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Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION................................................................................................................................ 3 GETTING STARTED ......................................................................................................................... 4 HELP DESK ......................................................................................................................................... 5


Configuring Organization Details ..................................................................................................................... 5 Organization Details ........................................................................................................................................... 5 Mail Server Settings ........................................................................................................................................... 5 Regions ............................................................................................................................................................... 9 Sites .................................................................................................................................................................... 9 Operational Hours ............................................................................................................................................ 10 Holidays ............................................................................................................................................................ 11 Department ...................................................................................................................................................... 11 User Management ......................................................................................................................................... 12 Active Directory ................................................................................................................................................ 12 LDAP Authentication ........................................................................................................................................ 14 Roles ................................................................................................................................................................. 15 User Additional Fields ...................................................................................................................................... 17 Requesters........................................................................................................................................................ 18 Technicians ....................................................................................................................................................... 20 Robo Technician ............................................................................................................................................... 20 Setting up (configuring) Help-Desk ................................................................................................................ 22 Helpdesk Customizer ........................................................................................................................................ 22 Incident Template ............................................................................................................................................ 29 Resolution Template ........................................................................................................................................ 31 Reply Template ................................................................................................................................................ 31 Task Template .................................................................................................................................................. 31 Service Catalog ................................................................................................................................................. 32 Help desk Work-Flow ..................................................................................................................................... 39 Modes of creating a Request ........................................................................................................................... 39 Create an Incident Request .............................................................................................................................. 39 Verify SLA ......................................................................................................................................................... 41 Business Rules .................................................................................................................................................. 42 Place in Support Groups ................................................................................................................................... 44 Raising a Service Request ................................................................................................................................. 45

ITIL SOLUTIONS ............................................................................................................................. 48


Incident Management ................................................................................................................................... 49 Problem Management ................................................................................................................................... 55 Problem Configurations ................................................................................................................................... 55

Problem Workflow ........................................................................................................................................... 56 Change Management..................................................................................................................................... 60 Change Configurations ..................................................................................................................................... 60 Change Workflow ............................................................................................................................................. 62 Asset Discovery.............................................................................................................................................. 69 Agent Settings .................................................................................................................................................. 69 Methods of Agent Deployment ........................................................................................................................ 69 Windows Domain Scan..................................................................................................................................... 73 Network Scan ................................................................................................................................................... 74 Audit Settings ................................................................................................................................................... 74 Distributed Asset Scan ..................................................................................................................................... 76 Assets ............................................................................................................................................................ 77 Asset Configurations ........................................................................................................................................ 77 Asset Management .......................................................................................................................................... 81 Software ........................................................................................................................................................ 85 Software Configuration .................................................................................................................................... 85 Software Management .................................................................................................................................... 87 Configuration Management Database (CMDB) .............................................................................................. 92 CMDB Configurations ....................................................................................................................................... 92 Defining CI Relationships .................................................................................................................................. 95 Relationship Map ............................................................................................................................................. 97 Purchase Orders ............................................................................................................................................ 99 Purchase Order Configurations ........................................................................................................................ 99 Purchase Order Workflow .............................................................................................................................. 100 Contracts ..................................................................................................................................................... 107 Creating a New Contract ................................................................................................................................ 107 Renewing Contract ......................................................................................................................................... 108 Other ServiceDesk Administrator Functions ................................................................................................ 109 Preventive Maintenance ................................................................................................................................ 109 Notification Rules ........................................................................................................................................... 110 Leave Type...................................................................................................................................................... 110 Survey Settings ............................................................................................................................................... 110 Define Survey ................................................................................................................................................. 112 Survey Results ................................................................................................................................................ 112 Self Service Portal Settings ............................................................................................................................. 113 Backup Scheduling ......................................................................................................................................... 113

Introduction
Help Desk
Integrates communication from users and departments as tickets. Incident and service requests created instantly with customized request form for each Incident Template. Automated dispatch of tickets. Resolving request The request form has everything a technician needs to solve the request.

Problem Management

Integrates request from requester and technician as problem. Finding the root cause for the problem proactively. Prevent further incidents related to the problem by providing a workaround.

Change Management
Proposal for change Evaluation for change Execution of change Post Implementation Review Close change request

Asset Management
Scanning Assets Configure Manage Assets

Configuration Management Database (CMDB)


Group CIs under specific CI Types Understand the relationship between the CIs with the help of Relationship Map View all the pending requests, problems and change requests raised for an Asset, Business and IT Service through the Relationship Map

Purchase
Create a new Purchase Order Submit for approval and approving the order Receiving the Purchase Order Closing the Purchase Order

Contracts
Create and Track Contracts with your vendors Attach scanned-copies of actual contracts Accurately track which assets are covered under contract Search Contracts for easy access to information Timely reminders for renewing important contracts

Getting Started
Logging into the ServiceDesk Plus On successful installation, the ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus login page appears in your default browser. 1. Enter the Username as administrator and the Password as administrator.

2. Hit the Login button.

Accessing the Admin Configurations After logging into the application, Configuration Wizard page opens with the start button. Click the start>> button to start with the initial setup of the ServiceDesk Plus. This opens the Help Desk - Category page. To go to Admin Configuration Wizard page directly, click Finish on the top right hand side of the page. The Admin Configuration Wizard page has a collection of all the Admin tasks for various configurations and customizations.

Changing your Password You can change your login password by clicking the Personalize link beside the Log out link. 1. Click the Change Password tab. 2. Specify your Current Password. 3. Specify your New Password and re-enter your new password in Confirm New Password field. 4. Click the Save button. Your password would be changed successfully.

Help Desk
Configuring Organization Details

Organization Details
Organization Details is where you need to specify the details about your organization. The Organization Details specified here will appear in the Reports and Purchase Orders created from ServiceDesk Plus.

Mail Server Settings


Setting the mail server details in necessary to fetch and send mails from ServiceDesk. You need to set both the incoming and outgoing mail server settings to send and receive mails without any problems.

Incoming Mail settings Click the Incoming tab to specify the incoming mail settings. Server Name/IP Address: Denotes the Incoming Mail Server from where the mails need to be fetched. User Name & Password: Login credentials to the server. E-mail Address: The e-mail address to which the requests are sent and only these mails need to be fetched. E-mail Type: Indicates the type of e-mail fetching (For example: IMAP or POP and so on). If you have chosen IMAPS then you have an option to enable Transport Layer Security (TLS). Port: Port from where the mails need to be fetched. Fetch mails every: Enter the time span for the mails to be fetched periodically without having to fetch them manually.

All the above fields are mandatory and cannot take null values, except E-mail Type. Click the Save button. The configuration is saved and ServiceDesk Plus will try to establish connection with the mail server. On successful connection, the mail fetching status is enabled. To start the mail fetching, click Start Fetching button. Now, the Save button is disabled. NOTE: If you want to make any changes to the incoming mail server settings, then you need to stop mail fetching and only then make the changes and save them.

Outgoing Mail Settings Click the Outgoing tab to specify the outgoing mail settings. Server Name/IP Address: Denotes the outgoing mail server through which the mails will be sent to the external world. Alternate Server Name / IP Address: If you have a backup server that will take over if the main server mentioned above crashes, then enter the same here.

Sender's Name: The name that will appear in the mail beside the sender's email ID. Reply-to Address: The email address to which the replies need to be sent. Usually this will have the value specified in the email address field of the incoming mail server settings. E-mail Type: Indicates the type of mail e-mail dispatching (For example: SMTP, SMTPS). TSL Enabled: Option to enable Transport Layer Security (TLS). Port: The port from where the mails need to be sent.

If your outgoing mail server needs authentication, then select the check box Requires Authentication. Enter the User Name and Password that are required for authenticating the outgoing mails.

Spam Filter Spam e-mails are e-mails that are not intended to be logged in to helpdesk and using Spam Filters you can prevent unwanted e-mail converted in to request. E-mails from other domains (When helpdesk is serving only the internal customer's) can be stopped from being created in to new request. Example: You can create a rule like; Sender does not contain '@manageengine.com' and add it to Match the below criteria. So when an email arrives, the filter matches the defined criteria and if the Sender is not does not contain @manageengine.com domain, the request is not raised in the application. To specify the spam filter details specify the Define Rule from the combo box and click the Choose button and specify the criteria matching the rule.

Select either Match ALL of the following criteria (or) Match ANY of the following by selecting the radio button. Once you select the match criteria and specify the define rule click Add to Rules button to add the rules to match the criteria. E-mail Command E-mail Command allows the technician to delimit fields in the e-mail, according to which the e-mail can be parsed and corresponding fields can be set. To configure E-mail Command, select E-mail Command sub tab and select the check box beside Enable E-Mail Command. This option should be enabled to activate the e-mail parsing feature. If this option is not selected, then the incoming e-mail will be handled as a normal mail based on established business rules even if the incoming e-mails contain the parsing string in the subject. In the E-mail Subject contains text box, enter valid subject that determines the e-mails which have to be parsed. E-mails containing this text will be parsed for various fields. Example: Assume the E-mail Subject identifier is given as @@SDP@@, then all e-mails with subject as @@SDP@@ alone will be considered for parsing. Provide any special character (@@, ##, $$, %%, &&, so on) as the Command Delimiter. The field values assigned between these special characters is assigned to the corresponding fields while the requests are created. Example: Assume if the Command Delimiter is @@and category field needs to be set to Printer, then the email description should contain @@Category=Printer@@.

Regions
Regions denote the various geographic locations where your organization has its branches. Specify the regions of your organization. This data is mostly essential for Site configuration.

Sites
Sites denote the offices located in the various regions. Each office in a region is considered as a site. So if you have various offices in a region, then each of these offices should be configured as a site. The main purpose of Site configuration is to maintain a single ServiceDesk Plus installation irrespective of its location, working hours and IT operations executed in the sites. NOTE: Before getting started with the Site configuration, make sure you have configured the Operational Hours, Holidays, Departments, Business Rules, Technicians and Service Level Agreements. The data configured for these settings are considered as the Default Settings.

Add New Site Click Add New Site link, and specify a unique name for the Site. Select the Region and the Time Zone. The Operational Hours for a site is calculated based on the selected Time Zone. Next specify the Address and Contact information for the site. Related Settings: Select the configurations for the site. You can either choose to copy the default settings or customize separate configurations for the site. Copy Default Settings: A separate copy of the default settings is maintained for the site. With a separate site based configuration, you can alter the name of the default settings like the Department; IT Services can be renamed as IT Operations in the site configuration. Or, you can also add additional holidays, business rules, technicians, support groups and service level agreements for the site alone. NOTE: Any change made in the default settings, like a new holiday is added in the default list, then the same is reflected in copy default settings.

Refer Default Settings: The site follows the default settings configured in ServiceDesk Plus. Any change made under the default settings is also applied to the site. NOTE: You will not find separate site based configuration for sites following Refer Default Settings. The sites will not be listed in the drop-down menu of the default settings. Custom Settings: The sites with this setting will follow neither the refer default settings nor maintain a separate copy of the default setting. You need to customize separate configurations for the site. If a Site is not configured then the default settings configured for holidays, business rules and service level agreement will be applied to a request.

Site Admin assigned to a site can configure the holidays, business rules, service level agreement, department and technicians for their associated sites.

Operational Hours
Helps you set the operational hours of your organization. This information is used in calculation of the service request completion time. Service request completion is based on the SLA and priority given to the request.

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If your organization works round the clock, then select the radio button provided for the same and choose the working days of your support crew in a week by selecting the check box beside the days of the week listed. If you do not work round the clock, then select the radio button beside Select Operation Hours. From the drop down boxes of time for Start Time and End Time, choose the appropriate values. Select the Working days of your organization from the given list by enabling the check box.

Holidays
You can add and view the list of holidays for your organization situated in various sites. This information along with the operational hours will be used for calculating the expected completion time of a request including the priority or SLA applicable for the request. To add holidays for a specific site, select the site from the Holidays for combo box. The available list of holidays for the selected site will be displayed. To add new holiday, click Add New Holiday link. The Date can be selected on invoking the calendar icon. You can also set repeated holidays such as, Christmas, to an organization in a site. By doing so, you need not manually configure the repeated holidays every year.

Department
The organization situated in different sites can have various departments and, each of these departments is governed by a Department Head with a group of employees in them. The users are associated to department and departments are associated to sites. Hence, the users need not be associated to the site directly. So, while importing users from Active Directory, the department information of each user is also imported and, these departments are associated to the site.

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User Management
Active Directory
The Active Directory application in ServiceDesk Plus enables you to import user information from the Active Directory server. Once you have all your user details in ServiceDesk Plus, you can configure Active Directory Authentication which allows users to login to ServiceDesk Plus using their Active Directory credentials. In addition to this, the Pass-through" Authentication provides instant access into ServiceDesk Plus when the user logs into their Windows system. Thus avoiding the ServiceDesk Plus login screen. Step 1: Import Requesters from Active Directory Before you enable Active Directory Authentication, you should import requesters into ServiceDesk Plus. ServiceDesk Plus will automatically fetch all the Windows Domains in your network. So all you need to do is specify the Domain Controller for the Active Directory server and provide the login credentials. While importing users, you can also import their details such as Phone, Department, Job Title, Mobile, Site Name and E-mail Address. If you have configured any requester additional fields, then the same can also be imported from Active Directory.

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Click Import Now. This opens the import wizard page, which displays the various Organizational Units (OUs) available in the domain. Select the specific OU to import users. Click Start Importing button to import the requesters. After importing the requesters you get a report on successful and failed import. Step 2: Enable Active Directory Authentication When you import all your users into ServiceDesk Plus, you can allow users to access ServiceDesk Plus using their AD credentials by selecting Enable Active Directory Authentication check box. In the Login screen, the users can log into ServiceDesk Plus by specifying their Active Directory login credentials and selecting the Domain from Log on to drop down. NOTE: If the user does not want to specify the Active Directory credentials, then the user should select Local Authentication option from Log on to drop down and specify the local credentials.

