Use the Alert Plus Utility to Register Sites

Overview of the Alert Plus Utilities

NOTE: Use the Register Site tab of the Alert Plus Utility when upgrading from Alert Plus Release 2.8 or earlier. It is not needed if you are upgrading from a later release.

Background

Alert Plus Release 3.0 replaced the Web Service architecture of previous Alert Plus releases with SharePoint timer jobs. Alert Plus Release 2.8 and earlier registered sites to the Alert Plus Web Service using a file called data.xml. This file was located on the server where the Bamboo.AlertPlusService was installed (often an application server instead of a SharePoint Web front-end server). In order to “register” a site with the Alert Plus service, you needed to visit the page where the Alert Plus Web Part resided, which typically happened when you created your first alert. The data.xml file contained information about each site where an Alert Plus Web Part was used.

Alert Plus Release 3.0 and higher registers sites using site collection properties, so the data.xml is no longer required. Site registration is still updated by visiting the web part page where the Alert Plus Web Part resides, and is a step in the Upgrading Alert Plus from Release 2.x to 3.1 process. No alerts will be sent until the site where alerts reside is registered.

If you have several sites using Alert Plus, visiting every one to register the web part may take some time. The Alert Plus Utility can update site registrations for Alert Plus from a central place, eliminating the need to visit multiple sites. There are two different methods the utility uses. If you are upgrading from release 2.x, it can reference the old data.xml file to know where Alert Plusresides. Otherwise, you can enter the specific site URL you want to register.

Steps

Follow the instructions below to update site registration using the Alert Plus Utility:

Step	Action
1.	From the Alert Plus product installation, start the install by clicking Setup.bat and highlight the Alert Plus Utilities. Verify the location and required permissions for the application and then click the Install button to launch it. NOTE: Although the button says Install, there is nothing to install. The Install button launches the application directly from the Bamboo.AlertPlusUtilities folder of the Install package. An alternative way to start the application is to go to that folder and double-click the EXE file.
2.	In the Register Site tab, choose whether to register: All Alert Plus sites at once using the Alert Plus Release 2.x data.xml file. If you choose this method, browse to the location of the data.xml file. NOTE: You might consider copying the data.xml file to the server where you are running the Alert Plus Utilities. OR A single site. If you choose this method, enter the URL of the site to register. NOTE: If you have the data.xml file available, it is much faster to register sites using it. The data.xml file is on the server where the Bamboo.AlertPlusService for Alert Plus Release 2.x was running. Bamboo recommends copying this file to the server location where the Alert Plus Utility is running.
3.	After selecting a registration method and entering required information for that method, click the Register Site button. NOTE: The Register Site tab of the Alert Plus Utility also allows you to unregister sites. You may want to unregister a site if an Alert Plus Web Part is removed from a site. See Use the Alert Plus Utility to Unregister Sites for more information.
4.	Review the results of the registration activities in the status box. For any errors or warnings, read the information provided for important troubleshooting steps.
5.	Repeat steps 2-4 for other sites that need to be registered.

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