Using the UPS shipping application integrated within IBM LotusLive Labs

Introduction

United Parcel Service (UPS) is a shipping service provider that helps its customers create shipments online, along with many other services. The UPS application available in IBM® LotusLive^TM (accessed from LotusLive Labs) leverages the UPS shipping services for LotusLive contacts.

The application allows you to generate and print sample shipping labels quickly by selecting your LotusLive contacts and uses various services offered by UPS to create and manage your shipments.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This article is an update to last year's wiki article, “Integrated UPS Shipping services are available from LotusLive Labs.” The latest version of the application is set up with a demonstration-only UPS shipping account number to let users create sample shipments without using their own UPS account number. The UPS application from LotusLive Labs accesses the test server from www.ups.com to generate a sample label at the end of the process.

Accessing the application

Using the integrated UPS application, you can:

• Ship a package to a LotusLive contact
• Choose a suitable delivery option based on the date of delivery and shipping cost
• Print the label of a shipment whenever required
• View a list of shipments created by you
• Use a search functionality to find shipments
• Sort shipments by the selected field of your choice
• View details of a particular shipment

To use all these features, you must perform a one-time registration when creating the shipment for the first time. The registration process accepts and stores the www.ups.com account details. (We discuss this process in detail in Section 3.1 below.)

To access the application, follow these steps:

1. Log on to LotusLive:

2. Access LotusLive Labs Home Page:

3. Access the UPS application from Labs Home Page:

Using the application

Registration

Before you start using UPS to ship your packages, you must register with UPS. This is a requirement from the ups.com that every user must accept license terms and conditions before a user can start the shipment process. As mentioned, this is a one-time process.

Why do you need to register?
IBM provides this solution by integrating with the UPS organization. UPS identifies each user uniquely by using credentials. During the registration process these credentials are generated and stored securely by the UPS application, and these same credentials are used to send all subsequent shipping requests for the user.

How do you register?
When you click the UPS application link from the LotusLive Labs home page for the first time, the Registration page will display (see figure 1). Follow these steps to complete the registration:

1. Enter the primary contact details. A primary contact is the person in your organization or department who dispatches and receives packages on behalf of all employees. If you do not have such a contact person, enter your own details in these fields.

Figure 1. Primary contact details


2. Add your UPS shipper details (see figure 2). UPS provides a shipper number to every user who ships packages. Your organization may have multiple shipper numbers assigned to every department or branch. Since this application is only for demonstrating the shipment creation process, the details are auto-populated with default values.

Figure 2. UPS shipper details



3. Understand and agree to UPS Terms and Conditions (see figure 3). UPS terms and conditions are fetched and displayed from www.ups.com and are applicable to all users who use this shipping service in LotusLive.

Agree to these terms and click the Submit Your Information button to complete the registration process.

Figure 3. Terms and Conditions window

UPS Dashboard

The UPS Dashboard is displayed every time you log in after successful registration (see figure 4). It displays your shipping history and your account information, and provides access to other features.

Figure 4. UPS Dashboard

Shipping a package

Shipping a package involves only three steps: enter the shipment details, select a service option, and print the label to paste on your shipment. Here are the details:

Step 1: Enter shipment details

1. On the Dashboard, click the Create Shipment button; the Create a Shipment window displays (see figure 5).
2. Your LotusLive Contacts are displayed in the Select a Contact drop-down list. Select the contact to whom you wish to send a shipment; the contact's name and address information will be populated in the Name, Address, City, etc. fields.
3. Verify these details and change them if required. You can also send the shipment to any other person as well.

Figure 5. Create a Shipment window


4. Verify your LotusLive profile address that displays here as the Sender address (see figure 6). Change it in your LotusLive profile if required. (Since the current application is for demonstration purposes, a default address is displayed, not your profile address.)

Figure 6. Sender address window


5. In the next section, select a package type from a predefined list of types (see figure 7), and enter the weight and dimensions of the package. You don't need to enter the dimensions if the package is a letter. If your package requires special handling, then select the Additional handling option.

Figure 7. Package details


6. (OPTIONAL) Enter additional service details such as the insurance details, if required (see figure 8).

Figure 8. Additional services


7. To track your shipment with a simple identifier, add a alphanumeric value by which you can refer to this shipment. The Reference number is useful in identifying a particular shipment.

Figure 9. Reference number


8. Click the Next button to select the service options.

Step 2: Select a service option

Service options are fetched from www.ups.com based on the given shipment details and displayed in the Shipment Summary window (see figure 10).

1. Verify that all the shipment summary details are correct. If you wish to change something, you can go back and change the details.
2. If everything is correct, select a service option from the given list and click the Confirm Shipment button. Note that the estimated time and date are effective from the date when www.ups.com receives the package from you.

Figure 10. Review Shipment Summary and Select a Service

Step 3: Print shipment label

Now that you've selected the service option and confirmed the shipment, you just need to print the label, and you are ready to submit your package at any www.ups.com outlet or drop box.

1. To view the label for the newly created shipment, click the Print label button in the Shipment Completed Successfully window (see figure 11).

Figure 11. Shipment confirmation


2. The sample label shown in figure 12 displays. You can print the label using your browser's print feature. You can see the shipment history on the dashboard or create another shipment by clicking the Create Another Shipment button.

Figure 12. Shipment Label


Note that the Shipment Label can also be printed from the Dashboard by clicking the Printer icon at the far right-hand side of the row for the shipment you wish to print.

Sorting and searching shipment list

You can filter the Shipping History list, using the Search functionality provided on the dashboard (see figure 13), and can search a shipment by its Tracking number, Reference number, status, or recipient name.

Figure 13. Filter shipments


Also, the Shipping History list can be sorted on all the columns in the list. Users can choose the number of shipments listed on a single page. Finding a shipment is made easier by listing a limited number of shipments per page and page navigation.

Figure 14. Shipping History list

View shipment details

Package details, service details, and recipient details of a shipment can be viewed in the Shipment Details pop-up window (see figure 15). To view the pop-up, click on the Tracking number of a shipment in the list.

Figure 15. Shipment Details window

Conclusion

You should now be familiar with the details of all the current features of the UPS application integrated within LotusLive. We discussed how to access the application from LotusLive---the one-time registration process---and the detailed steps to create a shipment starting from accessing the application to finally generating the sample label.

Resources

LotusLive Labs product demo:
https://www.lotuslive.com/en/catalog/index.php?id=labs&tab=labs_overview

developerWorks article, “Introducing IBM LotusLive:”
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/lotus/library/lotuslive-intro/

LotusLive wiki article, “Integrated UPS Shipping services are available from LotusLive Labs:”
http://www-10.lotus.com/ldd/bhwiki.nsf/dx/Integrated_UPS_Shipping_services_availible_from_LotusLive_Labs

About the authors

Anurag Srivastava is a Team Lead on the LotusLIve Partner Integration team, working on the design and implementation of various partner applications. Prior to this, he contributed to IBM's innovations as a member of the Technology and Innovation team. He has roughly 15 years of experience in software development, design, and architecture.

Krishnaprasad Subbarao is a developer on the LotusLive Partner Integration team, working on the design and implementation of various partner applications. Prior to this, he contributed to IBM's innovations as a member of the Technology and Innovation team. He has around 8 years of experience in software development and design.

Sachin Jha is a developer in LotusLIve Partner Integration team and works on the design and implementation of various partner applications, before which he contributed to LotusLive as a developer for the BSS user interface. Prior to this he worked on the SCM product in IBM's Systems and Technology Group. He has around 8 years of experience in software development and design.