • HelpSpot Cloud – Hosting for HelpSpot provided by Userscape
  • Native iOS/Android applications
  • True multi-lingual support (UTF-8 character set support)
  • Better search via SphinxSearch search engine
  • See https://www.helpspot.com/new for more!

Additional features:

  • Sidebar can search request history.
  • Added user option – User can decide to make sidebar search full history by default
  • Modified attachment handling so they are not lost when switching between public/private/external.
  • CLI Commands now supported in HelpSpot!
    • attachments:tofile – Save database attachments to the filesystem
    • convert:base – Convert helpspot 3 database to helpspot 4 database
    • convert:requests – Convert requests to UTF8 for helpspot 3 to 4 update
    • search:config – Generate configuration for Sphinx serach engine
    • update – After installing new HelpSpot files, run this command to update HelpSpot, useful for automating the update process
    • db:exists – Test if HelpSpot database (as configured in config.php) exists and has HelpSpot data within it
    • reset:email-templates – Reset email templates to “factory defaults”
  • Improved the markdown handling
  • Ability to add attachments to responses.
  • Added replying to notifications as public responses back to customer
  • API error responses for merged requests now returns the request ID of the correct request. Developer Note: API errors can now return meta data about the request $this->_error(208, ”, [‘field_name’ => ‘some_value’]);
  • Added additional email loop protection – HelpSpot ensures it is not emailing itself
  • Added private.meta – api call for getting basic details on the installation
  • Added private.util.getAllStaff – gets all staff ever in the install
  • Added private.util.getStaffPhoto – base64 of staffer image. Expects xPerson passed in via get
  • Viewing of closed requests now tracked and displayable
  • Improved display of currently viewing. Now shows in the workspace grid.
  • Added grouping by customer id and customer email to requests over time and total over time reports
  • Support for Outlook’s [mailto: example@domain.com] format in forwarded emails.
  • Filter has new “last update by” column, to show if last update (of any kind) was done by staff, the system or a customer.
  • Custom fields of type date or datetime in email defined as ##hs_custom
    :1234567890## can now parse human-readable dates, such as: ##hs_custom
    :11/13/1984 11:59:00## (the date format there can vary greatly and still be parsed accurately).
  • Added LDAP library that’s easier to use for Authentication and Live Lookup.
  • Added private.request.markRead and private.request.markUnRead (only usable for requests assigned to the user)
  • Implemented Google’s latest reCAPTCHA on public portal
  • Added private.request.markTrash – mark a request as trash
  • Added private.request.markSpam – mark a request as spam
  • Removed fTrash flag option from private.request.create and private.request.update
  • Added skipCustomChecks to private.request.create and private.request.update – allows custom field checks to be skipped
  • Added private.response.listAll – returns a list of all responses
  • Added private.response.usersMostCommon – returns the top 10 responses used by a user
  • Added private.response.get – returns a response
  • Added webhooks to triggers and automation rules (need to document sample of what’s POST’d perhaps in api docs?)
  • Added ##hs_request_id:012345## email parser tag to assign update to an existing request ID, useful if automated systems (e.g. eBay support) strips out the {12345} request ID tag from the subject line
  • Removed spellcheck module in TinyMCE wysiwyg in favor or browser-based spellcheck. All modern browsers now support this (including IE10+).
  • Live Lookup now expects your xml to be in UTF-8.

Bug Fixes:

  • Fixed users not receiving email on new, un-open requests.
  • Fixed dtGMTClosed date when setting fOpen = 0 via api –
  • Fixed a bug where clicking a predefined response parent folder would send the user to /null –
  • Fixed a bug when activating a previously de-activated trigger with a quote in the name would trigger a js error. –
  • Fixed a bug where some API calls that error could dump out invalid XML.
  • Fixed word break in request history for IE9 – NOTE: Need to document the portal templates css change –
  • Fixed the html to text conversion when quoting.
  • Fixed bug when calculating minutes in reports.
  • Fixed bug where multiple space-separated names in ##hs_customer_firstname## and ##hs_customer_lastname## email tags weren’t parsed correctly. For example fname: herbert walker and lname: bush would turn into fname: herbert and lname: walker bush.
  • Fixed bug where trigger notifications to staff included incorrect REQUESTCHECKURL value
  • Fixed bug with advanced tags encoding
  • Fixed bug where setting batch status to active wouldn’t reopen the request.
  • Fixed xss issue with customer information and extra fields.
  • Improved on styling for minor issues
  • Improved cache handling for images retrieved behind authentication
  • No longer url-encoding mailbox folder (INBOX and subfolders) so customers can include sub-folder mailboxs such as INBOX/helpspot.
  • Fixed KB title to be converted to htmlentities on save.
  • Fixed cdata in multiple results of LL
  • Fixed toggling of tags in responses
  • Fixed ability to set out of office forwarding to yourself. Basically anyone except the current staff you are editing.
  • Fixed issue where if you was subscribed to two tickets and later they became merged. You were subscribed twice.
  • Force logout users when marking them as inactive from admin.
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Ian Landsman
Ian founded HelpSpot in 2005 with the goal of making every interaction with your customers simple and efficient.
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