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| Faxchange overview |
FaxChange is a high performance fax server integrated into the electronic mail environment. FaxChange's structure is extremely flexible and allows easy employment of company specific applications. Thanks to it FaxChange may be successfully implemented into small firms with a small number of users upto large organisations with heavy fax traffic.
FaxChange is designed to maximmally economize fax expenditure (delayed sending until off-peak hours, searching for optimal sending locations, both user and administrator time saving). FaxChange simultaneously increases the security of information engaged in fax messages. Setup and configuration of FaxChange is very simple and runs in a very short time period - it's not necessary to install any extensions on the client side and demands minimal user training. Furthermore, FaxChange possesses modules that allow simple integration with existing information systems within organisations.
FaxChange allows you to shorten this time to a minimum. You will be able to faxes easier and more comfortably directly from your personal computer with the help of electronic mail.
How does FaxChange work ?
The fax is created either using a fax printer or directly in the electronic mail client from which it is consequently sent to a suitable mail server. With the help of a connector the fax is then sent to the FaxChange server which is already taking care of the physical sending of faxes onto the public telephone network. In comparison the reception of faxes into user's personal mail boxes operates continually in the opposite direction.
FaxChange helps you to markedly reduce your fax expenditures. You can easily follow the expenditures of users, groups or projects, find out who and to where a person has faxed as well as how much it has cost. You may define whether or not a user may fax locally, inter-city or internationally, and which type of faxing is to be prohibited. It is possible to setup fax sending for particular times within off-peak periods (night or weekends) or to take advantage of FaxRouter.
It is possible to configure FaxChange so as to automatically select the optimal fax sending time in view of call tariffs. This option is configurable not only globally, i.e. for all sent faxes but also for selected fax numbers. All faxes maybe processed with three levels of priority.
This function is of interest to large organisations with a multi-branch computer network. The FaxRouter module allows faxes to be directed via a computer network to a place place/branch which are then sent. By doing this faxing can become significantly cheaper. For example, if we send a fax from Prague to Brno, it is financially more sensible to send it first via e-mail to Brno and then to fax it locally to the number for a local tariff.
FaxChange does not require the installation of a client extension - everything is installed on the server, client components are installed automatically upon initial usage of fax services. The users will save time normally necessary when sending faxes from a classic fax.
How many people in between will read it ?
FaxChange allows automatic delivery of faxes to the addressee without the participation of the operator which distributes the fax. You will receive your fax immediately after its arrival within your company and in addition the security of the operating system will safeguard the fax's confidentiality from non-registered users.
FaxChange allows a number of methods for the inbound routing of incoming faxes:
Every user can have an allocated virtual fax number which will allow incoming faxes to be routed appropriately. This method of routing requires the co-operation of the branch exchange which after fax re-directing from the virtual fax line to the physical fax line repeats for the fax server the sequence of numbers identifying the destination mail box.
faxes are routed on the base of MSN numbers.
CSID is a identification chain specific for each individual fax instrument. In accordance with the CSID FaxChange is capable of routing faxes every time to an existing user.
The OCR module in version 4.0 is capable of saving a fax from a TIFF to a text (RTF or MS Word) format. This module also implements OCR routing. OCR searches on the first page of the fax for potential addressees to which the fax is sent.
All arriving faxes on the given fax line are sorted into one mail box possible into the "shared folders" of mail server. From here it is then possible to resend the fax to the destination addressees.
Supported Private Branch Exchanges (PBX)
For the inbound routing of faxes there is a supported line of PBXs. These include Siemens, Hicom, Ericsson, Alcatel, Kapsch, AT&T, etc. FaxChange contains a module for the connection of Ericsson PBXs which as standard do not support DTMF signaling. If you need to determine whether your exchange will connect with FaxChange please contact the Technical Support Department
How long did it take for your employees to learn how to fax correctly ?
Faxing with the help of FaxChange is very easy and requires virtually no training. FaxChange is above all integrated into an electronic mail environment where faxes are sent and received just as normal e-mail from a personal computer.
FaxChange is integrated into the e-mail system of the Microsoft Exchange Server, NT/SMTP and Lotus Notes. Not all functions of FaxChange are available to all systems. FaxChange is fully compatible with MS Exchange Server and therefore offers full functionality in this respect.
