New Features of ManitouNEO

Dear Bold Partners,

As we reach the midpoint of the year, I want to take a few moments to tell you about some of the key features of Bold’s new ManitouNEO platform, due to be launched at our 2016 Bold Users Conference.

The NEO platform is a replacement User Interface (UI) for the current Windows based UI. There are numerous advantages of the new UI:

An improved user experience and modern UI

We have kept the general layout of the original Manitou system, whilst adding modern screens and improving the flow where needed. The original Windows UI and the ManitouNEO UI will be available simultaneously for the first two major releases. This will allow a gradual transition to the new UI as operators become more comfortable with it.

As you can see from the screen comparisons below, there are a lot of familiarities, making the transition for operators quite natural.

ManitouNEO UI

alarm monitoring UI

Original Manitou UI

Web Browser technology

Providing device independence:
The new ManitouNEO interface will be accessible from a variety of devices other than computer workstations, such as tablets, smartphones, Chrome books, iPads, Kindles etc.

Resizable screens, larger fonts, multiple screens, brandable:
The ManitouNEO interface has been designed to be smart about the screen it uses; it will dynamically reorganize its content to use the space it has most efficiently.

New enhanced action patterns:
Action patterns have been enhanced significantly, and workflows have been fully incorporated. In ManitouNEO, workflows have been deprecated, and, because they can be fully implemented within action patterns, they will be automatically converted to action patterns when upgrading. Enhanced action patterns can now look back at history, run SQL statements, and execute external programs. Additionally, it is possible to construct logical statements such as “if, then, else.” Other standard programming constructs are available too, such as loops and the use of variables. However, we haven’t lost the simplicity of the current action patterns, and all complexity is hidden from the operator executing the action patterns. There is even a way to replace complex statements with simple English statements for improved presentation to the operator, dealer, and customer.

Central station software UI

A New Communication Center

Manitou was originally written as a call center application with built-in control for some PBX systems, TAPI, and modems. But times have moved on and central stations are much more than call centers now; they are communication centers. ManitouNEO is unique in being the first Automation Software to build a generic communication center into the heart of the product. Using NEO, an operator can be on the phone with a customer while emailing, texting, or notifying customers during alarm handling. For example, an operator can text back and forth with an end user using Bold NotifyMe regarding an Alarm activation directly from the Alarm Screen.

New Video Control Center (VCC)

ManitouNEO has a completely new VCC (Video Control Center). It will support all existing video and audio formats, and additionally, will fully integrate with I-View Now.

manitouNEO alarm layout

alarm monitoring in action

One platform – Central Station and Dealer

Previous versions of Manitou have had two user interfaces: one for within the central station and one for the dealer. With ManitouNEO, there is just one interface which adapts itself to the user’s requirement.

Improved Customer Wizard

Entering new customers quickly and accurately is important to any central station. ManitouNEO‘s new customer wizard leads the operator through the process, allowing easy navigation while showing the current level of completion.

alarm monitoring demo

manitouNEO customer

New REST API

Manitou has always led the way with API’s (Application Programming Interface), being the first automation system to ever develop one with our original OCX, shortly followed by our .Net API. Our current API is a SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol) based system, but in recent years the REST (Representational State Transfer) protocol has become more popular. To ensure the maximum amount of flexibility for our users and allow our large development community to take advantage of the REST interface, we are releasing this with ManitouNEO. Support will continue for the SOAP API.

Full 64-bit architecture

ManitouNEO will be 64-bit for all applications. There are a number of advantages of 64-bit processors over their 32-bit counterparts: they can use more memory, have a greater capacity, and operate faster. This is part of Bold’s philosophy to future-proof our customers’ businesses.

We hope you are as excited about ManitouNEO as we are! We look forward to debuting ManitouNEO at the Bold Users Conference in a couple of weeks, and are especially eager to see all our valued partners! Thank you for your continuing support of Bold Technologies.

Sincerely,

Rod Coles, CEO
Bold Technologies