FAQ / Popular Topics
Frequently asked questions and other popular topics not related to a specific software product.
- How to obtain support from Syncplify
- How to log into my Syncplify Customer Center Portal
- How to access/download your invoice(s)
- Maintenance and Support explained
- Emails from Syncplify not received. Why?
- Why Internet Explorer is not supported
- ECCN and export restrictions
- How to buy/renew/extend your maintenance and support plan
- What is LLTS (Limited Long-Term Support)?
How to obtain support from Syncplify
At Syncplify we care about providing the best experience to our customers. In an effort to streamline the entire support process we have recently developed a new infrastructure for all of our customers to request, obtain, and track the progress of their support requests.
When requesting assistance, first and foremost, please, take a moment to determine in which category your request falls:
- Pre-Sales: these are information requests from individuals and companies that are not yet our customers, but are considering buying our software products. If this is the category you fit in, please send your request via email to presales@syncplify.com
- Existing Customer: if you are an existing customer, simply log into your Syncplify Customer Portal, locate the exact license code you need support for, and click on the Request Support button next to it. Our software will verify that you have an active maintenance/support contract for that specific license, and will then open a support ticket for you in our private customers-only help-desk.
Thank you.
How to log into my Syncplify Customer Center Portal
The Syncplify Customer Center Portal (aka Syncplify Customer Center or Syncplify Customer Portal) is a new customer self-service portal that was introduced along with the launch of Syncplify Server! v6. Via this portal, a Syncplify customer can perform several common actions, like:
- Access license information
- Buy or extend maintenance/support plans for existing licenses
- Request customer support
- Access past orders and invoices
The portal can be accessed at this URL: https://cc.syncplify.com/
Your credentials have been sent to the email you used when you first purchased the software. The portal, though, has a function (on the login page) to request a password reset if you forget it or if you missed the original enrollment email.
How to access/download your invoice(s)
This procedure is - at the moment - limited to orders that include Syncplify Server! v6 licenses. Old orders (older versions of the software) or order that include AFT! licenses are, at this time, still managed via third party distributors and resellers who are responsible for invoicing them.
When you order a Syncplify software product (Syncplify Server! v6+) you or your company may need an invoice for your records. You can find such invoice in your Syncplify Customer Center Portal.
First, locate the order for which you need an invoice in the Orders page of the Syncplify Customer Center Portal:
For all orders that were successfully completed, you will see a little blue icon that looks like a document next to the order number. Click on that icon to access the invoice for that particular order.
Please double check your address, VAT code (etc...) on the invoice, if it's not correct you can edit your customer profile as shown in the picture below, and the changes will be reflected instantly in all of your invoices.
Once you access the invoice you can do several things: just display it on screen, print it on a printer, or "download" it by using your operating system's Print to PDF or Save to PDF function (all modern Windows, Linux and MacOS systems have had this feature for years):
Thank you!
Maintenance and Support explained
What is the Maintenance and Support plan?
In short, it’s a contract, tied to a software license, that entitles customers to the following:
- All updates/upgrades to all minor and major versions released during the subscription coverage period
- Documentation, and knowledge base access
- Email/ticket support if the software has a bug or is behaving differently from the documented way
- Remote assistance support (up to 3 incidents a year, when deemed necessary by Syncplify support staff)
Given the above, it is therefore important to understand what incidents are:
- if the software is behaving differently from Syncplify's official documentation, or you have identified a bug, that is an incident, and its resolution is included in the Maintenance and Support plan (if active)
- if you simply don’t know how to do something, that’s not an incident, and we kindly ask you to – please – read the documentation and search the knowledge base before contacting our support team (we’re deeply grateful for your understanding) - if you still prefer us to perform these tasks for you, please keep in mind that these won't be covered by your Maintenance/Support plan, and will be instead Professional Services
The cost for a maintenance/support plan is typically around 30% of the license MSRP. However, if you select multiple years of maintenance and support during your license purchase process, a discount is applied based on the number of years you wish to pre-pay for. So, for example, if you buy a single Basic license ($349) your annual optional subscription cost will be $104.70; another example: if you buy 2 Professional licenses without WebClient! ($849 each, total $1698) your annual optional subscription cost will be $509.40 ($254.70 * 2).
Emails from Syncplify not received. Why?
Here at Syncplify, we take support requests very seriously, and we always reply. Usually within 2-4 hours, and never beyond the second business day. The same applies to license-code delivery emails when you purchase a license from us.
Sometimes, though, the intended recipient does not receive our reply. Here’s a list of some of the most common causes:
1) Wrong requester e-mail address
Believe it or not, the most common reason for not receiving a reply from our support team is that you have mistyped your own email address while filling in the support request form. If you type john.doe@gmil.com (instead of gmail.com) we hit the “reply” button, and then get an “undeliverable” back from the server.
2) Your antispam rejects our reply
Sometimes we spend a lot of time typing a reply, just to find out that when we finally hit “send”, we receive an error like this:
554 5.7.1 <support@syncplify.me>: Sender address rejected: Blocked by this recipient
If you send us a support request and wish to receive our reply back, please, make sure your antispam is not rejecting emails coming from the syncplify.me domain name. We never spam anyone, so whitelisting our domain name is a safe choice.
