bridge11.zip - Bridge 97 Help Desk DEMO Version 1.1     Modified: 971006

1. What the program does, and how to use it.

Bridge 97 Help Desk tracks your internal or external technical calls,
tickets, problems, devices, or issues. 

This software is designed for:

                * Help Desks
                * Customer Call Centers
                * Computer Support Centers
                * Resource Centers
                * IT Response Centers
                * Information Systems Departments
                * Internal User Support Centers
                * Information Centers
                * ISP Technical Support
       
The Bridge 97 Help Desk 'client' is designed exclusively for the
Win95/NT environment while its ODBC compliant 'server-side' database
(Access 97, Sybase SQL Anywhere, Oracle or MS SQL Server) can reside
on your server (Microsoft NT, Unix, Novell or a mainframe) or your
desktop. You can have multiple databases on the same or different
servers and desktops.

2. Freely Distributed DEMO

The demo version, limited to input of 35 issues is packaged with an
Access 97 database, and the Access 97 runtime.  You do not need Access
97 (or any other version of Access) installed on a PC in order to run
Bridge. Even if you have a previous version of Access installed on your
PC(s), Bridge will not interfere with that version of Access.

3. Software/Hardware Requirements:

To use Bridge 97, you will need the following:

 - Microsoft Windows 95 or Microsoft Windows NT (3.51 or 4.0).
 - At least 8MB of memory (16MB or more is preferable).
 - 35MB of disk space.

4. Installation:

The self-extracting setupex.exe file within the bridge97.zip file is
self-extracting and will prompt you if you wish to install Bridge
in a directory other than what the installation program recommends.

5. Using Bridge 97:

Once you have installed Bridge 97, check the help file contents on
the main menu tab for detailed instructions for customizing Bridge
to for needs. You can page ahead thru the help file by clicking the 
">" button.). 

6. What the DEMO version does not include:

Due to licensing restrictions, the e-mail and paging interfaces
are not available in the DEMO version.

Bridge 97 Help Desk (full commercial version): Mail can be sent
and received through all major e-mail systems, including Microsoft
Mail / Exchange, Lotus cc: Mail / Notes, Novell GroupWise, and 
Internet (SMTP) mail.  A combination of mail systems can be used
together. For instance, you can send an issue to a user of your
corporate mail system (such as cc: Mail) and Internet addresses, 
all in the same "send". 

7. Future Improvements:

Here's a brief overview of what's in 1.5 beta soon to be released.

Reports - Various new reports as well as a new reporting infrastructure.
You can now create reports that can be exported to Word, Excel, Lotus
1-2-3, HTML and a variety of other formats.  Reports you create with
Crystal reports can be integrated into Bridge (run directly from within
Bridge).

Graphs - Several new predefined graphs.

Status Bar -  A status bar will appear at the bottom of the application
frame window (present at all times) and show up to four separate counts of
issues that are important to you (ie: My Issues, Open Issues, High Priority
Issues, etc...).  This status bar will be fully customizable, and a list of
the issues that make up this count can be opened with a right click of the
mouse.

Improved International Date Support - Bridge will now function with any
date format (dd-MMM-yy, etc...).

Delete User Fields if DBMS allows (not available with Oracle or MS SQL
Server) - You can now delete a user field when using Access or Sybase SQL
Anywhere.  Previously, this was only possible through direct intervention
with the database.

As for what's in 2.0, this is the tentative plan:

Web Interface
Answer Book/Knowledge Base
Customization of User Interface
Intelligence (ie: If x = y then default a to b)

8. Contacting Kemma Software:

E-Mail inquiries can be sent to:

Support Requests - support@kemma.com 
Bridge specific sales, feedback, suggestions - bridge@kemma.com 

We can also be reached at:

Kemma Software
114 Orchard Avenue
Glenshaw, PA 15116
Phone: (412) 492-1141
Fax: (412) 492-1142

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