Enable "Pass-through" Authentication [Single Sign-On] "Pass-through" Authentication or Single Sign-On provides instant access into ServiceDesk Plus, by avoiding the login screen, when the user logs into their Windows system. The "Pass-through" Authentication in ServiceDesk Plus uses NTMLV2 which provides better security and validates the credentials using NETLOGON service via a computer account.

1. To enable Pass-through authentication for users from a particular domain, select the Domain Name from the drop down list. The enabled domain should be two way trusted. 2. Specify the DNS Server IP of the domain in the provided field. 3. To use the NTLM security provider as an authentication service a computer account needs to be created in the Active Directory with a specific password. Specify a unique name for the Computer Account and Password for this account. 4. The Bind String parameter must be a fully qualified DNS domain name or the fully qualified DNS hostname of a particular AD server. 5. Save the authentication. You will get a confirmation message on the authentication. NOTE: An active user account cannot be specified as a computer account. Upon saving the details, a new computer account will be created on the Active Directory (with the help of VB Script). If the user specifies existing computer accountname, the password specified here will be reset on the Active Directory for the computer account. User can choose to reset the password of computer account by clicking on the Reset Password link as well. Even if there is a problem creating Computer Account or Resetting Password of already created Computer Account using VB script from SDP server(upon save, the script will be called automatically), the details specified here will be saved and user can execute the script locally on the AD server specifying the same details to create computer account / reset password. If there is an issue with computer account creation, user can specify an already created computer account name and reset password of that computer account with the help of reset password script. By default you will only be able to login as a guest. The administrator should select the technicians from the requesters list to provide you with the technician role.

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Step 3: Schedule AD import You have an option to schedule Active Directory import in specified number of days. Select the Schedule AD import check box. Specify the number of days in the text box. Requester details will get imported automatically once in specified number of days. Click the Save Schedule button to be in sync with the active directory.

LDAP Authentication
You can also import users from the LDAP server using LDAP authentication. On enabling the LDAP authentication, the user can login using their LDAP credentials. By default, the LDAP authentication will be disabled. NOTE: Ensure that the before you start configuring the LDAP authentication the users are already imported. The LDAP authentication supports both Linux and Windows users. Hence for windows user, on enabling LDAP authentication, the AD authentication gets disabled automatically. To import users from a New Domain, 1. Click Add New Domain button under Domain Controllers block. This opens the Add New Domain Controller form. 2. Specify the Domain Controller from where the users have to be imported in the Domain Controller text field. For ex: ldap://<server name> :<port number>. The default port is 389. 3. Enter the User Name along with the Organizational unit (OU) in the given field. For ex, CN: john, CN=Users, DC=domain name, DC=com. 4. Specify the Password in the respective field. 5. Specify the Base DN which represents the distinguished base name such as, CN = Users, DC = domain name, DC = com. 6. Specify the criteria which you want to apply on that particular domain controller in the search filter text field. For ex: mail=* will import users from the parameter mail in the specified domain controller. 7. Select the LDAP Server Type from the combo box. For ex. OpenLDAP. NOTE: If you have chosen the Server type as default LDAP such as, Microsoft Active Directory, Novell eDirectory and OpenLDAP then the Login Attributes Label, Mail Attribute Label and Distinguished Name Attributed Label will appear in a non-editable text. 8. If the LDAP Server Type is Others then, specify the Login Attribute Label and Mail Attribute Label in the respective fields. 9. The Distinguished Name Attributed Label is similar to the Base DN. 10. Click Save to save the domain controller. If you want to save and import the users, click Save and Import.

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You can also import users from the existing domain by clicking Import Now of the corresponding Domain Controllers. On importing the users from the same domain again, the existing data will be over written. Once the users are imported, enable LDAP authentication by selecting the check box. On clicking Save the user can login to the application using his LDAP credentials.

Roles
Once the users are imported into ServiceDesk Plus, the administrator should select the technicians from the requesters list, and provide the technicians with specific roles. The technicians accessing the help desk tool will have a set of permissions and tasks to execute in the application. These access permissions are termed as Roles in ServiceDesk Plus. ServiceDesk Plus allows you to configure multiple technician roles and assign it to the technicians. NOTE: Please note that the roles for requesters are pre-defined and hence cannot be configured. By default you have seven technician roles out of which, the SDSite Admin role is editable.

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To add new role click the Add New Role link. Specify the Role Name, Description and set the Access Permissions by selecting the check boxes beside each of privileges against the various modules. Access Permissions Access Permissions View Description View permission enables the technician to only view the selected module. They cannot perform any further operation. Add permission allows the technician to perform Add operation for the selected module. On selecting the Add option for a module, the View permission check box is automatically enabled. Add Note: If you have selected Add check box for request module, then the Add option under Advanced Permission - Request module is automatically enabled. Similarly, if Add check box is selected for purchase module, then the Add option under Advanced Permission - Purchase module is also enabled. Edit permission enables the technician to perform Edit operation for the selected module. The technician cannot perform Add or Delete operation. However, on selecting the Edit option for a module, the View permission check box is automatically enabled. Edit Note: If you have selected Edit check box for request module, then the Edit option under Advanced Permission - Request module is automatically enabled. Similarly, if Edit check box is selected for asset module, then the Edit option under Advanced Permission - Assets module is also enabled. Delete permission allows the technician to perform Delete operation for the selected module. The technician cannot perform Add nor Edit operation. However, on selecting the Delete option for a module, the View permission check box is automatically enabled. Note: If you have selected Delete check box for request module, then the Delete option under Advanced Permission - Request module is automatically enabled. Selecting full control check box for a module automatically enables View, Add, Edit and Delete check box for that module. Full control allows the technician with full access over the selected module. Full Control If the selected module has Advanced Permissions, then those options are enabled automatically. Note: If an action is disabled in Advanced Permission, say, Adding Requesters under Request module, then Full Control permission for request module gets automatically disabled.

Delete

The access permission for request and purchase modules are further categorized and defined under Advance Permission.

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By default, a technician can view all the requests, problems, changes and assets created in the application. If you want to restrict access to them then select any of the radio buttons, All: The technician is allowed to view the modules - requests, problems, changes and assets for all the sites configured in the application. All in associated Site: The technician is allowed to view the modules - requests, problem, change and assets for his/her associated sites. Note: Please note that the technician has the permission to view Requests, Problem, Change and Assets module, only if the View permission is selected in Access Permissions. All in Group & assigned to him: The technician is allowed to view requests assigned to his/her associated group, and also the requests that are assigned to him/her. Assigned to him: The technician is allowed to view the requests assigned to him/her alone.

User Additional Fields


User Additional Fields allows you to configure additional fields that would appear in the requester form or technician form. And, common fields that would appear in both requester and technician form. Select the additional field from Filter by type drop-down menu. Click the Add Field button. Select a Field Type. You can choose to enter Text, Numeric and Date/Time fields. The Text field can be Single-line, Multi-line or Pick List. Enter the Field Name and Description for the field. Save the details.

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Requesters
You can add, edit, or remove the requesters in the ServiceDesk Plus application and also provide them with login permissions as technicians and guest. To add requesters, click Add New Requester link. Specify the Personal Details of the requester, the Contact Information, Department Details and Self-Service Access Details. If you want to allow users to approve the service request or purchase order then select the check box.

Change Requester to Technician Usually when you import users into ServiceDesk Plus, the user list comprises of both, requesters and technicians. You can change the requesters into technicians without having to recreate the same as a technician. To change requester to technician, Click the name of the requester to open the edit requester form. Click the Change as Technician button this opens the edit technician form. To associate multiple sites to a technician, select the sites you wish to associate the technician from the list of Available Sites and move it to Associate Sites by clicking >> button. Similarly you can also dissociate the sites.

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To assign support groups, select the groups from the list of Available Groups and move it Associated Group by clicking >> button. To assign roles, select one or many roles from the Available Roles list and click the >> button to move the roles to the Assigned Roles list. To remove roles select one or many roles from the "Assigned Roles" list and click the "<<" button Assign Role. Save the details. The newly added technicians get listed in the Technicians list page. Generating the API Key The authentication between ServiceDesk Plus and Desktop Central or any other external application is through the API Key. This unique key is generated for a technician by clicking the Generate link. You or simply retain the same can select a time frame for the key to expire using the calendar icon key perpetually.

Associate Workstation to Requester You can also associate a workstation with the requester. To associate a workstation with the requester Click the Associate Workstation link available at the top right corner of the edit requester form. This opens the associate workstation window. Select the workstations that you wish to associate with the requester from the Workstation List and move them to the Associated Workstations list by clicking the >> button. To dissociate a workstation, select the workstation from Associated Workstations list and click the << button. If you wish to dissociate all the workstations, then click Dissociate All. After associating the required workstations, click Save Changes. Click the View Requests button in the edit requester page to view all the requests that are assigned to the requesters.

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Technicians
The IT help desk team will comprise of the help desk team manager, help desk agent, and technicians who will be handling the requests posted / raised by various employees in the organization. You can add, edit, or remove the technicians in the application and also provide them with various access privileges that suit their role and need. To add new technicians, click the Add New Technician link available. Specify the personal details and contact information. You can associate multiple sites to a technician. Select the site you wish to associate the technician from the list of Available Sites and move it to Associate Sites by clicking >> button.

You can also assign Support Groups for the technician. Select the groups from the list of Available Groups and move it Associated Group by clicking >> button. If you are providing the technician with the administrator privileges then select the check box. Or if you wish to provide the technician with other rules then select the roles from the available roles list.

Robo Technician
Using Robo Technician you can reset the user password quickly & easily. This involves two steps process to reset the user password such as, 1) configure robo task 2) creating an Incident Template.

Robo Task Configuration On the top right corner of the page you will have enable robo task option; by default the status of the robo task would be disabled. Enable the robo task by clicking the enable icon. Else you will not be able to perform the robo task operations. There are three blocks available in the configuring robo task page such as, Task Options, Action on Success & Action on Failure. In the Task Options block select Password Reset Type from the combo box. You have four passwords reset types such as, Random Password: In this case the robo technician assigns a random password to the user.

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Typed Password: In this type the logged in technician will enter the password in the given text field. Same as the User Name: The robo technician will assign the user name as password. Blank Password: In this type the password will be a blank password. If you wish, you can select User must change password on next login check box. Generally it is recommended to enable this option for security purpose. On resetting the password successfully you can configure the corresponding actions to be performed in the Action On Success block. Select the Request Status you wish from the combo box. Specify the Resolution Details in the text field. If the password-reset action is failed then you can configure the corresponding actions to be performed in the Action On Failure block. To assign the event to the currently logged in user select Assign to Invoker check box. Else you can assign it to the Group under which the problem is associated. And you can also assign the problem to the corresponding Technician. Specify the notes about the issue in the Notes text field. And save the details.

Creating an Incident Template On installing Robo Technician it automatically creates a default Incident Template for a particular Robo Task. You can edit this Incident Template based on your needs. Ex: Say if a user requests technician for password reset, and if the technician has already configured robo task, then he can create a request to reset password using this default template.

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Setting up (configuring) Help-Desk


Helpdesk Customizer
Using help desk customizer you can configure all helpdesk settings such as, category, status, level, mode, impact, urgency, priority, priority matrix, request type, request additional fields, request closure code, request closing rules, incident template, resolution template, reply template, task template and Service Catalog. Click the Helpdesk Customizer icon and you have the helpdesk customizer tree view on the left side of the page. Click the options to configure your helpdesk settings. Helpdesk Category You can classify different types of requests into different categories. Example: All requests for installing software can be classified under the category "Software". Also hierarchy of Category -> Sub-category -> Item is supported using which the type of the incident can be granularly categorized. By using different categories you can configure ServiceDesk to automatically route cases to the appropriate technician. As an example all Internet connectivity related issues could be automatically assigned to John - your Network Engineer. To create a New Category, click the New Category button. In the category form, specify the Category Name, Description and Technician in the given fields. All the issues related to this category will be assigned to the selected technician. Click Save and Add Sub-Category button to save the details and add sub category.

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Create Subcategory If you have selected the Save and Add Sub Category button, while saving a category, then the Subcategory form is displayed. You will find the Category field is pre-selected. Specify the Subcategory name and Description.

You can also add a new subcategory by clicking the New Subcategory button in the Category List view. Specify the Subcategory Name and Description. Select a Category from the drop-down menu for which you are creating the subcategory. Create New Item If you have selected the Save and Add Item button, while saving a subcategory, then Item form is displayed. You will find the Subcategory field is pre-selected. Specify the Item Name and Description.

You can also add new item by clicking the New Item button in the Category List view. Specify a name for the item and also provide a brief Description. Select the Subcategory from the drop down menu. Click Save.

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Helpdesk Status Request status is an option used to indicate the level of progress of a request, based on which any action can be taken to resolve and close the request. Grouping requests under various status helps in organizing the requests. By default, there are four helpdesk statuses namely, Open, Onhold, Closed and Resolved. Default Onhold status helps in calculating the accurate due by time of the request. Example: A request on Printer Problem is assigned to the technician, and the technician needs few more details from the requester to resolve the problem. If the requester takes more time to respond to the technician then in that case the actual completed time to resolve the request cannot be calculated. The technician can move the request to the on-hold status until he gets the information from the requester. On moving the request to on-hold state the timer stops and the due by time gets increased in proportion to the on-hold time. A request status is said to be Open when the request is In Progress and needs to be resolved within the due by time. By default, while raising a request, the status of the request is Open. The status of the request is said to be Closed when the request is completed and the solution/workaround is approved by the requester. Resolved status denotes the requests that are resolved with a resolution but waiting to be approved by the requester. Example: A request on software upgrade is assigned to the technician, and the technician resolves the request within the specified due by time. While waiting for the requesters acknowledgement of the solution, the status of the request is moved to Resolved to stop the timer.

Adding a Status To add a new status, click the Add New Status link and specify the details. While specifying the Type of the status, In-Progress status denotes the current status of the request. If you select the Stop timer check box the Timer Status will show Stop. If you have not selected the stop timer check box then the timer status would be running.