Thanks to the direct integration of FaxChange with the mail server it is possible for the sending and receiving of faxes to use already existing mail clients. It isn't, therefore, necessary to install any client extensions. This allows the easier sending of text faxes or faxes with attached files from the MS family of applications or MS Explorer. If the user decides he/she may install a completely automatic local fax printer capable of sending faxes from arbitrary Windows applications.
FaxChange allows document conversion on the server. In short it means that all items sent by the user as attachments are converted into the TIFF format and consequently sent as faxes. For the conversion of documents it is necessary to install on the server the suitable applications associated with the documents. The advantage of this insertion of documents is above all the option of sending one message as an e-mail to the addressees also as faxes (E-mail addressees will get the original document whilst FaxChange safeguards the document conversion to send to the fax addressees).
FaxChange can be administered remotely from any computer running under the Windows NT Server or Workstation operating system. The administrative utilities allow easier setup and distribution of fax rights to users and fax groups, working with the queue of sent faxes, changing of their priority and possible change of number, determination of who was faxing and how much was faxed, registration of a newly created cover sheet, configuration of individual fax lines as well as other functions.
Already no useless paperwork......all faxes will be stored in the database on the disc of your server. You can of course print faxes whenever and possible combine them with classic and electronic archiving systems.
presently both MS Access and MS SQL Server databases are supported. It's possible to archive in the TIFF format or in the original form (with sent faxes) or only fax confirmations. This applies to both sent and arrived faxes. With the help of FaxChange API you can create a DLL library which will store faxes into any other system - it is also possible to implement, for example, archiving into the Document Management system.
This module provides the function of paper faxing via FaxChange. Scanned faxes are sent as are any other faxes.
This module integrates the classic table fax into the FaxChange environment. Paper faxes maybe be sent to FaxChange which then takes care of its turn-around.
The advantage of both modules is full integration of all faxing into one environment by which you may create a self contained and full fax archive.
When sending faxes with the help of FaxChange you may assign an arbitrary number of addressees to any one fax. FaxChange automatically fills in the necessary information from the fax addresses (name, address, etc) into the cover sheet of every fax.
fax addresses may be used just like normal addresses from Outlook Contacts as with your personal fax addresses or fax "custom recipients' from the global directory. It is also possible to assign more than one fax numbers to one addressee by which FaxChange will then attend to individual numbers until it comes across either an engaged or faulty number.
The user may either take advantage of his/her own personal cover page or an common version registered on the FaxChange server. Pages maybe easily created via the cover page editor provided within FaxChange. A number of variables maybe be assigned to each cover sheet which are adapted to the given addressee.
FaxChange approaches so called Faxmailing in special manner - batch sending of a single fax to a number of addressees (fax sent to X addressees where X is after installation pre-configured to 10). FaxChange allows the automatic lowering of Fax priorities (other faxes "overtake" FaxMailing faxes, cover sheets are archived for each addressee, only one page containing personal data (saving of disk space) and FaxMailings may be archived minus the fax body (only the record of fax sending as opposed to the actual fax - saves disc space).
FaxChange allows the easy and rapid expansion of the faxing capacity in the case of an increase in fax traffic. To allow this expansion to take place a simple administrative action is required. In the event of insufficient fax line capacities simply adding a extra modem or card will immediately increase this capacity.
FaxChange was developed for heavy fax traffic.
Specialised fax cards such as Brooktrout and GammaLink allow processor loading to be relieved. All faxing is carried out on the card itself which is equipped with its own processor and compensatory memory. Faxing is from the computer viewpoint limiting the handover of data for the sending of faxes to the card and already announcing the success/non-success of the given operation. This permits reduction of the load on the server and operation of FaxChange on an relatively loaded server
For organisations with high levels of fax traffic with which even a dedicated fax server is becomes difficult to manage, you may carry out a distributed installation. Individual components of FaxChange are divided up onto numerous computers and the option of multi-installing various components within one licence is available according to needs.
FaxChange is easily integrated into different information systems. In practice it allows you to take advantage of FaxChange services from the environment of your information system or share common information.
FaxChange is designed as a fully open system that is easily integrated with other information systems. FaxChange stores all data into the database of which the structure is described in the documentation.
FaxChange is supplied with a programmers interface which allows easy expansion and adaptation of the existing FaxChange functions. API contains at the same time sample applications in source code.