To:     All WinTOTAL Aurora (version 5) users
From: Adam Calvery, VP Appraisal Products, a la mode, inc.
Re:    Aurora:  Get your February update

Today’s WinTOTAL Aurora update is now available on our servers. To download it, click the “Get Updates” button on the toolbar in your Appraisal Desktop.  Today’s update has improvements to a number of areas, with the most significant changes being in Aurora's contacts. You can read the update’s release notes at the end of this message, or to visit the Aurora Status site, click here.

I’m excited to get these contacts improvements out to all our users.  Contact management and synchronization in WinTOTAL Aurora is an area we’ve been working to improve for some time.  Frankly, it’s been needed, as many of you know.  We’ve been testing and refining “Contacts 2.0” since last fall, and if you’ve had issues with contacts in the past I know you’ll be pleased with today’s update.  I’d like to briefly mention some of the improvements. 

The first is what we call Ad Hoc contacts.  This will only apply to those who manually type contact information directly onto the order form rather than picking one from the database dropdown.  Until now, duplicate contacts could be created in WinTOTAL by entering the contact directly onto the order form, on an “ad hoc” basis.  WinTOTAL assumed you wanted this to be a contact and would create one for you when the report was synchronized to your XSite.  Now, WinTOTAL won’t make that assumption.  If a contact is typed in the order form in the Lender, Client, Bill To, Ship To, Appraiser, or Supervisor fields, you'll be prompted to create an Ad Hoc contact when you save.  And in the Contacts PowerView you'll now see a separate group in your database called Ad Hoc.  Also, even though a contact is in the Ad Hoc group, you can still use it in both XSite and WinTOTAL Desktop Billing management reports.

Next is the Contacts Cleanup Wizard found in your Contacts PowerView in the Appraisal Desktop.  It walks you through merging and cleaning up your contacts database so you have one master list of all contacts.  Once clean, it stays clean, and it ensures your WinTOTAL and XSites contacts are always in sync going forward. 

The third contacts improvement in this update is also geared towards users who also have an XSite.  From now on, when you synchronize orders with net.X Connect, your contacts will be synchronized as well.  We’ve dramatically improved the speed of synchronization, and you’ll be prompted when net.X Connect detects that a contact has been changed in both WinTOTAL and your XSite so you can decide which contact record is the right one.  Also, on the XSite you can now assign certain appraisers as contact managers which can help eliminate the contact duplication that working with remote offices has been known to produce. 

Looking forward, we’ll have a small update in mid-March that will contain the final supporting files in WinTOTAL for the live release of DaVinci Mobile Pro.  The DaVinci Mobile Pro live release will be a few days after that update.  (For more information on DaVinci, click here.)   Then we’ll have another substantial WinTOTAL update like today’s at the end of March.

If you have any feedback on the new contacts tools, please let me know directly, and as always, thank you for your business.

Adam Calvery
VP, Appraisal Products,
a la mode, inc.
adam@alamode.com

WinTOTAL Aurora (v5) – February 29, 2008 Update
This update contains the new Aurora contacts system. Read the release notes below for more details.

Ad Hoc Contacts:
In the past, contact duplication issues were caused by typing contact information directly onto the order form in a report instead of choosing one from the database dropdown.  WinTOTAL would assume you wanted this to be a contact and would create one for you when the report was synchronized to your XSite.  With this release of Contacts, WinTOTAL will no longer make any assumptions.  If text is typed in the order form in the Lender, Client, Bill To, Ship To, Appraiser, or Supervisor fields, you'll be prompted to create an Ad Hoc contact when you save.  They're called Ad Hoc contacts because WinTOTAL can’t verify if the contact is in the database.  Inside the Contacts PowerView in the Appraisal Desktop you'll see a new group called Ad Hoc.  Here you can view these entries.  Also, both XSite and Desktop Billing management reports keep track of files and invoices tied to Ad Hoc contacts.

Contact synchronization with net.X Connect:
For those of you that use an XSite, we’ve moved the contact synchronization process into net.X Connect.  Every time you synchronize your orders, you'll be synchronizing contacts as well.  We’ve also increased the speed of contact synchronization tremendously, and added the ability to resolve conflicts between contacts used in different reports if needed.  You'll be prompted when we detect that a contact has been changed in both locations and asks you to pick the right one. The new contact synchronization also performs a one-to-one match between your WinTOTAL contacts database and your XSite contacts database.  No longer will you have different results depending on where you’re viewing your contacts.

Contacts Cleanup Wizard:
Many Aurora customers have had issues with duplicate contacts cluttering their database as well as issues with synchronizing contacts to Appraiser XSites. You need a way to clean up your database and keep it that way. You also need a way to update the contacts tied to reports so that your duplicates are never re-introduced. To that end, we've built a Contacts Cleanup Wizard, available in the Contacts PowerView of the Appraisal Desktop. The Contacts Cleanup Wizard gives you the ability to:

• Consolidate all your contacts from your XSite and Aurora presenting a master list of all contacts. This will ensure that you're fixing both your WinTOTAL contacts and your XSite contacts at once. You won't have to worry about a synchronization undoing all your cleanup work.
• Group your companies and contacts to easily find duplicates. For instance, if you have 5 contacts all with the name John Doe, you’ll be able to group on name, find all 5 contacts, and then select them all to merge into one contact.
• Start the process of cleaning up your contacts and come back at a later date to finish it. We understand that even with this new tool, you may not want to clean up your entire database at once. You can start and come back later, picking up where you left off. 