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Helpdesk Level Request level is a measure used to indicate the complexity of a request. This helps in the proper assignment of requests to the corresponding technicians who are experienced enough to handle the requests. By default, there are four helpdesk levels namely, Tier1, Tier2, Tier3 and Tier4. If the received request just has some information and does not require any action to be taken, then it can be classified as Tier 1. If there is a minor level action, such as providing the requester some tips to resolve the issue, then it can be classified as Tier 2. If the request involves troubleshooting, then it can be classified as Tier 3 and Tier 4.

Adding a Level To add a new level, click Add New Level link and specify the details such as the Name of the level and a brief Description about it.

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Helpdesk Mode There is more than one way in which a service request can be submitted to your support team and it will be tracked in ServiceDesk. The modes by which you can submit your service request are, Submitting the query using a web-based new request form. Placing your request through a phone call to a service desk agent who will in turn file your request in the application. Sending an e-mail to the support team which will automatically get logged as a service request in ServiceDesk.

To add a new mode, click the Add New Mode link on the Mode list page and specify the details. Helpdesk Impact Impact is a measure of the business criticality of an Incident or a Problem. Impact is often measured by the number of people or systems affected. By default you have four Impact details listed in the list view.

To add Impact details click the Add New Impact details link on the impact details page. Helpdesk Urgency Urgency is about the necessary speed of solving an incident of a certain impact. By default you have four Urgency details listed in this page.

To add a new impact click Add New Urgency link on the urgency details page.

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Helpdesk Priority Priority associated to the request defines the importance that is to be given to the request. The priority can be indicated with a unique color by, either specifying the color code in the text field or selecting the color from the palette. To add a new priority, click the Add New Priority link on the right hand side corner of the Priority List table.

Helpdesk Priority Matrix The priority matrix helps you to determine the Priority automatically based on Impact and Urgency of a request. Impact is listed in the y-axis, and Urgency list in the x-axis of the matrix. Priority Matrix requires a one-time configuration by the Administrator for given business Impact and Urgency values. Once you set the Priority for specific Impact and Urgency in the priority matrix, when a requester selects a similar impact and urgency combination in the new request form, then the priority of the request will be determined based on the matrix. Example: In priority matrix: If Impact is Affects Business and Urgency is High then Priority should be High. Result in request form: If requester/technician selects Affects Business for impact and high for urgency in the request then, the priority field gets filled automatically and displays as high.

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Helpdesk Request Type Request Type helps you to configure the type of requests other than the default options such as incident, service request and so on. This is essential while creating a new request under the request module. To add a new request type, click the Add Request Type link on the right hand side corner of the Request Type list page and specify the details.

Helpdesk Incident Additional Fields You can define your own organization specific fields that need to appear in the new incident form apart from the pre-set fields that have been provided by default. You can add text fields, numeric fields, and date/time type fields in the form. Select each of the tabs and add the label name and description for each of the fields that you wish to add in the new incident form. Helpdesk Request Closure Code Request Closure Code denotes the reason behind closing a request, whether the request was closed successfully, unsuccessfully, cancelled and so on. Using the request closure code, you can comprehend the purpose of closing the request by the technician. In addition, comments can be provided to give a detailed explanation for closing the requests. The configured request closure code list appears while closing the request, and the data entered is viewed in the request details page. Helpdesk Request Closing Rules Request closing rules can be used to select the mandatory fields to be filled in by the technicians while closing the requests. You can also use it to confirm user acknowledgement to the technician and close requests either manually or automatically. Example: If you have selected Resolution as a mandatory field in this page, then the technician fixing the problem should enter the reason and solution for the problem in the resolution text field, else an error message pops up asking the technician to enter the details in the resolution field. If Yes, prompt a message radio button is enabled then, a confirmation message is prompted to the concerned technician if user has acknowledged the resolution. Select the mandatory fields for closing the request from the list by enabling the check box and Save the details.

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Incident Template
Incident Template supports to configure different fields in the form layout for different type of incident requests. Thus creating individual form for each Incident Template for the most frequently raised requests such as, printer problem or mail fetching problem. The fields can be pre filled with values so that a request can be created instantly. On creating a new Incident Template, the template is listed in the New Request combo box on the left side of the page. By default, the new request form displays the default the default request form will be opened. To create a new Incident Template, click Add New Template link on the right hand side of the Incident Template list page. The Incident Template form consists of three blocks namely, Header, Field list and the Canvas. Header: The header consists of the Template Name, Comments, Show to requester check box and the Undo and Redo buttons. If you want the requester to view the form, enable 'Show to requester check box'. By default, this option is disabled. Field List: The Field List consists of the list of fields and add new field option. Canvas: The canvas decides the form look and has drag and drop area.

Form Customization You can add/remove fields, set field properties and re-arrange the fields in the Canvas for an Incident Template. Thereby, creating and customizing an individual form for each Incident Template. Add New Field You can add new fields by dragging the Add New Field option under the Drag and Drop field on to the canvas. This opens the Add New Field pop up window. Enter the details in the respective fields. Click OK, the field gets added in the dragged place in the canvas.

The newly added fields are common for all the templates. The field name will also be same for all the templates. The newly added field can be edited in request-additional fields.

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Drag and Drop Drag the field from the Field List and drop it onto the canvas. The drop areas will be highlighted. The dragged field can be dropped only in the highlighted area. The fields in the form can also be re-arranged by dragging the field and placing it over an empty cell. The field can be placed only in the highlighted area. The request details can be moved as a whole block. Setting Field Properties You can customize the fields such as, status, priority, mode by either changing the field properties, i.e. making the fields mandatory or closing the fields. Thus you can customize the entire form by keeping the relevant fields in the canvas for the corresponding template. To customize the form, and Field Close icon appears. Click the edit field hover over the field, an Edit Field property property icon. A drop down appears containing the options, Mandatory Field: The field can be made mandatory by enabling the check box adjacent to this option. NOTE: If the Item field is marked as mandatory then the category and the sub category will automatically be marked as mandatory. Similarly if the Impact details is marked as mandatory then the Impact field will automatically be marked as mandatory. Requester can set: On enabling this option, the requester can edit the fields. The 'requester can view' option automatically gets enabled. Requester can view: The requesters can only view the field and cannot set nor edit values on enabling this option.

NOTE: The fields such as request details, subject and description does not have field properties and hence can be only re-arranged in the canvas. Click Field Close icon to remove the field from the canvas and add it to the field list.

NOTE: The fields such as status, priority, description, subject and requester details do not have the Field Close option.

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Request Preview You can have a preview of the Incident Templates for a technician and a requester. Click the Incident Template from the Incident Template list view page. By default, the Incident Template form for a technician is opened. The header section will be grayed and hence will be noneditable. You can view the Incident Template form for a requester if the Show to requester option is enabled. To view the Incident Template form for a requester, click the Requester tab on the top left hand side of the page. You can also view and add tasks related to the request by clicking on the Task tab. This displays the list of tasks for the template. You can also add tasks by clicking Add Task button. Deleting Incident Template 1. From the incident template list view page, enable the check box adjacent to the template which you want to delete. 2. Click Delete button, a pop up window appears confirming the delete operation. 3. Click OK to continue. The template gets deleted from the list. If the template is been used by a request then the template will be marked in grey indicating no further usage of the template in the incident template list view page. To bring the form back to usage, disable 'Template not for further usage' check box under the Header block of Edit Incident Template form.

Resolution Template
Resolution templates can be created to handle repeated requests with the same solution. The solutions of frequently raised requests, such as printer configuration can be made into a Resolution Template. Thus, technicians need not type the same resolution repeatedly for the request raised.

Reply Template
While replying to requests, technicians tend to type the same response repeatedly to many requests. With Reply Template, technicians can create templates for the repetitive response to requests, thus saving time and easing their work.

Task Template
Certain tasks need to be repeated by the technicians for different users and scenarios. With Task Template, repeated tasks can be pre-defined thus saving time on creating and assigning tasks to the technicians. Task Template can be applied while adding a task to a request, problem and change.

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Service Catalog
Service Catalog is where you can portrait the wide range of services offered by your IT department to the end-users. Some of the most common day-to-day IT services required by the users are, installation, relocation, internet access, email access, provision of hardware, software and so on. These services are grouped under Service Categories with an icon to depict its uniqueness. Service Categories holds classified group of service items and can be configured from the Manage drop down. Apart from this, an instant means to get to the add service category form is by clicking the Add Service Category button. From the Manage drop down, you can also configure the Additional Fields and Service Level Agreement for the service requests.

Service Requests for a service category can be configured using the Add Service button beside the category. The list of services under a service category can be viewed using the drop down icon beside them, and on hovering over the services, the delete, edit and disable icons appear. NOTE: Service Requests are different from Incident Requests. Service Request denotes requests that are raised for support, delivery, information, advice or documentation. Some examples of service requests are, requesting for external hard drive, resetting lost password, creating a CRM account and so on. Most of the service requests require an approval process.

Service Categories
Service Category is a comprehensive list of IT Services and Business Services provided by your organization to the end-users. Each service has a classified group of service items that can be made available to specific user groups.

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To add a service category, 1. Click Add New Service Category drop-down menu. You can add either an IT Service Category or a Business Service Category. Select the appropriate option to view the add form. 2. Specify a Name for the service category. This field is mandatory. 3. Enter a brief Description about the IT service details in the field provided. 4. Set an Icon for the service category. You can choose the icon from the icon set or upload an icon. The Icon set consists of the icons available in the application, by default. To upload an icon, click Upload an icon link and browse to select the icon. 5. Click Save to save the details and return to the list view.

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NOTE: 1. The default fields in the form such as, Service Support Hours, Business Criticality, Department, Incident Restoration Target, Availability Target, Cost, Managed By and Business Impact are configured while adding the Configuration Item Types. If you want to add or remove any of these fields then you can do so under Admin tab -> Configuration Item Types. 2. The newly added Service Category (either IT Service Category or Business Service Category) are listed as CIs in CMDB module.

Service Catalog Additional Fields


The pre-set fields in the service request form may not contain certain key information that is relevant to your company. But with Additional Fields, you can configure your organization specific additional fields. These fields appear in the service request form under the service field block, and can be made available in either all the service request forms irrespective of the service category or in specific service request forms. Select the Service Category for which the additional field should appear. If the additional field should appear in the service request form for all categories, select "common fields". You can add Text fields, Numeric fields, and Date/Time type fields in the form. Select the tabs and enter the Label name and Description for the fields to appear in the service request form. While adding Text fields, you have an option to choose the type of text field. The text field can be of a Single line text field, Multi-line text box, and a Pick List or drop down menu list. Select the corresponding radio button. If you wish to add any default values for these fields, you can enter the same in the text box provided for the same. Click Save to save the settings. Click Go Back to return to the Service Catalog configuration wizard page.

Service Catalog SLA


Service Level Agreement evaluates the efficiency, effectiveness and responsiveness of the help desk team. The services created in the application can be exclusively assigned with specific SLAs thereby setting a due by date for the service requests. Escalation rules can also be set if the request is not attended and resolved within the specified time. To add new SLA, Click Add New SLA link from the SLA list view page. The SLA form has three blocks of information, namely SLA Details, SLA Rules, and Escalations. The SLA details consist of the SLA name and description. SLA Name uniquely identifies the SLA. It is a mandatory field. You can provide a brief explanation of the SLA in the Description field. SLA Rules is where you need to set the Agreed upon Time (due by time) for the service request. Enter the agreed upon time in terms of days, hours and minutes. If the service request should be fulfilled irrespective of the working hours and holidays then enable Should be fulfilled irrespective of the operational hours check box. Escalate the service requests to other technicians if the request is not fulfilled within the specified resolution time. Select the check box beside Enable Level 1 Escalation. Click Choose button to select the technicians to whom the SLA violation should be escalated. You can choose to escalate before or after the SLA violation. If you wish to escalate the request before the SLA violation, click Escalate Before option. This informs the technician about the

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impending of the violation. Specify the number of days before the SLA violation in the text box. You can also specify the time of escalation. Click Escalate After option to escalate after the violation. Specify the number of days after the SLA violation has occurred in the text box. You can also specify the time of escalation. Similarly, there are four levels of escalation when the resolution time violates. Click the Save button to save the SLA and return to the list view. Click the Save and add new button to save the SLA and add another SLA.

Creating a Service Item


To add services under a service category, click Add Service button beside the service category. The service form is customizable consisting of a template for easy configuration. The form consists of three blocks, namely Header, Service Fields and Service Preview. Header: The header consists of the Service Name and Description. Service Field: The service field consists of the list of available parameters and an option to add new field. Service Preview: The service preview decides the form look and consists of drag and drop area along with the Undo and Redo buttons. You can add/remove fields, set field properties and re-arrange the fields in the Service Preview form. Thereby creating and customizing an individual form for each service item. Adding New Fields You can add new fields in the form by dragging the Add New Field option to the Drag and Drop area. Select the field type and enter the label name and description for the newly added field. For Text field, select the field type from Single-line, Multi-line or Pick-list. Click Ok to add the field in the dragged place of the form. These newly added fields are common for all the services under the service category. Alternatively, additional fields for specific service category can be created under Additional Fields, from where the existing fields can also be edited and deleted. Drag and Drop Fields from Service Fields block can be dragged and dropped onto the service preview form. The fields in the form can also be re-arranged by dragging the field and placing it over an empty cell. The requester details block can only be moved as a whole. While rearranging the fields, to Undo/Redo any changes, click the appropriate buttons. While raising a service request, the IT team would be well assisted if all the required information is provided in the form. But usually that may not be the case. The service request may be raised with half-filled information and may require a user to edit and provide the remaining details. The Editor, mostly a requester, can be configured for a service request by dragging the Editor Field onto the service preview. When this service request is raised with the Editor Field filled, the status of the request is automatically moved to On Hold. The On Hold status states that the service request is waiting for further update from the editor. Setting Field Properties You can retain relevant fields by customizing and deleting the existing fields from the form. To customize the form, hover over the field, an Edit Field Properties appears. Clicking on Edit Field Properties and a Remove Field icon icon lists the following options,

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Mandatory Field: Set the field as mandatory by enabling the check box beside the option. NOTE: If the Item field is marked as mandatory, then the corresponding Category and Sub category will also be marked as mandatory. Similarly, if the Impact detail is marked as mandatory, then the Impact field will also be marked as mandatory. Requester can set: Enabling this option allows the users to edit the field, i.e., they can enter or select values for the field while raising a new service request. Enabling this option automatically enables 'requester can view' check box. Requester can view: On enabling this option alone, users will not be allowed to enter values for the field while raising a service request. NOTE: The fields such as Requester Details, Subject and Site do not have Edit Field Properties icon and hence these fields can only be re-arranged. To remove a field in the form, click Remove Field icon. The fields detached from the form are listed in the Service Fields block. NOTE: Fields such as Status, Description, Requester Details, Site and Subject do not have Remove Field icon. Resources Info If the service involves any resources then you can mention them under the Resources block. The process involves a series of questions and the resources can be displayed either in the following formats - check box, drop down, plain text or with simple yes/no. 1. Click Add Resources button. 2. Specify the Resource Title and a brief Description on the purpose for adding this resource in the corresponding fields. 3. Next, select a question from the existing question list. You can also create a new question by selecting the New Question button. 4. Select the Question Type from the options provided. The question can be in a simple yes or no format, drop down, check box or in plain text. 5. If you have selected the question type as check box or select box, then Add Options appears from where you need to select the asset type. The assets under the selected asset type are listed. Select the assets to be displayed in the question by clicking >> (move right) button. 6. You can also manually add the resources on selecting Add Manually from add options. Enter the resource; click Add to make the resource available in the question. Click Ok to save the question. 7. Click Save to save the resource information.

