ZipOut Administrative Settings Tool

Download and Installation
How Administrative Settings Work
Special Settings
Using the Tool
Deploying Admin Settings
List of Administrative Registry Values

Every aspect of ZipOut's function and user interface can be administratively controlled through registry values in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE hive. The ZipOut Administrative Settings Tool shown below allows an administrator to easily create or modify a .reg file with the exact settings desired. The finished .reg file can be used to modify a ZipOut installation through a command-line parameter, or it can be incorporated into a transform file of the ZipOut Installer package.

Download and Installation

1. Visit the ZipOut Administrative Settings Tool Download page.
2. Click the download link to copy the Setup package to your computer.
3. Double-click ZipOutAdminTool.exe to install the ZipOut Administrative Settings Tool.

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How Administrative Settings Work

By default ZipOut gives the end user very granular control of its configuration. The user can decide whether to show or hide the ZipOut buttons on each type of Outlook item, what  compression level to use, whether or not to block potentially harmful attachments, what file types to block or to compress, etc. These choices and others are stored in the registry under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\Outlook\Addins\MicroEyeZipOut.Connect. ZipOut also reads the corresponding HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE key for values which are treated as Administrative Settings. An Admin Setting will override any user configured option and can not be changed through the ZipOut user interface. So, for example, if the Admin Setting for Always reset to ZipOut On has the value of 1 (True), then when the user opens the Micro Eye ZipOut property page the Always reset to ZipOut On checkbox will be checked and disabled. If the Admin Setting has a 0 (False) value then this option will be unchecked but still disabled. If there is no Admin Setting for a particular property (i.e. no value in HKLM) then the option will be enabled on the property page or toolbar and the user will be able to change the configuration at will.

ZipOut normally allows the user to turn attachment compression on or off on a message-by-message basis. This is controlled by the ZipOut On/Off button on the toolbar. The administrator can use an Admin Setting to lock ZipOut in the "On" state and ensure that attachments are always compressed. When this setting is applied the ZipOut On/Off button will not appear on the toolbar at all, to reduce confusion for the end user and free up some toolbar real estate. Likewise if the option to create Combined or Separate zip files is set administratively the corresponding toolbar button will not be displayed.

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Special Settings

ZipOut has special Admin Settings beyond those which are available to the end user. Some hide specific parts of the standard user interface. The NoPage value, for example, can be used to hide the ZipOut property page. Settings such as SkipPFCheck control aspects of ZipOut's behavior that cannot be set through the UI: when attachment blocking is enabled ZipOut will attempt to use Outlook's Level 1 Attachment list to identify files which are potentially damaging. If Outlook is configured to read its list of blocked files from the default form in the Outlook Security Settings or Outlook 10 Security Settings public folder then ZipOut will try to retrieve that list from the form when ZipOut loads. On some networks this call may create an unacceptable lag during Outlook startup. The administrator can set SkipPFCheck =1 to prevent ZipOut from trying to access the public folder.

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Using the Tool

The ZipOut Administrative Settings Tool can be used to create a new Admin Settings .reg file or modify an existing one. When the tool loads it will ask if you want to load an existing file.

• To create a new file answer No to the prompt.
• To open an existing file, answer Yes to the prompt and select the .reg file in the ZipOut Admin Reg file dialog box.

The tree view lists the individual items that can be included in the Admin Settings file, along with headings such as "Item Types" that are only used for grouping and do not map to a specific registry value. To include a particular item select it in the tree and then check the Admin lock down box. Once you check an item type such Mail Items or a setting like Compression Level you will be able to choose the specific value for that setting, corresponding to a user selection on the ZipOut property page.

If an item or any of its children have been checked it will appear bold in the tree to make it easy to identify. Bear in mind that any setting which is normally configurable through the user interface will be locked and disabled when Admin lock down is checked.

Once you have selected and configured those settings that you want to control administratively click Save to write your selections to a .reg file. You can modify your choices later by launching the Admin Settings tool and browsing to this file.

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Deploying Admin Settings

There are a number of different ways to use an Admin Settings .reg file in a ZipOut deployment. You can supply the path to the file as a command-line argument, import it into an Office Custom Installation Wizard transform, or add it to your own transform if you have a tool for creating and modifying Windows Installer packages.

Command line install To deploy Admin Settings in a command-line install add an argument for the ADMINREG property with the full UNC path to the .reg file that you created:
    msiexec /i \\UNC Path\ZipOut.msi /q [PIDKEY="license code"] [ADMINREG="\\UNC Path\AdminSettings.reg"]
The ADMINREG argument can be combined with arguments for other properties such as PIDKEY and any Installer switches that you choose to include.

Chained Install If you include ZipOut within a Microsoft Office deployment as a chained install you can set ZipOut's Admin Settings at the same time. Include  ADMINREG="\\UNC Path\AdminSettings.reg" in the Cmdline= option of Setup.ini.

Installer Transform You can use a tool for working with Installer packages to create a transform that modifies the ZipOut MSI. This tool may allow you to directly import a .reg file, or you may need to merge your Admin Settings file into the registry on a build machine and then import the values from the MicroEyeZipOut.Connect key under HKLM. The transform that you create can be included in a command line installation of ZipOut using the TRANSFORMS="\\UNC path\your transform.mst" argument. If you use an Active Directory Group Policy object to deploy ZipOut then your transform should be used to modify the base installation. When creating a new package for ZipOut under Software Installation you must select "Advanced published or assigned" as the deployment method. Then add the Admin Settings transform that you created on the Modifications tab of the package property pages.

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List of Administrative Registry Values

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