NetConnect User Guide

NetConnect is a desktop app for managing contacts in SMEs, optimized for use via a Command Line Interface (CLI) while still having the benefits of a Graphical User Interface (GUI). It enables HR and relations managers to efficiently manage their employees, clients, as well as suppliers, all in one place ☝🏻.

The inspiration behind NetConnect lies in solving a specific set of challenges faced by the food business managers demographic. Specifically, we aim to address the challenge of managing various contact types: clients, suppliers, and employees.

If you relate to this problem we identified, then NetConnect might be just right for you. This user guide will accompany you in maximising the capabilities of this product, freeing time for more pressing issues.

Table of Contents

• NetConnect User Guide
• Table of Contents
• Quick start
• Features
  • Data Constraints
  • Viewing help : help
  • Adding a person: add
  • Deleting a person : delete
  • Listing all contacts : list
  • Editing a person : edit
  • Locating Contacts : find
  • Clearing all entries : clear
  • Create Relations between Profiles : relate
  • Remove Relations between Profiles : unrelate
  • Show Relations Associated to a Person : showrelated
  • Open on Last State
  • Export view to CSV File : export
  • Exiting the program : exit
  • Saving the data
  • Editing the data file
• Planned Enhancements
• FAQ
• Known issues
• Command summary

Quick start

1. Ensure you have Java 11 or above installed in your Computer.

2. Download the latest netconnect.jar from here.

3. Copy the file to the folder you want to use as the home folder for your NetConnect.

4. Open a command terminal, cd into the folder you put the jar file in, and use the java -jar netconnect.jar command to run the application.
   A GUI similar to the below should appear in a few seconds. Note how the app contains some sample data.
   

5. Type the command in the command box and press Enter to execute it. e.g. typing help and pressing Enter will open the help window.
   

6. Refer to the Features below for details of each command.

Features

Data Constraints

Constraints: Here are the constraints for each field in the application:

• NAME: Names should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces, and it should not be blank.
• PHONE_NUMBER: Phone numbers should only contain numbers, and it should be at least 3 digits long to accommodate staff extensions.
• EMAIL: Emails should be of the format local-part@domain. NetConnect does not check for the validity of the domain part, hence extra attention should be put into ensuring no typos are present in the domain part of the email.
• ADDRESS: Addresses can take any format, and it should not be blank.
• ROLE: Roles can only be client, supplier, or employee.
• REMARK: Remark can take any format.
• TAG: Tags should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces.
• DEPARTMENT: Department names should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces.
• JOB: Job titles should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces.
• SKILLS: Skills should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces.
• PREFERENCES: Preferences can take any format.
• TERMS OF SERVICE: Terms of service can take any format.
• PRODUCTS: Product names should only contain alphanumeric characters and spaces.

Viewing help : help

Shows a message explaining how to access the help page.

Format: help

Adding a person: add

Adds a person (Client, Supplier or Employee) to the address book. Note that each role (e.g. Client, Supplier, Employee) has its own specific set of fields that can be added. The input for all fields should adhere to the Data Constraints.

Format: add n/NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER e/EMAIL a/ADDRESS role/ROLE [r/remark] [t/TAG]…​ (other fields specific to the role)

Client:

• Format: add n/NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER e/EMAIL a/ADDRESS role/Client [r/remark] [t/TAG]... [pref/PREFERENCES] [prod/PRODUCT]...

• Example: add n/Benson Mayer p/87728933 e/mayerb@example.com a/311, Clementi Ave 2, #02-25 role/Client pref/Dairy-free prod/Sourdough bread prod/Raisin Bread

Employee:

• Format: add n/NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER e/EMAIL a/ADDRESS role/Employee [r/remark] [t/TAG]... [dept/DEPARTMENT] [job/JOBTITLE] [skills/SKILL]...

• Example: add n/Bob Ye p/8928732 e/boby@example.com a/Blk 11, Clementi Ave 1, #03-32 t/friends t/coreTeam r/requires follow up on pay raise role/employee dept/HR job/Manager skills/Java

Supplier:

• Format: add n/NAME p/PHONE_NUMBER e/EMAIL a/ADDRESS role/Supplier [r/remark] [t/TAG]... [tos/TERMS OF SERVICE] [prod/PRODUCT]...