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Show to Requester: To make this service request available to requesters, select Show to Requesters check box. If there are User Groups configured in the application, then you can select the service request to be made available to specific user groups. Click the Save and Configure Work Flow button.

Work Flow
Approver Details: Certain service request raised in the application requires approvals from the concerned users to go ahead with the request. The approvers can be technicians or requesters with the permission to Approve Service Requests, and should possess an email address in the application. You can configure up to 5 stages of approvals for a service request. Each stage may possess one or more approvers. Select the Approvers from the icon . The approver(s) can also be the department head to which the requester belongs provided the approver has the permission to approve service requests. Send approval notification automatically when a service request is raised - Enable this check box to send an approval notification to the concerned authority each time a service request is raised. If you have configured multiple stages of approvals, then the notification is sent to the next consecutive stage only on approval from the previous stage. All configured approvers have to approve the Service Request - Enabling this check box makes it mandatory for all the configured approvers to approve the service request. If anyone of the approver (at any stage) rejects the service request, then the request does not proceed to the next stage. NOTE: If you have selected more than one approver in a stage, then all the approvers in that stage should approve the request.

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Do not assign technician before Service request is approved - This option is enabled only on selecting "Send approval notification automatically when a service request is raised" check box. On selecting this option, a technician is assigned to a service request only when the service request is approved by the concern authority.

SLA: Select the SLA for the service request from the drop down. You can also add new SLA using the Add New SLA link. Tasks: Tasks related to the service request is configured in the Tasks block. Click Add Task button and proceed on filling the task form. The configured tasks in the list view can also be organized to suit your desired priority. The tasks for a service request are automatically created and assigned to the configured technician each time the service request is raised. Template Action: This functionality is available only when Desktop Central 7.0 and above is integrated with ServiceDesk Plus. To avail this functionality, configure the Server Name and Port number of the Desktop Central server in ServiceDesk Plus application. Click Save and Configure Requester button, to configure service request form for requesters.

Service Request Preview for Requester


You can have a preview of the service request for technicians as well as for requesters. Requesters can view the service request if "Show to Requester" check box is enabled. Select a service request template from the Service Catalog page. By default, the request template form for technicians is opened. Click the Requester tab. The header section is grayed indicating that it is non-editable. You can drag and drop fields from the Service Fields block to the canvas and rearrange the fields. Click Save.

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Help desk Work-Flow

Modes of creating a Request


In the help desk workflow you can see that the request can be created in three ways by default, 1. Requester can call the help desk agent and tell him the requirement and he will in turn file a request. 2. Submitting your query through web-based new request form 3. Sending an e-mail to the support team, this will automatically get logged as a service request in the ServiceDesk Plus. NOTE: The Modes 1 and 2 can be used to raise a service request in ServiceDesk Plus. If you have raised a service request through e-mail, then the request will be under Incident Request list.

Create an Incident Request


The Incident Requests denotes the failure or interruption of an IT Service or a Configuration Item/Asset. Some examples of incident requests are, display problem in your laptop, unable to login into File Server, frequent crash of an application and so on. We will see how to create an incident request through web-based new request form. 1. Click the New Request link available just below the tabs in the header pane or click the New Request button in the Request index page. This opens the Default Request form. 2. Select the Request Type from the combo box. By default, there are three types of requests, a. Incident: Failure of a business service or degradation of a service for one or more users. Problem or issue in the existing service comes under this request type. E.g. Unable to print b. Request for Information: Request for information is basically in need of some information or knowledge.

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3. Select the Mode of request submission, and select request Level and Priority from the combo box. 4. Select the Status of the request. The default entry of the Status of the request will be Open. 5. Select the Impact, Impact Details and Urgency of the request from the combo box. 6. To provide the owner for the request select the Group of the request. On selecting the Group, technicians associated with the Group alone will be listed in the Technician drop down list. Select the Technician for the request from the combo box 7. You can also add Additional Request Details in the request form; you can define your own organization-specific fields that do not appear in the New Request form. Depending on the fields, enter the required values for the fields. 8. You can select the requester from the list of users using the ServiceDesk Plus application. Under the Requester Details block of the New Request form, beside the name field, click the ). The Requester List window pops up as shown below, click the requester lookup button ( hyper-linked requester name to select the requester. If the requester list is huge, then you can choose to view only a select group of requesters by clicking the alphabets at the top, or by entering a search string and clicking Go. Now choose the requester name. The name of the requester is displayed in the Name field in the Requester Details block. If there are any other details associated with the requester, such as Contact Number, Department, Workstation, and Site then the relevant details will be populated in the respective fields. 9. You can also add new requester directly by clicking the Add Requester button from the requester list page. And also you can edit the requester details directly from this page by clicking the edit icon beside each of the requester name in the list.

10. By default, the location of the requester will be populated in the Site text field. If the site is not specified for the requester then the Site can be manually chosen from the combo box. 11. Under the Category Details Block, there is a Category drop-down box. This lists the various categories under which a request can be classified. Select the relevant Sub-Category from the combo box. Also select the relevant Item from the combo box. 12. Specify the subject line and provide a detailed description with any other associated details relevant to the request in the Description text box. 13. Click the Attach a file link beside the Attachments field to attach attachments.

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14. You also have an option to add Resolution to the request in the new request form. If you have an answer or solution for the request you can quickly add in the resolution text field and add it to the request. The purpose of having resolution in the new request form is, when a technician is reported about a problem which has been already cleared by him/her then, in this case he can create a new request, specify the solution in the resolution field, set the status as Closed and can close the request. Thus this option makes the job easier for the technician to specify the resolution and close the request immediately. 15. Once you have done all the above, click the Add request button. The request gets added to the list of requests and can be viewed from the request list view which can be invoked by clicking the Request tab in the header pane.

Verify SLA
Once the request is created, ServiceDesk Plus automatically verifies for SLAs configured for that site to resolve the issue. You can define SLAs for the different sites by setting the rules to attend service requests generated from requesters / departments. The requests are solved based (preference) on the SLA rules. By default, you have four SLAs listed in the SLA list page, Example: If you set the SLA for the London site with matching criteria as, Priority is Normal and the request matching the criteria should be resolved in 4hrs. Then whenever a request comes in from the site London, with a normal priority the request will be resolved in 4hrs with respect to the operational hours of your organization. To add a new SLA, 1. Select the site for which you wish to configure the SLA from the Service Level Agreement for combo box. Click the Add New SLA link on the right hand side corner of the SLA List page. 2. Specify the SLA name and Description. 3. Select the (And), (OR) condition by selecting the radio button. 4. Set the criteria by selecting from the Select Criteria combo box, and then choose the individual values that need to be matched with the criteria by clicking the choose button. 5. Specify the Days and Time for Response Time and Resolution time. Any request matching the above rules should be responded and resolved within the specified date and time. 6. If you wish to resolve the request irrespective of the operational hours select the check box. 7. You can choose to escalate to your higher authority if the Response time and Resolution time elapses. You can choose to escalate before the violation or after the violation. If you wish to escalate about the SLA violation in advance to the technician then, select the Escalate Before option. Specify the number of days before to be escalated in the text box. This is to escalate to the technician about the onset of the violation. Also specify the time of escalation. Click Escalate After option to escalate after the violation. Specify the number of days after the SLA violation to be escalated in the text box. Also specify the time of escalation. 8. Save the details.

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Business Rules
On verifying the SLA and due by time, ServiceDesk Plus checks for the business rules to automatically route all the requests to group, technicians or departments. You can define Business rules for every site that will enable you to organize the incoming requests (form and e-mail) and perform any action ranging from delivering them to Support Groups, to assign status and other parameters of the requests. To add a new Business Rule, 1. Select the site for which you wish to add the business rule from the Business Rule for combo box. By default, the combo box shows default settings. 2. Click Add New Business Rule link on the right hand side corner of the Business Rule page. 3. Specify the Business Rule Name and provide a corresponding description for the business rule. 4. Business Rule can be executed on a request when it is created via web form (or received via email), edited or both on choosing the options from Execute when a request is drop-down list. By default, the 'Created' option is selected. 5. You can disable a Business Rule by selecting Disable Business Rule check box. 6. By default, the execution of the business rule will stop once a rule is applied on a request. To continue execution of successive business rules even after a business rule is applied on a request, select Turn on Cascade Execution check box. 7. By default, when a business rule is applied, the request values will be changed with the values in the business rule only if the request value is empty. If the request value is not empty, the business rule value will not be applied. To override the request values with the values in the business rule enable Override request values with Business Rule values. 8. Under the Business Rules block, define the business rule. Specify the criteria and condition for the business rule.

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Set the criteria by selecting from the Select Criteria combo box, and then choose conditions, and then the individual values that need to be matched by clicking the Choose button. Example: if you want to match the requester name John, then select Requester Name from the criteria combo box and condition as, is or is not from the drop down list. This list varies for the selected criteria. Then, click Choose button, to open the list of requesters in a pop-up window. Select the requester name from the list and click Select. For multiple selection, press Shift or Ctrl key while selecting the names. The selected names will appear in the text box just before the choose button. Click Add to Rules to add the defined rule to the rules table. By default, the radio button Match ALL of the following is selected. If you do not want all of them to be checked but if it is enough if any one of the rules are matched, then select the radio button Match ANY of the following. After defining the rules, you need to define the actions that need to be performed on the request matching the criteria. Choose the action that needs to be performed on the request from the Perform these Actions drop down list. Click Choose button to the select the values for the chosen action. For example, if the action you had chosen was to Place in Group, then click the choose button, the list will display the available support groups in which the request can be placed. You need to select the group in which the request has to be placed and click OK. Click Add.

9. 10.

11. 12.

You can send Email and SMS notification to technicians once a business rule is applied.

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Place in Support Groups


Support Groups denote the classification of help desk team under which the various incoming requests can be categorized. Each Support Group can have a group of technicians in charge of handling the requests pertaining to that Group. You can configure these Groups in such a way that notifications can be sent to support group who belong to the Group regarding a new request creation. In addition to this, you can configure Support Group E-Mail ID, Sender E-Mail and Name for each Group. So, when a request is sent to this Support Group E-Mail ID, it will automatically be assigned to this Support Group. When Sender Name and EMail ID are configured for this group, the same will be taken into account when a reply is sent to the Support Group mail. To add a new Support Group, click Add New Group link on the right hand side corner of the Group List page. Specify the details and save it.

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Raising a Service Request


Service Requests are requests raised for support, delivery, information, advice or documentation. Some of the examples service requests are installing software in workstations, resetting lost password, requesting hardware device and so on. We will see how to raise a service request from ServiceDesk Plus, Similarly to the New Incident drop down menu, the Service Catalog drop-down menu lists all the service items configured in the application. The service items are grouped under a service category for easy reference and identification. From the list of service items available to you, you can browse and raise a service request. NOTE: If New Request drop-down is displayed instead of Service Catalog drop-down menu, then the administrator has enabled the option Combine incident and service templates listing for the service in Self Service Portal Settings. The New Request drop-down menu groups both, the Incident Requests and Service Request Templates based on the category. Click Service Catalog drop-down link to view the Template Categories and the Template List.

Raising a new service request is as simple as creating a new incident request from the available templates. Browse through the Template List and select a service that is relevant to your needs. 1. Select the service item from the catalog. This takes you to the New Service Request form. The delivery time frame of the service is displayed. The delivery time frame is displayed only if an SLA is assigned to the service request. 2. Select the parameters such as Status, Level, Mode, Priority, Category, Sub category and so on, that is available in the template. 3. To select a Requester from the list of users configured in the application, click requester beside the requester name field. The Requester List window pops up. Click lookup icon the hyper-linked requester Name. The requester name and details associated with the requester are populated in the requester details block.

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If the requester list is huge, then click on the Alphabets at the top of the page to view only a selected group of requesters. Conduct an instant search for the requester by entering the search string in Search Requester List field and click Go. If you are aware of any requesters details such as name, login name, department, email and so on, then conduct a column-wise search using the search icon . In addition, add new requester directly by clicking the Add Requester button from the requester list page. Also, you have an option to edit the requester details directly from this page. Click the edit beside the requester name to perform the edit operation. icon

4. The assets associated to the requester are populated in the Asset drop down. Select the . Asset from the drop down. You can also select assets by clicking the icon In Select Assets pop-up window, you can filter the assets by selecting the Type of assets such as, access point, routers, workstation and so on, from the drop-down. Selecting All Assets lists all the assets available in the application, irrespective of the asset type. You can further filter the assets according to sites associated to the logged in technician using the Site drop-down. Selecting a site lists the assets from that particular site. Say, for instance, if the site selected is "New York" and the asset type is "Access Point", then all the access points associated to the site New York are listed. Tip: If the Service Request is "Installing Software", then select the workstation in which the software should be installed.

