Implementing the Toshiba e-FOLLOW Cloud Service

Creating the Connection

Your first area is to create a new Connection for Toshiba e-FOLLOW Cloud.

This can be accessed under the Main Menu under Connections

Then by clicking "Add Connection"

Expand "EXTRACTOR TYPE" and select e-FOLLOW Cloud.

We first start by entering the customer information in the Name field. This is the Toshiba country code e.g. "TUIS", followed by the customer name as it appears in your CRM, i.e. "Stocker Bros".

The "Description" is the expiry date for that implementation, this is in the format of YYYY-MM-DD, e.g. 2028-01-31, for the 31st of January 2028. This description must be updated if the customer renews:

In the tabs on the right, each area must be configured for that customer. Starting with the "API Connection Details", you will be entering in the URL of the e-FOLLOW tenant, with the field underneath being populated by the API token.

The URL + API Token can be generated within the e-FOLLOW Cloud UI under Settings -> General -> Database / Support:

Moving onto the next tab "API Configuration", the number of days to export is recommended at 730 days. Whilst you can enter more, consider the impact on the e-FOLLOW Cloud resources and the relevancy for that customer. In some instances, you may only be able to retrieve up to 30 days from the API, but Intuitive will build up this data incrementally over time.

"Configuration Data" is a JSON statement for how we handle the results from the e-FOLLOW Cloud API. The latest copy of this can be found here.

With that data entered in you can also edit the pre-configured SQL View for how Intuitive aggregates and presents the data, by clicking on the "View" tab. This step can be considered as optional, but if the customer has requested modifications to what data points are supplied to dashboard fields, then this is the area you change. This is also an area that is cited during support procedures.

The main areas to change are at the top of the SQL Editor - particularly around time ranges retrieved (SQL_View_Date_Range) and the contents of the main configuration columns (e.g. [User])

Clicking "Scheduling", set the scheduled refresh time to 1am each day.

The last tab is "Activity" which will display the logs relevant to this Connection. Information is only visible here after having saved the Connection, so you can check back on this tab to see more. You can also refresh the logs by clicking the icon in the top right:

The final step for the Connection is to Save via the Floppy Disk, and to name the Connection as the full legal name of the customer, then publish the Connection to the appropriate area under "Administration (Toshiba Admins ONLY)". 

1. Commercial Installs - Invoiced customers
2. Trials - Customers trialling the Print Management software
3. NFR's - Showrooms, typically one per product

Organisations

Next, we need to assign our Connection to an Organisation. If you recall to the previous module, this is where we also assign currency values to costs. Open the Main Menu, then under Administration, there is “Organisations”.

In this new screen, we need to add an organisation for this customer. This is performed by clicking the “+ Add Organisation” icon.

In these fields, enter a name for the customer. Ideally, this is the same company name that your sale was addressed to. For example, if I am performing this implementation for the customer “TUIS-Stocker Bros.”, as it appears for its associated Connection which we created earlier.

For the Custom Dataset Field, this is where you enter in the cost symbol that will appear in multiple dashboards. This can be many different special characters, but it’s a piece of text that prefixes costs. Should you not supply a character, this will not cause an issue with usage of the dashboards as the calculated decimal value will just be used. E.g. 0.04 instead of $0.04.

Theme is the stylesheet that will be served back to the User when they login. You have a few options in the dropdown, and it is up to your discretion to select the appropriate theme.

For the Description, this is the expiry date - like the Connector.

Under "Template Connections", we need to tie the Intuitive for Print dashboards to the Customers’ Connection. Click the “+” icon:

In the resulting popup, on the left under "Template" select Intuitive for Print under:

Global -> BI Solutions -> Intuitive for Print -> Intuitive for Print

Under “Data Source” select the Connection you saved earlier in this process. Remember, this is the Connection with the customers’ name or integration name. e.g., such as the below:

Global -> Administration (Toshiba Admins ONLY) -> Connections -> 1. Commercial Installs -> TUIS-Stocker Bros

Then click the Add button to add these changes.

Finally, we can add the Users if they have already been created. You can return to this part after creating the Users, but Users can also have the Organisation added at that step. Both options can be found later in the article, here.

 

Users

 

Creating Users follows a similar practise to previous iterations of the software. This is performed via Admin -> Users, and Users are added by clicking the “+ Add User” icon in the top right.

When adding a user, the fields onscreen marked with the red asterisk are mandatory. For the Shared Toshiba service, you are required to use 2FA. This is when an internal account is created inside Intuitive, with a secondary authenticator being used to allow users to sign in.

Ensure that you give this new user an appropriate role. For most users, Dashboard Viewer is the most applicable for end-customer scenario's. Consider which users are administrators to the entire platform, and who needs just Dashboard access.

We can give the user access to the dashboards on the right hand side. This is as simple as checking the box next to the published area you wish to grant access to. Then, we can save our changes.

We can finally assign our user(s) to the Organisation we created in the previous section. You have the flexibility of adding them either per user in the "Organisations" tab, clicking the "+" icon and selecting the Organisation we made earlier. 

Alternatively, you can add users in bulk when editing the Organisation directly. This is performed by editing the Organisation via the Main Menu -> Administration -> Organisations, clicking on the Organisation you created earlier then clicking on the tab marked "Users".

You need only click the "+" icon, and then select the new Users in bulk. You can also Search for key words for selecting that customer base, e.g. their email address "stockerbros".

 

Checking Data Flow

After saving the Connection, Organisation and Users, this should have given the API time to retrieve all of the customers’ print data. You can check what data has come back by opening one of our many dashboards via the left Intuitive "i" icon and by checking the "Activity" log via the Connection. In some instances, you may need to wait a few minutes for the API to completely receive the results.

Generally, the best dashboards to open are those that may show multi-year data, such as the "User Profile". This shows a breakdown of print-related activity by Month, and is a good indicator for the amount of data present.

During the setup of the Connection, you will have specified the number of days to export data from the customers’ Print Management system. In some cases, customers may have been set up within the 730 days we would normally retrieve. This is perfectly fine, as the Connection will only retrieve up to that amount of data, and thereafter will retrieve incremental data since the last print record.