• Example: add n/Fiona Kunz p/94824272 e/lydia@example.com a/little tokyo role/Supplier tos/Delivery within 2 weeks prod/Office Supplies prod/Furniture

Deleting a person : delete

Deletes the specified person from the address book.

Format: delete [n/NAME] [i/ID]

• Deletes the person with the specified NAME or ID.
• If there are more than one person with the same specified NAME, ID has to be used.
• ID refers to the unique identification number assigned to each person when first added to the list.
• ID must refer to a person that exist within NetConnect.
• Full name must be provided for NAME.

Examples:

• delete n/Benson Mayer deletes the person with the name Benson Mayer (if no one else have the same name).
• delete i/2 deletes the person with an ID of 2 in the address book.

Listing all contacts : list

Shows a list of all contacts in the address book.

Format: list

Editing a person : edit

Edits an existing person in the address book.

Format: edit i/ID [n/NAME] [p/PHONE] [e/EMAIL] [a/ADDRESS] [r/remark] [t/TAG]…​ (other fields specific to the role)

• Edits the person with the specified ID. ID refers to the unique identification number assigned to each person when first added to the list.
• ID must refer to a person that exist within NetConnect.
• At least one of the optional fields [..] must be provided.
• When editing multiple-value fields, all existing values of that field will be removed and replaced with the new values, i.e., adding tags, products, skills is not cumulative.
• You can remove the value of the optional fields by typing the respective field flag without specifying any value. For example, edit i/6 t/ will clear all the tags in contact ID 6.
• You cannot edit a field that is invalid for the current person type.

Please refer to the Data Constraints for valid input.

Examples:

• edit i/4 p/91234567 e/johndoe@example.com Edits the phone number and email address of the person with ID of 1 to be 91234567 and johndoe@example.com respectively.
• edit i/2 n/Betsy Crower t/ Edits the name of the person with ID of 2 to be Betsy Crower and clears all existing tags.

Locating Contacts : find

Finds persons whose information matches any of the specified parameters. You can find persons by names, phone numbers, tags, roles, and remarks. To search via different fields, you can stack multiple find-type commands to narrow down your search.

Format: find [n/NAME]... [t/TAG]... [p/PHONE_NUMBER]... [role/ROLE]... [r/REMARK]...

• Only one type of field is allowed for each find command.
• Multiple parameters of the same field can be provided, showing persons who match any of the field in that command, e.g. find n/alex n/david will show all persons with either alex or david in their names.
• list is required to remove the stacked filters.
• Searches are case-insensitive, e.g. hans will match Hans.
• Partial matches are allowed for names, e.g. Ha will match Hans.
• Find by remark requires full word match that is contained in the remark sentence, e.g. find r/marketing will match r/marketing IC, find r/has dog will match r/he has a dog, find r/market will not match r/marketing.
• Find by remark requires all words given to be contained in the remark sentence, e.g. find r/has cute dog will not match r/he has a dog.
• Find by remark allows unordered search, e.g. find r/dog has will match r/he has a dog.
• find r/ will search for contacts with an empty remark.
• For phone numbers, tags and role, only exact matches are allowed, e.g. 83647382 or 8364 will not match 83641001, find t/fri will not match contacts with tag friends, find role/clie will not match contacts with role client.

Find by name example:

• find n/John returns john and John Doe.
• find n/megan n/roy returns Megan Lim, Megan Ho,Ng Royton, Roy Chua.
  

Find by tag example:

• find t/friends returns all persons who have the tag friends.

Find by phone number example:

• find p/98765432 returns John Doe who has the phone number 98765432.

Find by role example:

• find role/client returns all persons who have the role client.
• find role/supplier role/client returns all persons who have the role supplier or client.

Find by remark example:

• find r/ returns all persons who have an empty remark.
• find r/has a dog returns all persons who have the remark containing all these words ['has', 'a', 'dog']

Stacking find by role and tag example

• find role/Employee returns all persons who have the role Employee.