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5. By default, if the site location of the requester is configured in the application, then the same is populated in the Site field. 6. On selecting the site, the groups corresponding to the site gets populated under the Group field. The request is routed to the particular group by selecting the Group name from the drop down. 7. On selecting the Group, technicians associated with the Group alone are listed in the Technician drop down list. Select a Technician to handle the request from the drop down. . 8. If the editor field is enabled for the service request, then select the Editor from the icon Refer the topic Service Request Editor to know the purpose of the editor and how to enable the editor field. 9. For a service request template, the subject line is already specified. You can change or modify the subject. The subject line is displayed as the request title and is a mandatory field. 10. Provide a detailed description with any other associated details relevant to the request in the Description text box. 11. To add any attachments relevant to the service request, click the Attach file button in the Attachments block. 12. While entering the request details, if you have a solution for the service request, then the same can be entered in the Resolution field. 13. Click Add New Request button. The request details page is displayed from where you can perform further actions on the service request. NOTE: Please note that the following operations cannot be performed on a service request Merging requests, Duplicating requests, Associating Problems to a request and Associating Changes to a request.

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ITIL Solutions

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Incident Management Incident Workflow


User Call

Record basic details

Follow Specific Procedures

Yes

Request

No

Interrogate CMDB

Define Priority

Assess Incident details

Can Service Desk Plus resolve?

No

Assign to specialist support group


When resolved

Provide User with resolution advice

Code and close Incident

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An incident is disruption of normal service that affects user and business. The goal of Incident Management is to restore normal services as soon as possible with workarounds or solutions to make sure that it does not affect business. Incident Workflow in ServiceDesk Plus Incident Identification and Incident Logging Incident Classification Incident Prioritization Incident Diagnosis Incident Escalation Resolution & Recovery Incident Closure User Satisfaction Survey

Incident Identification and Incident Logging Incidents can be any failure or interruption to an IT service or a Configuration Item/Asset. An incident can be created, From Network Management tool From Web Interface By User Phone Call By E-mailing Technician Staff

Incident Classification Incident Classification is significant to understand the source of the incident. The helpdesk technicians can categorize an incident into three levels namely Category, Sub Category and Item. The incident can be categorized depending on the failure reported and can be automatically routed to the appropriate support technician.

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For instance, when your helpdesk team handles over a 100 requests per day, it would be timeconsuming to manually assign the incident to Technician Groups or Technicians, or even with request parameters (category, level, priority and so on). Business Rules help automate the assigning of incidents. By defining rules and criteria based on the pattern of failure, the incident would be automatically assigned to technicians or categories or levels. But you dont have to entirely rely on Business Rules to automate the assigning of incidents to technicians. The Technician Auto Assign option automatically assigns incidents to technicians using either the Round Robin or Load Balancing method based on the availability of the technicians.

Incident Prioritization Each incident may cause a different impact on your business, and setting the right priority is crucial to minimize this impact. You can define Priority based on the Impact and Urgency of the incident from the Priority Matrix. So when a similar impact and urgency combination is selected in the new incident form, the priority set in the Priority Matrix would get applied.

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Incident Diagnosis When the incident is created, it is analyzed and the symptoms are discovered. The symptoms are added as Notes which will help find the failure and the means to correct it. You can search for existing workarounds or solutions from the Knowledge Base and reply to the user instantly with the resolution. This reduces the turnaround time for the incident.

Incident Escalations If the first-level support technician is unable to resolve the incident (i.e. when it is not a known error) then the incident is referred to the second-level support technician. The incident would get escalated to the third-level support technician if the second-level support technician is unable to resolve the incident within the due date. Service Level Agreement helps in prioritizing the incidents and enabling timely escalations.

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Resolution & Recovery For critical incidents which has affected any IT Service, it is vital to make sure that the incident is identified and resolved quickly. After resolving the incident, you could add the resolution to the Knowledge Base articles. This helps in giving a quicker response time if a similar incident is reported again.

Incident Closure Closing an incident may not be an instant task as it requires the users confirmation of the resolution. But ServiceDesk Plus makes it simple by providing the user with the privilege to close his incident. If the user has not responded back even if the issue is resolved or has not closed his incident, then the Automatic-Closure option would help in closing the incidents for such instances. The incidents would get closed after the specified number of days when there is no response from the user. By enabling fields as mandatory, you can ensure that the incidents have the required parameters filled before it is closed.

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User Satisfaction Survey User Satisfaction Survey helps in identifying the Satisfaction Level of the users and knowing performance of the support engineers in resolving the issue. The performance of the support engineer can be measure and improved based on the survey results.

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Problem Management
Problem Configurations
The goal of Problem Management is to find the root cause of incidents and reduce the impact on business. Problem Management is a proactive approach that prevents recurrence of incidents.

Problem Additional Fields You can define your own organization specific fields that need to appear in the new problem form apart from the pre-set fields that have been provided by default. You can add text fields, numeric fields, and date type fields in the form. Select each of the tabs and add the label name and description for each of the fields that you wish to add in the new problem form.

Problem Closure Rules Problem closing rules can be used to select the mandatory fields to be filled in by the technicians while closing the problems. It also includes optional rules that can be enabled by the technician on closing the problem. Example: If you have selected 'Associated Tasks should be closed' as a mandatory field in this page, then the technician whoever resolving the problem, should close all the related tasks to a problem and enter the details in the corresponding field before closing it. Else an error message pops up, asking you to fill the details in the field. If you have selected the optional rules as E-mail all requesters affected by this problem and Close all associated incidents then, on closing the problem a pop up window listing the selected optional rules appears. Based on the incident the technician can enable the check box corresponding to the optional rules. Select the mandatory fields and optional rules for closing the problem from the list by enabling the check box and save the details.

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Problem Workflow

Problem Detection and Classification

Problem Priority

Problem Analysis

Solution, Workaround and Error record

Problem Closure

Problem Detection & Classification Trend analysis is the key to spot the Problems. A Trend analysis helps in giving a proactive approach to the Problem Management by which you can avoid the occurrence of the problem earlier rather than resolving the problem at a later stage. The reports in ServiceDesk Plus give you a clear picture of what should be identified as a problem.

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Problem Logging The Problem Logging is critical as all the necessary information and conclusion from the incident has to be captured while creating the Problem. NOTE: Avoid duplicate entries by searching for similar existing problems before creating a new problem.

Categorization Proper classification (Category > Sub Category > Item) will help the technician to qualify the problem. When a problem is created from an incident, the Incident Categorization is automatically applied to the Problem. This ensures that the Problem technicians are in the same level of understanding as the Incident technicians.

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Problem Priority Depending on the Urgency and Impact level of the problem, the priority can be set for the problem. This prioritization will help the technician to assess the various problems and take necessary action, focusing on the critical problems first.

Problem Analysis The technician can analyze the root cause and impact of the problem and attach the same in SDP as part of the problem. This helps in giving a one stop understanding of what may be cause of the problem and solution or work-around that can be given.

Solutions, Workarounds and Known Error Records Solutions are permanent fixes to the problems raised. Workarounds are temporary solutions that can be used by the technician till actual solution is ready. Optionally, you can also add Tasks that need to be done to clear the Incident.

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Problem Closure You can set rules for problem closure in Admin > Problem/Change Management > Problem Closure Rules. Only if the mandatory fields are completed can the problem be closed.

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Change Management
The goal of Change Management is to control and manage approved changes with accepted risk. ServiceDesk Plus allows you to implement a comprehensive change management system that allows you to handle pre-approved changes with complete approval cycle.

Change Configurations
Change Type The change types show the significant changes in the organization involving cost and time. Each change type is referred by different colors. By default you have four change types.

To add a new change type, click the New Change Type link on the right side of the page and specify the details as shown below.

Change Status Change Status shows the current state of change in the organization. You have list of default change status. Requested, Completed and Rejected are pre-defined change status hence cannot be deleted.

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Click the New Status link on the right side of the status list page. Specify the details and save it.

Change Advisory Board

The Change Advisory Board (CAB) is a body that exists to recommend changes and to assist Change Management in the assessment and prioritization of changes. The members of the CAB are selected based on their expertise and capability to assess change adequately from business and technical point of view. Click the New CAB button to add the CAB members and save the details. Change Additional Fields You can define your own organization specific fields that need to appear in the new change form apart from the pre-set fields that have been provided by default. You can add text fields, numeric fields, and date type fields in the form. Select each of the tabs and add the label name and description for each of the fields that you wish to add in the new change form. Change Closure Rules Change closing rules can be used to select the mandatory fields to be filled in by the technicians before closing the changes. Example: If you have selected Impact as a mandatory field, then the technician whoever doing the change, should enter all the impact details of the change before closing it. Else an error message pops up, asking you to enter the details of the impact in the corresponding field.

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To select the mandatory fields, select the mandatory fields for closing the change from the list by enabling the check box and save the details.

Change Workflow

Initiate Change Request

Change Plans and CAB

Approval from CAB members

Co-ordinate Change Implementation

Post Implementation Review

Change History

Initiate Change Request You can initiate New Change Request or initiate a change from one or more Problems. The Request for Change is considered based on the Business Impact, Urgency and Priority. The Change plan is formulated to get started with the change process.

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The Change Plan needs to have complete details about the reasons for considering the change, how this change can impact business. The Change Planning stage needs to have following information so that Change Managers and CAB has all the detailed to make informed decisions. Impact Analysis - risk involved in implementing the change Rollout Plan - how the plan will be implemented Back out Plan - plan to restore things to back to original state if plan fails Checklist - List of mandatory items required for the plan to succeed

Change Plans and CAB (Change Advisory Board) ServiceDesk Plus offers 4 different types of built-in Change Plans. Standard Change Minor Change Major Change Significant Change

ServiceDesk Plus allows you to define and configure your own Change Types with color codes to denote severity. Standard Change Standard Changes are pre-approved changes authorized by the Change Manager based on Management policies. Frequent changes such as permitted RAM upgrade to users or list of allowed software applications can be pre-approved by the Change Manager so that changes are fulfilled faster. Minor Change A Minor change is defined as a change that has low impact on business and does not consume lot of resources. The Change Manager approves the Minor Changes.

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Major and Significant Changes Major and Significant Changes need the approvals from all the members of the Change Advisory Board and the Change Manager. The members of the CAB (Change Advisory Board) are determined based on stakeholders who will be affected by the change. Based on the change plans and risk involved the CAB members will vote and recommend to accept or Decline a change plan.

Change Advisory Board ServiceDesk Plus enables you to create CABs. Based on the defined change type, you can choose to send the change plan for approval to CAB members.

Recommending the Change by CAB Members General Work Flow for approving a change The CAB should be convened for a change. The CAB members can differ for each change. The CAB member can be a requester or a technician whoever is capable to asses from both the business and technical viewpoint. Once the CAB is convened the change should be sent to the CAB members for recommendation. The technician whoever receiving the change or assigned a change will be the owner of the change and he will send the change for recommendation to the CAB. If the change is recommended by the CAB members, the CHANGE MANAGER should approve the change. The change manager can approve or reject the change based on the need. Only the approved change will be taken further by the technician to take necessary steps.

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The CAB Members meet once in two weeks or once in a month to discuss the changes that are submitted for approval. Based on the change plan and the risk analysis, the CAB Members take a unanimous decision to Recommend or Reject a Change Plan. Approving Change by the Change Manager Only the Change Manager has the authority to approve the change. Any technician with the SD change manager role permissions can approve the change. A change manager can or could not be a member of the CAB. If needed the change manager can reject the change though the change is recommended by the CAB members. It is to the change manager's discretion whether to approve or reject the change. Except for the Standard Change type all other change type should be approved by the change manager. The standard change type is a pre-approved change type hence it does not require any approval from the change manager. Only the approved changes will be taken further to solve the issue. Change Manager Roles

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To Approving the Change by the Change Manager, From the Changes tab -> click the title of the change to be approved. Click the Approvals tab, you get a link on the top right hand side of the page to approve or reject the change. On clicking the Approve link the change will be approved.

Text in the link changes as Approved with the change manager name, date and time will also be displayed as shown below. At any time to reject the change, you can click the reject link next to the approve link.

Co-ordinate Change Implementation Forward Schedule of Change (FSC) All Approved Changes have to be implemented with minimal service downtime. ServiceDesk Plus gives you built-in reports based on Priority, Urgency, by Incident, and Problem counts that helps Change Managers to prioritize and schedule changes.

Change Calendar Based on the changes considered for the next implementation, the changes are scheduled and published. The Change Calendar keeps everyone informed when a particular service will be down for maintenance and when it will be restored.

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Implementations ServiceDesk Plus helps you keep track of important tasks involved in implementing an approved change. The task delegation helps Change Managers to assign tasks to technicians, schedule the task and track task status. The Task works like a simple to-do list and are child request to the change.

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Post Implementation Review The Post Implementation Review helps Change Manager to keep track of the rolled out change to Capture the glitches that happened during the change Track KPI to measure the effectiveness of the change

Keep Track of the Change History As Change Management involves key business, it is important to maintain clear documentation about the change. ServiceDesk Plus keeps track of the complete change History. This helps to audit changes and get all the information such as, when the change plan was edited, when it was approved, who approved it and what time. The Property View helps you keep a record of all changes for auditing purposes.

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Asset Discovery
Agent Settings
ServiceDesk Plus supports both, Agentless and Agent based scanning to scan the Windows Workstation and Servers. While in Agentless mode the Windows workstation and servers are scanned using WMI, in Agent Mode the application provides an agent, which is deployed in the network workstations through various methods. Once the agent is deployed in the network workstations, it scans all the workstations and provides easy access for remote assistance. If you have enabled the agent mode, the agent based scanning is performed and if that fails, the agentless scanning is performed. For a successful scan, the agent should communicate with the ServiceDesk Plus server. The server details are configured under Agent Configurations. By default, the server in which the application is installed is populated as the server details. You can modify these configurations to create your own Agent Configurations. Server Name: The server name or IP address of the computer where ServiceDesk Plus is installed. The agent residing in the client computers communicates with the ServiceDesk Plus server using this Server Name/IP address. Server Port: The port configured for the application. Protocol: The protocol used to communicate with the server. Agent Port: The port number of the agent. Scan at System Startup: On enabling this option, the agent scans the workstation on every startup.