DaVinci Support:

• Previously, opening a WinTOTAL report in DaVinci, then moving it back to be opened in WinTOTAL again would cause existing non-DaVinci sketch files to be removed.  These sketch files will now be saved to the report's Digital Workfile.
• When using DaVinci with WinTOTAL, files created in Aurora will retain the addenda after the field inspection is completed with DaVinci.
• In certain circumstances, sketches done in DaVinci would become inaccessible in reports started in Aurora.  This has been corrected.

Desktop Billing:

• Previously, incorrect information could be shown for invoices assigned to companies without contacts on some management reports.  This has been corrected.

Delivery Wizard:

• Existing recipients will now show in the “message recipients” list when adding additional recipients via the Search Contacts dialog.
• Delivering a report through the GAC plugin that only contains the 1007 form will now include all signature files.

Files PowerView:

• Associating a Desktop Billing report to an XSite report will now refresh correctly and display both the XSite icon and the Billing icon in the Appraisal Desktop. 

General:

• Added a recent response drop-down for the “Title of form” field when you use the “Add” document utility in the Forms PowerView. (Thanks Paul L.)
• Importing Athena image databases will now work correctly even if duplicate image filenames exist in that database.
• On the Canadian additional comps page you can now correctly type into all available fields in the additional comments section.

Images PowerView:          

• In certain scenarios, using the image optimizer from the Images PowerView could cause comparable photos to be replaced with subject photos.  This has been corrected.

Virtual Earth Mapping: 

• Comparables that have been geocoded in the Comps Database will now display the correct confidence level in the map wizard.
• Replacing an aerial or hybrid map with a road map would no longer cause an extra map page to be added to the report.
• Completing Step 3 in the wizard will now immediately refresh the subject address in the Maps PowerView when the option to make all alphabetical characters uppercase is selected.
• Using the “Location map only” option will no longer cause previously altered flood, census, and USPS data to revert back.

net.X Connect:

• Auto-close option will now work correctly if an order fails to sync on the first try but succeeds on the second try.
• Carriage returns in a WinTOTAL order are no longer converted to “vbcrlf” when the order is edited and uploaded to the XSite.
• Choosing the link to Configure net.X Connect on the net.X dialog multiple times without closing net.X now works correctly.
• Having a large number of purged contacts on the XSite could cause synching contacts between WinTOTAL and the XSite to be extremely slow.  This has been corrected.
• Learn more about net.X Connect link will now open to the correct section in the WinTOTAL User's Guide.
• Occasionally, net.X Connect will appear to lock up while synching with your XSite.  This has been corrected.
• Order changes will now correctly sync down from the XSite after an order has been unchecked for XSite integration, then re-checked.  You will now be prompted to associate the order or create a new one.
• Payment information from the XSite will now update the invoice in a signed WinTOTAL report.
• The prompt to send a support request will no longer be shown if a report fails to sync on its first try but succeeds on the second try.
• Resolved an issue with reports being XSite Integrated but not showing the XSite icon in the Appraisal Desktop.
• Sorting by the Edit column in the send status will now work correctly.
• The conflict resolution screen will no longer pop up unless information has been changed in both locations, WinTOTAL and the XSite.

Order PowerView:

• The scrollbar is now available if the company and/or contact name extends past the available window width in the Contacts Find dialog. 
• Selecting a contact from the Order PowerView will now populate the correct address whether the contact is set to “use company address” or “use this address” in the actual contact record.
• Creating Ad Hoc contacts by typing them into the order form will now set the correct phone extension if available.
• Opening reports that contain contacts not currently in the database, and then choosing to not save the report will no longer force contacts to be created as Ad Hoc.
• FEMA Flood Zones on the Order PowerView now retain new data when manually changed after automatic retrieval.

Property Presentation Wizard: 

• The Property Presentation Wizard no longer loses focus when extracting photos from the report being delivered.
• Canadian users can now upload reports to their XSite using the Property Presentation Wizard.

WinTOTAL Print Engine:

• When creating PDF files in WinTOTAL, the default compatibility has been increased from version 4.x to version 5.x to support DaVinci sketches.  Sketches created with DaVinci use transparent layers to render the areas, which are not supported in versions of the PDF file format prior to v5.x.

New Forms (US):

• Desktop Restricted Use Appraisal Report [01/2008]
• Desktop Valuation Appraisal Summary Report [01/2008]
• HUD Appraisal Review Report
• HUD Appraisal Review Report Addendum
• Letter of Transmittal [Automatic Lgl w/sup sig] 
• Operating Expense Analysis Worksheet [HUD-92274 5/03]
• Uniform Underwriting and Transmittal Summary [06/05] 
• USDA Rural Development Guaranteed Rural Housing [10/06]

Revised Forms (US): 

• GP Condo [Signature][6/2007][Lgl]
• GP Condo [No Signature][6/2007][Lgl]
• GP Condo [Signature][6/2007][Ltr]
• GP Condo [No Signature][6/2007][Ltr]
• Environmental Compliance Record [Rev. 7/01]
• [MREC] Desk Property Evaluation
• Multi-Purpose Supplemental Addendum [Rev. 2/2003]
• One-Unit Field Review [Form 2000] [03/05] 
• Settlement Statement [HUD-1 3/86] 
• Settlement Statement [Transactions w/o Seller] [HUD-1A 2/94] 

New Pocket TOTAL Forms (US):

• GP Consumer [No Signature][10/2007][Ltr]
• GP Consumer [Signature][10/2007][Ltr]
• GP Consumer Short Form [No Signature][10/2007][Ltr]
• GP Consumer Short Form [Signature][10/2007][Ltr]