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Documentation

July 2024

This month, we made it easier to manage your site with IaC and made more logging available. Here's what's new in Files.com in July 2024.

New Logs Available

Site administrators now have access to logs for Public Hosting activity, WebDAV activity, and Outbound Connections.

Terraform Provider for Files.com

Terraform lets you manage your infrastructure using IaC (Infrastructure as Code) processes, providing automation, standardization, and quicker provisioning and de-provisioning of your business resources. Use the Files.com Terraform ProviderExternal LinkThis link leads to an external website and will open in a new tab, and its modules, to automate management of users, folders, sharing, encryption, automations, file transfer services (FTP, SFTP, AS2, WebDAV), integrations, notifications, security, data governance, and customization of your Files.com site.

Learn more about managing your Files.com site via Terraform.

Minor Updates

Use Dedicated IPs With Custom SMTP

Sites with dedicated IP addresses and Custom SMTP settings can now be configured to use those dedicated IPs when connecting to their Custom SMTP. This won't apply to most customers, because using the general pool of IP addresses for Custom SMTP is usually secure enough. If your Custom SMTP server must whitelist the addresses allowed to connect for compliance reasons, this setting is now available.

SharePoint Integration Sync Reliability

We tracked down an elusive problem with some syncs using Microsoft SharePoint remotes. Those syncs are now more reliable. No action is needed to update your syncs.

Learn more about integrating with SharePoint.

New Authentication Option for SFTP Remote Servers

We added a new way to authenticate with remote SFTP servers. For servers that require it, you can configure your connection with both password credentials and a private key. Site administrators can choose this type of authentication when configuring your Remote Server.

Improved Performance For Syncs To Google Drive

Syncs with Google Drive now handle larger files more quickly. This improvement is already enabled for all Google Drive syncs, and there's nothing you need to do.

New Wildcard Options for Automations

We added more wildcard patterns to match the files used as the source of an Automation. You can now use curly braces { and } to supply multiple patterns, along with all of our time-related wildcards. Administrators can use the new matching options to reduce the total number of automations they need to manage.

Learn more about Matching Source Path and Filenames for an Automation.

Time Range Schedule Options for Automations

It's now simpler to configure an Automation to run every hour during your business hours, or hourly during off-peak times. The Custom Schedule option that defines when an Automation is started now supports time ranges. You can specify multiple blocks of hours, and the automation will run once per hour for each hour included in the range. You can edit any existing automation's custom schedule setting to define time ranges.

Password Authentication for AS2 Partners

You can now define password authentication to use rather than certificates for your AS2 Partners. This lets your site exchange files with more types of AS2 systems. Site administrators can enable basic authentication and provide the credentials in the trading partner configuration.

Improved Logging for AS2

We clarified the error messages that can be returned when sending AS2 messages. This helps you track down problems, such as out-of-date credentials, with less interruption. No action is needed to enable the updated messaging.

Learn more about Troubleshooting AS2.

Improved Preview Performance

We did another round of optimizing how image previews and thumbnails are generated. Previewing folders with lots of files is faster. No action is required to enable this.

Improved Error Messages for the On-Premises Agent

We improved the error messages provided by the Agent when it is running on a Windows remote. This makes it easier to debug problems with Windows not supporting certain folder names. To take advantage of this improvement, update your Agent installation to version 2.0.2122 or higher.

Removed Time Sync Requirement for Agent

The On-Premises Agent now handles host systems with clocks that are out of sync. This removes the need to run an automatic clock synchronizing system, such as NTP. Update to version 2.0.2153 or higher to enable this.

New Countries Supported for SMS 2FA

We added four more countries — Australia, Türkiye, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia — to the list of countries compatible with SMS 2FA messages. We're working on more options, so if there are other countries you'd like us to support for SMS two-factor messages, let us know.

The Internal Note field helps your users organize and manage their Share Links. We added a new setting to require the internal note on any Share Link. A site administrator can enable the setting, which applies to all Share Links.

Make an Inbox Email-Only

We added a new setting for Inboxes that accept email, allowing you to disable web uploads to that inbox. The inbox will then only allow uploads via email. Combine this with a list of allowable domains and folder settings that limit filenames to configure a fully automated, secure landing spot that receives files via email. Any administrator with access to the folder can change the inbox settings to disable the web interface.

Android 14 Support for Mobile Application

We updated our Mobile App to support Android 14. You can download the latest version from the Google Play store now.

Troubleshooting Zip Issues With Desktop Application

Some people have run into problems decompressing zip files using the Desktop application on macOS due to disk access permissions. We updated our documentation to help you troubleshoot this issue and fix your system permissions.

Better Feedback Using CLI for Syncs

We updated the CLI to display more feedback about the comparisons made while syncing a folder. This gives more reliable estimates of how long a sync will take to complete. Update your CLI to the latest version to take advantage of the new stats display.

Learn more about Synchronizing Files and Folders with the CLI.

Improved User Creation Form

This month, we redesigned the Create User page to make manually creating users faster and to provide a better overview of the available choices for each user account. Your site already has the new form.

Easily Clone Entire Folders

We added one-click access to create a copy of a folder within the same folder. The new folder takes the original folder's name followed by - copy. No action is required to enable this feature in the web interface.

Learn more about the File Manager.

The web interface now displays a warning when changing the site-wide expiration limit would immediately expire any existing Share Links. No action is required to enable this warning; it appears when you change the setting if any links would immediately expire.

Email Notifications Table

As requested, we added a Triggers column to the table on the Email Notifications page so you can see which file activities cause an email to be sent. Along with our Outbound Email Logs, making more information available in the table helps with tracking down the eternal question of "Why didn't I get an email?" No action is required to enable this column.

Markdown Formatting Guide

Numerous settings within the web interface support Markdown. We compiled a guide that demonstrates the formatting options available to you, whether in your site header or footer, clickwrap body text, or text displayed to Share Link or Inbox visitors.

SDK READMEs Updated To Clarify Use Of Base URL

The RubyExternal LinkThis link leads to an external website and will open in a new tab, PythonExternal LinkThis link leads to an external website and will open in a new tab, and .NETExternal LinkThis link leads to an external website and will open in a new tab SDK READMEs now better explain the intent of the Base URL configuration parameter: handling connections when global acceleration is disabled for your site, or when connecting to a mock server for development/CI. This is purely a documentation change, so you do not need to upgrade your SDK.

Developer Documentation Updates

We spent significant time on our Developer Documentation site this month. The introductory overview text for each language has been updated to make it more relevant to the SDK or tool you're using to connect. We re-organized the API resources (all 50+ of them) into categories that reflect our Web UI and product documentation. We also added more tools to the documentation, including Zapier and our new Terraform provider.

Check out the Developer Documentation.