3) Your antispam puts our reply in the junk/spam folder
This one is tricky because if your antispam didn’t reject our email but only moved it to the spam folder, there’s no way for us to know that our reply did not reach you. From our perspective, it went through. So, please, always check your spam folder when you’re waiting for a response from us.
4) Also look at the "clutter" folder
Some email providers (like Office365 for example) don't only have a junk/spam folder, they also have a so-called "clutter" folder, where they temporarily place emails that their algorithms determines to be "not urgent". We've been advised that, occasionally, emails from our domain are mistakenly places into this "clutter" folder, so we recommend you check it as well.
5) Unknown causes
Even when everything else fails, please, remember that you can always skip the email channel, and submit a ticket right here in this very support portal.
Why Internet Explorer is not supported
Most software products by Syncplify are configured via web user interfaces (UIs). These are graphical interfaces that run inside of most browsers.
All browsers based on Chrome/Chromium as well as those based on Firefox are fully supported, and most other independent browser engine work well, too. The only browser we officially do not support is Internet Explorer.
The reason is simple: while almost all other browsers have converged onto a common DOM (document object model) and, even more importantly, a common JavaScript standard (ECMA-262), Internet Explorer is the only browser that went its own way, more often than not causing issues with web UIs that every other browser is, instead, capable of running flawlessly.
Even Microsoft (who makes Internet Explorer) has given up on trying to support it, and has officially announced that as of August 2021 their own office suite will not support Internet Explorer anymore. Furthermore, as of June 2022 Microsoft is planning on dropping Internet Explorer for good and move exclusively to their newer browser engine (Edge).
In our opinion, this goes to show that our choice not to support Internet Explorer in our products was correct. So, please, do not use Internet Explorer in conjunction with any Syncplify software products, and - if you at all care about your safety and broad software compatibility - we recommend you do not use Internet Explorer at all.
ECCN and export restrictions
Being a US-based corporation, Syncplify is subject to the United States rules regarding the import/export of software products. This article aims at clarifying some of the most common doubts regarding such a topic.
First of all, the ECCN for all Syncplify products (except Notepad!, of course) is 5D002.
Here are some definitions to better understand what such a number means:
5A002(a)(1): Information security hardware that is designed or modified to use “cryptography,” employing analog principles when implemented with digital techniques, with the following features:
- Asymmetric algorithm employing a key length in excess of 56-bits; or
- An “asymmetric algorithm” where the security of the algorithm is based on any of the following:
- Factorization of integers in excess of 512 bits (e.g., RSA);
- Computation of discrete logarithms in a multiplicative group of a finite field of size greater than 512 bits (e.g., Diffie-Hellman over Z/pZ); or
- Discrete logarithms in a group other than mentioned in 5A002.a.1.b.2 in excess of 112 bits (e.g., Diffie-Hellman over an elliptic curve)
5D002(c)(1): “Software” that has the characteristics, or performs or simulates the functions of the equipment controlled under ECCN 5A002
The United States Departments of State, Treasury, and Commerce maintain lists of companies, organizations, and individuals with which U.S. companies, like Syncplify, are prohibited from trading. Therefore, Syncplify is required to screen all export sales against these lists. Orders may not be accepted when coming from individuals and entities included in such lists. In particular, we are not allowed to export our products to the following countries: Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Sudan, Syria.
Should you have any further inquiries regarding export restriction, please, feel free to contact us.
How to buy/renew/extend your maintenance and support plan
Though we never force any of our customers to buy (or keep current) their maintenance/support plan, we do encourage them to do so because that's the only way to gain access to:
- updates and upgrades (including bug-fixes and hot-fixes)
- customer support
Buying or extending your maintenance/support plan is really easy. First of all, log into the Syncplify Customer Center with the same email address that was originally used to purchase your license.
Once you're in, locate the license code which maintenance plan you want to buy or extend, and select the Buy/extend maintenance item from the three-dot menu on the right-hand side of the same line of the license code, as shown in the screenshot below:
You can even co-term multiple maintenance plans, and have all of them expire on the same day, by simply selecting multiple license codes with a check-mark, and then clicking the button on the top-right corner (as shown below):
Please be aware that when buying/extending any maintenance plan, the minimum time period will be 1 year, so you will be prompted to select a date that is at least 365 days in the future.
Thank you!
What is LLTS (Limited Long-Term Support)?
When we retire a software version, we typically keep providing a certain level of support for it for a certain period of time, to make sure the transition to the new version that replaced it is as smooth as possible.
This period of extended support is called LLTS, or Limited Long-Term Support. And, as the term itself suggests, it's limited in terms of time, scope, and priority.
So, how is this LLTS different from the level of support the current version receives? In summary, when a certain software version under LLTS:
- incoming support requests are handled after those that came in for the current version
- only suggestions, recommendations, and (when possible) workarounds are provided, no development is performed, not even to fix bugs (only the current version is under active development)
- the LLTS itself has a termination date: past such date no support at all will be provided for that version
It is, therefore, always extremely important to keep your software up to date, and always use the most recent (current, under active development) version of the software.