Methods of Agent Deployment


If you have enabled Agent Mode, you can deploy the agent in the Windows machine through any of the methods given below, Active Directory ServiceDesk Plus Application Manual Installation

Import from Active Directory logon script An instant method to push the agent in the entire Windows machine within a domain is through Active Directory logon script. Instead of providing permission to all the scanned workstations for file transfer, the agent is installed once the user logs into the machine. In addition, the agent can be deployed to all the newly added workstations automatically on scheduling an AD Import. To install the agent from Active Directory, 1. 2. 3. 4. Create a network share like, \\MyServer\MyShare Click Download Agent and run the agent.msi file. Save the agent and the script in the network share. In your Domain controller, click Start -> Administrative Tools -> Active Directory Users and Computers. 5. In the console tree, right click on your domain, and select Properties.

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6. Select Group Policy tab, and click Open (New) button. The Group Policy Management window pops up. 7. Right click on the name of domain or the Organizational unit for which you would like to configure the script. Click Create and Link a GPO Here... option.

8. Type a name for the new GPO say, AGENT DOWNLOAD and click Ok. The GPO is added to the existing list.

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9. Right click on the newly created GPO and click on Edit option.

10. In the new window go to the User Configuration -> Windows settings -> scripts -> double click Logon. 11. In the new Logon Properties window click on Add. Now browse and select the script "\\MyServer\MyShare\InstallAgent.vbs". The script should be accessible by the target workstations. 12. Specify the Script parameters as msi file name with path (e.g. \\MyServer\MyShare\ManageEngineAssetExplorerAgent.msi) and click Ok. 13. Close the Group Policy Window and click Ok. 14. Quit the Active Directory Users and Computer Window. 15. When the client computer starts the agent is automatically installed. ServiceDesk Plus Application Apart from Active Directory which involves deployment of agent in workstations of a particular domain, you can deploy agents in workstations that are part of a network group or workgroup from the application. You can choose to deploy the agent as a bulk or in individual machines. a. Bulk Deployment of Agent 1. From the Workstation Configuration page, click on Agent Details link. The workstation for which the agent is not installed is listed.

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2. Select the check box beside the workstations for which the agent should be installed. 3. Click Install Now. The agent is installed in the selected workstations. b. Installing Agent in individual machine In credentials for Agent Installation page, Name/IP: Enter the workstation name or the IP address of the workstation for which the agent should be installed. Login Credentials: Select the login credentials as either Global or Local. Global credentials are common login permissions for all the assets. Local credentials are private login permissions for an asset. If you have enabled Local Credentials, specify the login credentials to your machine.

If you have enabled Global Credentials Scan Type: Specify the scan type as Domain mode/Network mode under which the workstation is configured. Domain Name: Select the Domain name/network under which the workstation is configured. Login Name & Password: Specify the domain credentials.

Manually Installing the Agent Once the Agent configuration is set, you can download and Install the agent as a service. 1. Click on Download Agent button. 2. Run the ManageEngineAssetExplorerAgent.msi file. The ManageEngine Asset Explorer Agent Setup Wizard appears. 3. Click Next >. 4. Choose the Installation folder name under which the Agent needs to be installed. By default, the folder name is specified as C:\ManageEngine\AssetExplorer directory. 5. If you want to change the installation directory, then, click the Browse button beside the directory path. From the file chooser window, choose the directory of your choice and click Ok. 6. You can choose to install the agent for yourself or for everyone who uses the computer with the application. Select the corresponding radio button. Click Next >. 7. The next step is Agent Configurations, if you have not yet configured the agent, you can specify the server details and agent settings. Click Next >. 8. You also have an option to enable scan whenever the system starts up. Click Next to install the agent.

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Windows Domain Scan


Allows you add various windows domains that are a part of your network and scan for the workstations that are grouped under these domains. Normally, during the first time startup of ServiceDesk, all the domains in your network are automatically discovered and you will just need to provide the login and password for these domains to scan for workstations. Before scanning the domain, you need to specify the username, password and domain controller name to start the domain scan. Else, if you start the scan without providing the details you get a failure message asking you to specify the user name and password. Choose the site for which you wish to scan the workstations from the combo box.

To specify the user name and password, click the domain name in the domain list page. This opens the Edit Domain page. Specify the Domain Controller, Login Name, Password and Description about the domain in the given fields. If you would like the domain to be listed as public then select the Public Domain check box and on enabling the Active Directory authentication these public domains will be listed in the login screen.

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Once you specify the user name and password, click Scan Domain icon from the windows domain scan page to discover all workstations under Windows Domain. This brings up the Domain Scan Wizard page. Choose the Organizational Units for which you want to import by enabling the check box. Click Start Scanning button to start the scanning process. You can get the complete reports of the scan, with successful and failed workstation list.

Network Scan
This section allows you to configure networks that are part of your enterprise and scan those networks for Linux workstations and windows workstations (which are not in domain) and are grouped under these network. NOTE: It is recommended to scan windows workstations which are grouped in domain through Domain Scan. To add a new network, click Add New Network link on the right side corner of the Network Scan page. Specify the details. You can specify the entire network or specify the From and To of the network range. By default you have SSH protocol selected for other than Linux workstations.

Audit Settings
You can schedule periodic scanning of your network, enable regular cleanup of the scanned information, and set re-scanning interval for scanning workstation.

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To configure regular scanning, select the Enable Scheduled Scan check box. Then set the time frame in which you require the scheduled scan to be performed. Select any of the 5 radio buttons below the Enable Scheduled Scan. Scan Once: You can schedule scanning once on the specified date, on which you want to scan your network. Daily Scan: You can schedule scanning on a daily basis on the specified date and time. Weekly Scan: In the weekly scan option, you can also choose to schedule a daily scan on the specified time. Monthly Scan: In the monthly scan option you can choose to scan every month throughout the year on a specified date and time. Or you can also choose the months you want to scan on a specified date and time. In the monthly scan option you can also choose to schedule a weekly scan by specifying the scanning day and date and time of the week. Periodic Scan: You can enter a random period of time to repeat the scan. The scan will be performed on every specified nth day. Where n is the number you enter in the field. The default value is 7th day. History Clean up You can enable regular cleanup of scanned information, by selecting the Enable Scan History Cleanup check box and enter the number of days in the field provided for deleting the scanned information. Check for newly added workstations: You can also check for newly added workstations to the network every specified day in the given field.

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Distributed Asset Scan


ServiceDesk Plus will help you scan assets distributed across multiple sites. Install AssetExplorer in your remote sites where you want to scan assets. When scanning is complete, you will be able to export the data from the remote AssetExplorer server in the site and import it in your central ServiceDesk Plus Server. As explained below in 2 easy steps, 1. Scan the data in the remote server and export it to central server. 2. Import the scanned date in to the central server.

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Assets
Asset Configurations
Product Type
Each product can be categorized into a specific product type. This is the high level categorization of the assets in the organization. Example: Adobe Photoshop or Macromedia Flash can be categorized under the product type Software, while HP Inkjet Printer can be categorized under the product type Printer. To add a new product type, click the Add New Product Type link on the right hand side corner of the Product Type page. Specify the details of the product type in the given text fields.

Product A specific asset type which has a unique identification is termed as product. For example, Dell Latitude D600 is a product representing Dell Laptops.
To add a new product, click the Add New Product link on the right hand side corner of the Product page. Specify the product details and save it.

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If the selected Product Type is an asset or a component, then the Depreciation Details block is displayed. To configure Depreciation Details while adding the product. 1. Select the Depreciation Method from the drop down box. If the Depreciation Method is Declining Balance, then the Useful Life radio button and Decline Percent radio button appears. If the depreciation method is Straight Line, then the Useful Life radio button and Depreciation Percent radio button appears. 2. Specify the Useful Life of the product. If you have enabled Decline Percent or Depreciation Percent radio button, then specify the Decline Percent or Depreciation Percent of the product. 3. Specify the Salvage Value of the product. 4. Click Save button. On adding the product, simultaneously Vendors tab is also added to associate vendor to the product. Click the Vendor tab -> Click the Associate Vendor button and specify the details to associate the vendor with the product.

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Vendor
Using this option you can specify all the business contacts you have with more than one vendor in your organization and also you can maintain the records about each vendor and the list of products that are supplied by them. To add a new vendor, click the Add New Vendor link on the right hand side corner of the Vendor page. Specify the product details and save it. On adding the vendor, simultaneously Products tab is also added to associate product to the vendor. Click the Product tab -> Click the Associate Product button and specify the details to associate the product with the vendor.

Workstation Additional Fields


You can define your own organization specific fields that need to appear in the new workstation form apart from the pre-set fields that have been provided by default. You can add text fields, numeric fields, and date type fields in the form. Select each of the tabs and add the label name and description for each of the fields that you wish to add in the new workstation form.

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Asset Additional Fields


You can define your own organization specific fields that need to appear in the new asset form apart from the pre-set fields that have been provided by default. You can add text fields, numeric fields, and date type fields in the form. Select each of the tabs and add the label name and description for each of the fields that you wish to add in the new asset form. Click the Save button.

Asset State
Assets can be categorized based on its current status in the organization. Example: Assets In Use, In Store, Expired and so on. By default, there are five asset state listed in ServiceDesk Plus which can neither be edited nor deleted. To add a new asset state, click the New Asset State link on the right hand side of the page. Specify the Asset State and relevant information about the asset state in the Description field. Click the Add Asset State button. The newly added asset state is saved and displayed in the List view.

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Asset Management
As an asset manager you would like to know, How many Workstations do we have in our enterprise? How many Workstations are in a site? Dell is replacing D-400; do we have dell any d400s around? How many Windows XP machines do we have? Do we still have workstations with 256 MB RAM? Are we compliant? Do we know how many software licenses we have purchased and how many we have actually installed? How can I track renewal dates for so many assets?

The Assets module in ServiceDesk Plus helps you to solve all the above mentioned problems. The Assets module provides better visibility of your assets and helps to control and manage your IT and Non-IT assets. All your asset details are available in a single view under Assets tab in the home page.

Assets
Assets can be categorized as, IT Assets: All IP based assets are discovered under IT assets such as Workstations, Laptops, Printers, Switches, Servers, Routers and Access Points. Non IT Assets: All non IP based assets are grouped under Non - IT assets such as, Projectors, Scanners, Tables, Chairs and Telephones. Components: A part of the asset (i.e. associated with the asset) which does not stand alone are grouped under components such as Keyboards, Mouse, Softwares, Software Licenses and Printer ink.

IT Assets
To add a new IT asset, 1. Click on Assets tab -> Click Quick Actions tab on the top left hand side of the page -> Click Asset option from the drop down menu. [OR] Click IT Assets under Assets on the left side of the page -> select any one of the listed IT assets link. E.g. Access points, printers etc. Click the New button. Specify the Product Name, Asset Name, Asset Tag, Asset Serial No, Bar Code, Vendor Name, Asset Cost in $ in the corresponding text fields. Specify the Acquisition Date & Expiry Date Region, and Location in the given text field. Select the Site for which you wish to add the asset from the combo box. Specify the Asset State by selecting the current status of the asset from the combo box. If the asset is in Use state you need to associate or assign asset to department or user or asset. Allocate the asset to an Asset or to a User or to the Department by selecting any of the two radio button. Say Associate to Asset or Assign User/ or Department. If you choose to associate asset to an asset then select the asset name from the Choose Asset combo box. Or if you have chosen to assign to user or the department then select User or Department from the combo box. If the asset is leased select the check box Asset is Leased. If the asset is leased then specify the From and To date from the calendar button. Save the changes.

2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

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Scanning Workstations 1. Click the Assets tab and select Workstations under Assets block. Click the workstation name to be scanned. 2. Click Scan Now tab to scan the selected workstation. Based on the success or failure of the scan, corresponding message is displayed at the top of the page. To add new workstation, 1. Click Quick Actions tab on the top left hand side of the page -> click Workstation option. 2. Specify the Name of the computer, Model, Service Tag, and Manufacturer of the workstation. 3. Specify the Processor Count, Processor Info, Clock Speed, and Manufacturer of the processor in the given text fields. 4. Specify the RAM and Virtual Memory in (MB) in the given text fields. 5. Specify the Name and Service Pack of the operating systems. 6. Specify the Resource Tag, Resource Serial No, Bar Code, Acquisition Date and Expiry Date in the given text fields. 7. Choose the Vendor Name and Site from the combo box. Specify the Location in the given text field.

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8. Select the current Asset state from the combo box. 9. Select the Network IP Address, MAC Address, NIC, Network, Domain, DNS Server name & Default Gateway. 10. Select DHCP enabled. 11. Specify the Monitor, Keyboard, Mouse Type and Manufacturer in the given text field. Save the details. You can see the asset getting listed.

Non IT-Assets
To add new Non-IT Asset, 1. Click Quick Actions tab -> Click Asset option from the drop down menu. [OR] Click Non - IT Assets under Assets on the left side of the page -> select any one of the listed Non - IT assets link. E.g. Projectors & Scanners etc. 2. Click the New button. Specify the Product Name, Asset Name, Asset Tag, Asset Serial No, Bar Code, Vendor Name, Asset Cost in $ in the corresponding text fields. 3. Specify the Acquisition Date & Expiry Date from the calendar button. 4. Select the Site and Location in the given text field. 5. Specify the Asset State by selecting the current status of the asset from the combo box. If the asset is in Use state you need to associate or assign asset to department or user or asset. 1. Allocate the asset to an Asset or to a User or to the Department by selecting any of the two radio button. Say Associate to Asset or Assign User/ or Department. 2. If you choose to associate asset to an asset then select the asset name from the Choose Asset combo box. Or if you have chosen to assign to user or the department then select User or Department from the combo box. 3. If the asset is leased select the check box Asset is Leased. If the asset is leased then specify the From and To date from the calendar button. 6. Save the changes.