• Followed by find t/friends, returns all persons who are Employee and have the tag friends.

Clearing all entries : clear

Clears all entries from the address book.

Format: clear

Create Relations between Profiles : relate

Creates a relation between two profiles in the address book.

Format: relate i/ID i/ID

Example: relate i/1 i/3 creates a relation between the profiles with ID of 1 and 3.

Remove Relations between Profiles : unrelate

Removes a relation between two profiles in the address book.

Format: unrelate i/ID i/ID

Example: unrelate i/1 i/23 removes a relation between the profiles with ID of 1 and 3.

Show Relations Associated to a Person : showrelated

Shows all the relations associated to a person in the address book.

Format: showrelated i/ID

Example: showrelated i/1 shows all relations between the profile with ID 1 and all other contacts.

Open on Last State

With every change to the command input, NetConnect saves and updates the command input in a separate file. When the app closes and is opened again, the last command present before closure will be retrieved from the separate file and input into the command field (if any). This way, you never have to worry about losing progress!

Export view to CSV File : export

Retrieve information on a group of profiles at once with this function! This can be useful for consolidating all the emails or contact number at once, or to share information with third parties.

To export all profiles in the address book to a CSV file:

Format:

Step 1: list

Step 2: export [filename]

• The list command in the first step is to pull all profiles into the current view.
• Following export in Step 2, you can choose the filename to save the file as. The filename must end with .csv. If you do not specify a filename, it will be automatically named as contact.csv

Example:

Step 1: list first returns the list of all contacts

Step 2: export a CSV file containing all contacts to a folder on your laptop that is located within the same directory as the NetConnect application.

To export a specific group of profiles to a CSV file:

Format:

Step 1: find [keyword]

Step 2: export [filename]

• The first step is to filter the profiles you want to export into the current view.

Example:

Step 1: find role/Client
Step 2: export client.csv The CSV file named clients.csv containing all client contacts is exported to a folder on your laptop located within the same directory as the NetConnect application.

Exiting the program : exit

Exits the program.

Format: exit

Saving the data

NetConnect data are saved in the hard disk automatically after any command that changes the data. There is no need to save manually.

Editing the data file

NetConnect data are saved automatically as a JSON file [JAR file location]/data/netconnect.json. Advanced users are welcome to update data directly by editing that data file.

Caution: If your changes to the data file makes its format invalid, NetConnect will discard all data and start with an empty data file at the next run. Hence, it is recommended to take a backup of the file before editing it.
Furthermore, certain edits can cause the NetConnect to behave in unexpected ways (e.g., if a value entered is outside the acceptable range). Therefore, edit the data file only if you are confident that you can update it correctly.

Planned Enhancements

The NetConnect team is working on new features and fixes for you, but they are unfortunately unavailable in this current implementation. We intend to have future fixes for these occurences below!

1. Improved error messages for showrelated command
2. Improved command success messages for relate and unrelate commands
3. Improved validity checks for relate and unrelate commands
4. Wrap text instead of truncate in GUI to accommodate long text fields
5. Handle situations where input entered is the same as the current value for edit command
6. Data recovery

Further details on the planned enhancements can be found in the Developer Guide.

FAQ

Q: How do I transfer my data to another Computer?
A: Install the app in the other computer and overwrite the empty data file it creates with the file that contains the data of your previous NetConnect home folder.

Q: How do I know if Java 11 is already installed on my computer? A: Open the Command Prompt (Windows) or the Terminal (MacOS) and run the java -version command. The output should contain Java 11 if it is installed.

Q: What if I have newer versions of Java already installed on my computer? A: You will still need Java 11 to run NetConnect, though multiple versions should be fine. You may check this using the java -version command. The output should contain Java 11 if it is installed.

Q: What operating systems can I use NetConnect on? A: NetConnect can be run on Linux, Windows, and macOS, provided that Java 11 is installed.

Q: Do I require the internet to run the application? A: No, you do not need the internet to access our application or its features.

Known issues

1. When using multiple screens, if you move the application to a secondary screen, and later switch to using only the primary screen, the GUI will open off-screen. The remedy is to delete the preferences.json file created by the application before running the application again.

Command summary