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Components
To add new components, 1. Click Quick Actions tab on the top left hand side of the page -> Click Asset option from the drop down menu. [OR] Click Asset Components under Assets on the left side of the page -> select any one of the listed IT assets components link. E.g. Keyboards etc. 2. Click the New button. Specify the Product Name, Asset Name, Asset Tag, Asset Serial No, Bar Code, Vendor Name, Asset Cost in $ in the corresponding text fields. 3. Specify the Acquisition Date & Expiry Date from the calendar button. 4. Select the Region, Site, Location in the given text field. 5. Specify the Asset State by selecting the current status of the asset from the combo box. If the asset is in Use state you need to associate or assign asset to department or user or asset. 1. Allocate the asset to an Asset or to a User or to the Department by selecting any of the two radio button. Say Associate to Asset or Assign User/ or Department. 2. If you choose to associate asset to an asset then select the asset name from the Choose Asset combo box. Or if you have chosen to assign to user or the department then select User or Department from the combo box. 3. If the asset is leased select the check box Asset is Leased. If the asset is leased then specify the From and To date from the calendar button. 6. Click Save button to save the changes.

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Software
Software Configuration
Software Type
All different forms of software such as, licensed, prohibited, freeware, shareware, excluded and un-identified software comes under this category. By default, there are six software types in ServiceDesk Plus which can neither be edited nor deleted. Shareware: Software that is available free of charge, may be distributed for evaluation with a fee requested for additional features or a manual etc. Freeware: Software that is provided without charge. Prohibited: Software that is prevented from use. Managed: All licensed software comes under this software type. Un-Identified: Unknown software can be categorized under this software type.

Excluded: Software that is omitted from use.

Click New Software Type link on the right hand side of the page. Specify the Software Type and Description in the text field. Click Add Software Type button to save.

Software Category
Different groups of software such as, software used for Accounting, Internet, Graphics, Multimedia, Operating System and so on are added to ServiceDesk Plus using this option. By default, there are nine software categories displayed in ServiceDesk Plus which can neither be edited nor deleted. Click New Software Category link on the right hand side of the Software Category List page. Specify the Software Category name and any relevant Description in the corresponding text fields. Click Add Software Category to save.

License Additional Fields


If you require any further additional information while adding a software license apart from the pre-defined fields, you can configure them under License-Additional Fields. You can add Text fields, Numeric fields, Date/Time fields and Cost fields in the form. While adding text fields, you have an option to choose the type of text field you want. The text field can be of a Single-line text field, Multiple-line text box, and a drop down menu list. While adding a cost field, you can either Add Costs or Subtract the cost fields. Select the appropriate radio button. You can also specify Default values for these fields in the text box provided for the same. Click Save to save the settings.

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Software License Type


Every software manufacturing company has their unique software license type apart from the several common license types. Since it is not feasible to support all the license types, you can customize the license types for all software manufacturers based on the workstations and

users.

1. Click Add New License Type link and specify the Manufacturer of the software and the License Type say, Enterprise, Standard. 2. The License type is based on the workstations or users. Workstation: The license is allocated to the workstation. User: The license is allocated to the workstation as well as the user. Select the option from Track By drop down. Single: Similar to Individual license, only one installation is allowed for this license type. Volume: Multiple installation(s) is allowed for this license type. Unlimited: Unlimited installation(s) is allowed for this license type. OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturers): The software license is attached to the hardware say, laptops for which the software is installed. The software cannot be transferred to another workstation and the license expires once the workstation is moved to Disposed state.

3. Choose any one option from Installation allowed drop down.

4. On selecting Workstation, the Is Node Locked option appears. Enable this option for workstation with specific configurations. The Installation Allowed field automatically changes to Single. 5. On selecting Users, the Users Allowed field appears. Select the number of users who can access the software. 6. Enable Is Perpetual if the software is a onetime installation and does not require a renewal. Enable Is Free License if the software is freeware with unlimited installations and no expiry date. 7. Few software license types can be divided into sub license types say for instance, with Client Access License (CAL) you can purchase license for every user who access the server (Per User) or license for every device that accesses the server (Per Device). Enter the License Option and click Add to add it in the pick list field. 8. Click Save.

Agreement Additional Fields


If you require any further additional information while adding a license agreement apart from the pre-defined fields, you can configure them under Agreement-Additional Fields. You can add Text fields, Numeric fields, Date/Time fields and Cost fields in the form. While adding text fields, you have an option to choose the type of text field you want. The text field can be of a Single-line text field, Multiple-line text box, and a drop down menu list. While adding a cost field, you can either Add Costs or Subtract the cost fields. Select the appropriate radio button. You can also specify default values for these fields in the text box provided for the same. Click Save to save the settings.

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Software Management
ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus discovers all installed software in the network. Asset managers have tough time managing personal, official and recreational software that is common in the workplace. 1. 2. 3. 4. ServiceDesk Plus groups scanned software based on Managed, Open Source types etc. Help in license management Help in Group based on application Software metering which tracks the usage of the software in each workstation.

Click Assets Tab -> Scanned Software option under Software in the resource block. This brings up the Software view list page. By default, the list of All Software will be displayed. Select the corresponding filter option from the Filter combo box. You can view the software with different status levels using filters. They are, Excluded Freeware Managed Prohibited Shareware Unidentified

Adding New Software


1. Click Software link under Assets on the left hand side of the page. Click on Scanned Software link. Click the New button to add new software.

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2. Specify the Software Name in the given text field. E.g. Adobe Photoshop. This is a mandatory field. 3. Specify the Version of the software. Say 7.1, 7.2 etc. 4. Select the Software Type from the combo box. E.g. Managed. 5. Select the Software Category from the combo box. E.g. Others. This is mandatory field. 6. Select the Manufacturer from the combo box. E.g. Adobe Systems, Samsung. This field is also mandatory. 7. Specify relevant information about software in the Description field. 8. Click Add button to add the software. You can see the newly added software getting listed in software view list page.

License Agreements
Software License Agreement is a contract between the software vendor and the purchaser. In ServiceDesk Plus, you can maintain the license agreement in the database by adding the license agreement in the application. Also, you can associate the license agreement with the software licenses. To add a new license agreement, 1. Click Software -> License Agreement under Assets block. The available license agreement is listed. 2. Click Add New button. 3. Select the Manufacturer of the software for which the license agreement is created from the drop down. If the manufacturer is unavailable in the list, select add new icon . Enter the Manufacturer and Description in the pop up. 4. Specify the Agreement Number and Authorization Number. The Agreement Number is a mandatory. 5. Select the Acquisition Date and Expiry Date of the software using the calendar icon. 6. Select the Vendor from whom the software was purchased from the drop down. and enter the Vendor If the vendor detail is unavailable in the list, select add new icon Name, Description and name of the Contact Person. 7. Specify the Description and Terms for the license agreement. 8. If required, you can also attach relevant documents to the agreement. Click Attach File button. Browse through the file and click Attach file. 9. You can add additional license agreement fields directly from this form by clicking Add More Fields.

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You can choose the type from single-line, multi-line, pick list, numeric and date/time fields. Enter the Label and Default Value (for single-line and multi-line) to be displayed in the form. 10. Specify the Purchase and Invoice Details such as, Purchase Order Number, Purchase Order Name, and the date of purchase of the software in the respective fields. 11. Also, enter the Invoice Number, Invoice Date from the calendar icon and the Total Cost of the software. 12. You can either associate the license with an existing software license (provided there are unassociated license available for the selected manufacturer) or add a new software license and associate the agreement. Associating existing license to agreement 1. Click Associate to Existing License button. 2. From the Associate Existing License pop up window, choose the Site and Software from the filter drop down. 3. Enable the check box beside the license to be associated with the license agreement. 4. Click Associate to agreement button. The selected licenses is associated and listed below the Purchase Software License block. Add New License and Associate You can instantly add a software license and associate it to the license agreement. 1. Click Add New License and associate button. 2. From the pop up window, select the Software, License Type, License Options, Installations Allowed, License Key and the Cost ($) from the drop down. The License Type, License Options and Installations Allowed are mandatory fields. 3. You can add licenses for other softwares by clicking the Add icon and repeat the steps as above. 4. Click Associate to agreement button. The license is associated and listed below the Purchase Software License block. 13. You can notify users before the license agreement expires by selecting the users to be notified from the Users List. Click >> button to move the selected user to Notified User List block. 14. Select the Days before which the selected users should be notified of the license agreement expiry. If you have selected the users to be notified of the license expiry then this field is mandatory. 15. Click Save.

Software Licenses
To add software license, 1. From the software view list page, click on the software name to open asset details page. 2. Click Actions tab on the right side upper corner of the software details page. Click Add Software License option. 3. Specify the License Type from the combo box. Individual: license provided for each individual (license for limited users). Volume: license provided for specified number of users. Enterprise: license provided for the entire organization (license for unlimited users).

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4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Client Access License: Client Access License (CAL) is required to access or use the services of the server. CAL is primarily used for Microsoft products. Specify the Number of licenses in the given text field. This is also mandatory field. Specify the License Keys in the given text field. Say XBVJD, YCCYR, 7DF28, JH2PX, MYT7M. Select the Vendor Name, specify the Purchase Date from the calendar button. Select the Site you wish to add the software license from the combo box. Save the changes.

If you have selected the License Type as CAL, the following License Options appears, Per Seat-Device/ Per Seat-User: License given to each unique user/device to avail the server software product. The number of CALs is equal to the number of devices/users accessing the server software. Per Server: License given to each server. The number of devices accessing the server simultaneously is limited and is primarily recommended for servers that require limited access. Pre Processor: Connect unlimited users/workstations to the server product. Pre Mailbox: License for each mailbox using Exchange Server.

Software Usage Tracking


1. From the Software view list page, select Managed software type from the Filter Viewing combo box, to view the license details of the software. All the licensed software comes under Managed software type. 2. Click on the software name to view the software details. In the software details page, you have the Product Name, Version, Manufacturer and Category. You can also change the category by clicking change link adjacent to the category. 3. You can also view the purchased licenses details, Licensed users, Available Licenses and Unlicensed Installations. On having unlicensed installations you get a warning message for license violation as shown below,

Licensed Installations Under Licensed Installations, you can view the workstation details, user details, software usage details, number of licensed installations and allocated licenses details. Unlicensed Installations Under Unlicensed installations, you can view the list of unlicensed installations; users using the unlicensed software, usage of the software say frequently or occasionally can be viewed. Allocate Licenses to single machines 1. Click on the Select software license icon -> Select software license page opens. 2. Select the license name by enabling the radio button. Save the changes. You can see the unlicensed installations changing to licensed installations and listed under the Licensed Installations column. Allocate Licenses to multiple machines 1. Select the workstations to allocate licenses by enabling the check box.

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2. Click Allocate License button to allocate licenses to bulk of workstations. It takes all un-allocated licenses and assigns it to the workstations automatically.

Purchased Licenses Under Purchased licenses, you can view the number of purchased licenses, license type, Installation details, license key details etc. You also have an option to delete the purchased license.

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Configuration Management Database (CMDB)


Configuration Management Database (CMDB) is a centralized repository that stores relevant information about all the significant entities in your IT environment. The entities are termed as Configuration Items (CIs) which are grouped under specific Configuration Item Types (CI Types). Some examples of CI Types are Hardware, Software Applications, IT Services, Business Services, Documents and People that are part of your organization. The CMDB is designed to support a vast IT structure where the relationships between the CIs are detected and maintained successfully. From the relationship map, you can identify the CIs relationship with other CIs, the impact degradation causes on other CIs, and the pending requests, problems and changes raised for an IT Service, Business Service and Assets.

CMDB Configurations
Configuration Item Types
The Configuration Item Types (CI Types) denotes the broad classification of entities under which the CIs are categorized. Each CI Type is defined with Attributes and Relationships which are unique for the CIs classified under them. To add a new CI Type, click Add New CI Type link. CI Type Name: The name of the CI Type under which the CIs are classified. Say, Workstations, People, and Department. This field is mandatory. Parent Type: For a granulated CI Type structure, you can further drill it down to Sub Types. For instance, the CI Type - Workstation can possess sub type like IBM Workstation, Unix Workstation and Windows Workstations. If the entered CI Type name is a sub type, then select the Parent Type from the drop down. Enter a brief Description about the CI Type and click Save. The page navigates to Edit Configuration Item Type with the specified CI Type name, Parent Type and Description prepopulated. Icon: Choose an icon to depict this CI Type in the CMDB tab. Click change link to upload an icon. Track as Asset: Enable this option to track CIs under a CI Type as assets in the asset database. The CIs can be tracked as an IT or Non IT asset/component. For instance, the CIs under the CI Type Workstation, Server, Access Point, Keyboard and so on, can be tracked as assets/components in the asset module. Note: 1. If 'Track as asset' option is enabled for the parent type, then this option will not appear for its sub types. 2. You cannot create a sub type for the CI Type - People. Instead you can create sub types for Requesters and Technicians.

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3. Sub Types inherit the Attributes and Relationships from the parent CI Type. Apart from this, attributes and relationships can also be configured for the sub type.

Attributes Tab Attributes are data elements that describe the characteristics of a CI Type. Each CI Type has Default Attributes and CI Type specific attributes. While Default Attributes are common to all CI Types such as Name, Site, Department and so on, the CI Type Specific Attributes are attributes that provide more information on a particular CI Type like the attributes for CI Type 'Server' are Model, Service Tag and IP Address to name a few. The Drag and Drop Field section lets you add additional attributes to a CI Type. Different types of customizable fields can be configured such as, Single line, Multi line, Pick List, Numeric and Date fields. Apart from these customized fields, System Attributes (entities configured in the Admin tab or data fetched during scan) can also be set as attributes for the CI Type. Adding Customizing field 1. Drag and drop the field (Single line, Multi line, Pick list, Numeric or Date field) in the CI Type attribute form. 2. The Add Attribute form pops up where you need to enter the Attribute Name and Description. In the case of Pick list fields, enter the options to add to the list. 3. Click Save. The customizable field is added in the form. In case of system attributes, choose the system attributes from the form, specify a Label Name and Save the details.

Relationships Tab You can establish default relationships between the newly added CI Type and other CI Types from the Relationships tab. For instance, the relationship set for the CI Type Workstation can be, Workstation (Newly added CI Type) Runs (Relationship Type) Software (CI Type)

The inverse of this relationship type will be automatically added for CI Type Software, Software (CI Type) Runs on (Relationship Type) Workstation (CI Type)

Setting default relationships provides feasibility while adding relationship between the CIs categorized under the CI Type. A sub type inherits the relationships of the parent CI Type, apart from which, new relationships can also be created. To add a new relationship, click the Add button. 1. Select the Relationship Type and the CI Type from the drop down. 2. Click Save.

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Relationship Attributes provides additional information of the relationship between the CI Types. For instance, the relationship attributes for the relationship between CI Type Server and CI Type Software are, installation path of the software, the installation date, the version installed in the server and so on. To add relationship attributes, click Add New Attribute button. 1. Enter the Attribute Name. Example, Installation Path. 2. Select the Field Type from the drop-down. The field type can be Single line, Multi line, Pick List, Numeric or date field. 3. Enter a brief Description on the relationship attribute in the field provided. 4. Click Save. The attribute is added to the relationship attribute list. The relationship configured with other CI Types can be viewed from the Relationship Map. Also from the map, you can add and view CI(s) under a CI Type, view the relationship attributes for a CI Type, print and export the relationship map.

Relationship Types
Relationship Types denotes the nature of relationship between a CI and another CI. The Relationship Type is expressed twice, one as Relationship Type and the other as Inverse Relationship Type. Some of the examples of relationship types are Runs::Runs On, Sends data to::Receives data from, Located In::Houses, and so on. For instance, the relationship between a server and software with the nature of relationship as Runs::Runs On is expressed as Server1 Runs Application1, while the relationship between the application and server is automatically expressed with the inverse relationship type, Application1 Runs On Server1. By default, there are some Relationship Types available in the application. To customize a relationship type, click Add New Relationship Type link. Relationship Type: The nature of the relationship like Sends data to, Enables and Submits. Inverse Relationship Type: The Inverse of the Relationship Type like Receives data from, Is enabled by and Submitted by. Description: A brief description of the relationship types and the context in which it can be used. Click Save. The newly added Relationship Type is populated in the list view along with the default types. Click Cancel to return back to the list view.

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Defining CI Relationships
To define relationships in your CMDB, three piece of information is required. 1. The CI for which the relationship is created 2. The Type of Relationship denoting the inter-dependencies between the CIs, and 3. The dependent CI. For example, consider a sentence like "ServiceDeskServer Depends on CentOS2Server". Here, ServiceDeskServer is the CI for which the relationship is created, Depends on denotes the nature of relationship, and CentOS2Server forms the dependent CI. NOTE: To make your CMDB structure less complex, consider only the relationships that you require in your CMDB, and ensure you use the right Relationship Type to define the nature of the relationship. To add relationships, 1. Click CMDB module in the header pane. 2. Select the CI Type from the Configuration Items block. Say, Workstation. Else, select All CIs link to view all the CIs irrespective of the CI Type. 3. Select the CI Name link to view the CI details. 4. From the CI details page, click Relationships sub-tab. 5. Click Add Relationships button. The Add relationships window pops up. 6. The default relationships configured for the CI Type "Server" is listed in the Choose Relationship drop-down. Select the relationship from the drop-down, say, "Runs Software". The CIs under the CI Type "Software" are listed along with the configured relationship attributes.

7. If you would like to create relationships with other CIs, enable Search other CIs to Create Relationships radio button. 8. By default, the CIs available in the CMDB are listed in the Available CI(s) column. If the CI list is excessive in length, then you can conduct a search for the CI by entering the search string. Click Search button. The search result is displayed in the Available CI(s) column.

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9. You can also view CIs under a specific CI Type. Select the CI Type from the drop-down, say, Department. The CIs available for the CI Type Department are listed under Available CI(s) column. You can also conduct a search operation if the CI list under a CI Type is excessive in length. Say, for the CI Type Department, the entered search string is "Finance". On clicking Search button, "Finance" appears in the Available CI(s) column.

10. Select the CI(s) from the Available CI(s) column. Click Move Right >> button to move the selected CI(s) to the Selected CI(s) column. 11. Select the nature of relationship between the CIs from Choose Relationship Type drop down. 12. Click Add. The relationship is added in the relationship map.

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Relationship Map
The Relationship Map is uniquely designed to provide the ability to understand the dependencies between the CIs. With the help of the map, you can analyze the impact caused by a CI on other CIs and identify the root cause of a problem. Thereby, eliminating the perpetual issues faced by your organization by establishing appropriate measures. The Relationship Map also shows the number of pending requests, problems and changes raised for the Assets, Business and IT Services. To identify if a request, problem or change is raised for the CI, . Move your mouse pointer over the CI to view the number the CI is denoted with a warning icon of pending requests, problem and changes raised for the CI. You can also view the details of the request, problem and change from the Relationship Map.

Quick Create - Relationship The Quick Create - Relationship is an instant means to create relationships between the CIs. You can create relationships for the existing CIs in the relationship map or create dependencies between other CIs using this option. In order to create a relationship using the Quick Create - Relationship option, three piece of information is required. 1. The CI for which the relationship is created. 2. The Relationship Type, denoting the inter-dependencies between the CIs. 3. The dependent CI. For example, enter a sentence like "ServiceDeskServer Depends on CentOS2Server". Here, the ServiceDeskServer form the first piece of information, Depends on is the relationship type and CentOS2Server forms the dependent CI. If the CI name has a space in between, specify the name in double quotes like, "ManagegEngine ServiceDeskServer" Depends on CentOS2Server.

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NOTE: To denote installed software, use the relationship "Runs::Runs on". To create relationships using the Quick Create - Relationship option, 1. Select the Quick Create - Relationship button in the Relationship Map. The Quick Create Relationship dialog pops-up. 2. Enter a sentence with the CIs and the relationship type. Example, ServiceDeskServer Depends on CentOS2Server. 3. Click Add. The CI dependencies are added in the Relationship Map.

For dependencies added between two CIs that are not present in the Relationship Map, select Click here to view map link to view the relationship map between those CIs. In case of conflict between CIs with similar CI names, such as "Administration" and "Administrator", the Quick Create - Relationship option provides the list of CIs, from where, you can choose the appropriate CI. To ease your selection process, choose the CI Type from the drop-down. You can also create relationships between CIs that are not available in your CMDB. Say, for instance, if Admin is unavailable in your CMDB, then you can add Admin as a new CI by selecting the CI Type from the drop-down. Click OK to view the CI in the relationship map.

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Purchase Orders
Purchase Order Configurations
Purchase Additional Fields
You can define your own organization specific fields that need to appear in the New Purchase Order. You can add Text fields, Numeric fields, Date/Time fields and Cost fields in the form.

Cost Center
Individual department or a group of department makes a Cost center. These cost centers are budgeted and tracked for the cost, income and allocation. These cost centers will be associated with the purchase order while making a new purchase in your organization.

GL Code
A general ledger account will have a specific code for all transactions in the organization. On specifying the GL code you will be able to track the necessary information for a specific transaction. Example: If you like to know all your company's IT purchases for the November month 2007, then you can specify the GL code for IT purchases in November 2007 and get the details.

Purchase Default Values


You can set the default purchase related values such as the default currency, tax rate, signing authority, billing & shipping address, cost center, approver(s), terms and remarks of purchase. Click Purchase Default Values under the Purchase/Contracts Management block in the configuration wizard page. Specify the details and save it.

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Purchase Order Workflow

Create PO
In the New Purchase Order form, 1. Specify the Order No. E.g. 2268. 2. Specify the PO Name say, Dell Lateral 600 and the Required By date from the calendar button. By default, the status of the Purchase Order while adding will be New PO, after which the status changes to Open. 3. Select the Vendor Name from the combo box. If the specified vendor name is not available in the list, click Add New link icon adjacent to the Vendor field and specify the vendor details like Name, Address and Contact Person of the vendor. 4. Select the Shipping and Billing Address from the combo box. You can also add the shipping and billing address by clicking the Add New link icon. Enter relevant details in the pop up window. 5. On selecting the Vendor, the corresponding Product Type and Products gets populated in the combo box. Select the Product type and the Products, the items gets listed one below the other along with the price details. beside the You can also add new product to the specified vendor by invoking the icon product combo box. 6. Select the Cost Center and the GL Code from the combo box. By default, the Requested By will be the name of the technician creating the PO. The Created Date and the Owner is in non-editable text. 7. Specify any related comment regarding the purchase order in the Remarks field. Ex: if the PO# name is PO L 600-500 then in this case you can explain about the L 600 in the PO# name. Where L600 stands for lateral 600. 8. Specify the terms and conditions of the purchase in the Terms field. 9. If you would like to attach a file then click Attach file button. 10. Select the Approvers of the purchase order from the PO Approver(s) list pop window by . clicking the icon 11. Specify the Signing Authority of the company. 12. Click Save the Purchase Order button to save the details.

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Submit for Approval


By default, all purchase orders are grouped under All POs. The PO has to be approved initially by the higher authority and then sent to the vendor to receive the items. The PO approval process is initiated with a request for approval and sent to the concerned authority depending on the decision taken by the personnel to approve or reject the PO. To submit PO for approval, 1. Click Actions tab -> Click Submit for Approval option. This opens Submit for Approval page.

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2. Select Send mail notification check box. The To and Subject fields drops down. 3. Enter the To Email ID. If needed you can modify the subject content manually, else you can change the same from the Notification Rules email template. 4. Type in the message text for mail notification in the Description field. 5. Click Save.

The mail notification is sent to the person who was addressed in the To field of the notification. The mail contains the link to the specific PO, which needs approval. On clicking the link, it leads you to the login screen, where on providing the proper credentials, the PO awaiting approval opens.

Approve / Reject PO
Once the PO is submitted for approval, a mail is sent to the user addressed in the To field. The email contains the link to the PO requiring approval. Clicking the link displays the PO awaiting approval. The user can also approve/reject the PO directly from the application. NOTE: To approve or reject the PO the authority should have the Approve PO role permission.

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Approve/Reject PO from the application If you have the permission to approve/reject a Purchase Order, 1. 2. 3. 4. Login to the ServiceDesk Plus application with your login credentials. Click the Purchase tab in the header pane. Select the POs Pending for Approval using the Filter drop down. Click the PO name link. From the PO details page, click Actions tab -> Approve/Reject option. You can send an email notification to the PO owner regarding your decision.

The approved Purchase Order is grouped under the status Approved POs while all the rejected Purchase Orders is grouped under Rejected POs status. The Rejected POs can be deleted completely from the system or can be edited and sent for approval again.

Ordering PO from the vendor


Once the Purchase Order is approved by the concern personnel, you need to order the items from the vendor. 1. Select Approved POs from the Filter drop down. Click the PO name link. 2. From the PO details page, click Actions tab -> Order this PO option. The Order this PO dialog pops up.

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4. Enable Send Mail Notification check box, if you wish to send a mail to the vendor regarding ordering of items. 5. Enter the Email address of the Vendor in the To field. You also have an option to CC this mail. 6. If required, you can modify the Subject content manually and type in the message text for mail notification in the Description field. 7. Click Attach file button to attach relevant files to the Order. 8. Click Send.

Receiving PO Items
The Approved PO is sent to the vendor to acquire the ordered items. The vendor can dispatch the items either completely or partially, providing a receipt in both cases. ServiceDesk Plus has the ability to change the status of the PO accordingly, i.e., when the items are received partially, the PO Status is automatically changed to Partially Received and on receiving all the items, the PO Status changes to Items Received. To mark partially or completely receive items, 1. Select Ordered POs from the Filter drop down. Click the PO name link. 2. Click Actions tab -> Receive Items option. The Receive Items dialog pops up.

4. Enable the check box beside each of the received items. If only a part of the ordered items are delivered, enter the Quantity that has been received. 5. Click Receive items button. The PO form is updated with the Received Quantity value and the status is moved to Partially Received POs.

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To associate assets, 1. From the Purchase Order details page, click on Actions tab -> Associated Assets option. All the received assets for the PO are displayed. 2. Enable the check box beside the asset to associate the asset to a group. Click Actions drop down -> Add to Group. The Add Resource (s) to dialog pops up. 3. Select the group from the existing list of groups or enable the radio button beside New Group, to add a new group. The asset gets associated to the corresponding group.

Invoice details and Notification


Once the PO is approved by the concern personnel, the Invoice and Payment options get populated in the Actions tab. On receiving the Invoice from the Vendor, you can add the Invoice details and also sent a notification to the concern technicians. To add invoice, 1. Click the PO Name link of the Purchase Order to add an Invoice. 2. From the PO details page, click Actions drop down -> Add Invoice option. The Add Invoice dialog pops up. 3. Enter the Invoice ID. This field is mandatory. 4. Select the Receive Date and the Payment Due Date from the calendar icon. 5. If required, enter the relevant comments from regarding the Invoice in the Comments field. 6. You can also enable payment notification to the technicians by enabling the check box. 7. Select the technicians from the list for payment notification. Click >> button. 8. Enter the Days before which the notification should be sent to the selected technicians. 9. Click Save.

Once the Invoice is received from the Vendor, you can notify the same to the PO approvers.
Click Actions drop down -> Receive Invoice option. The Receive Invoice dialog pops up. Enable Send Mail Notification check box. Enter the email address in the To field. If required, you can modify the Subject content manually and type in the message text for mail notification in the Description field. 5. Click Send. The status of the PO changes to Invoice Received. 1. 2. 3. 4.

Payment details and Notification


Once you receive the Invoice from the Vendor, you can proceed with the payment process and notify the approvers done the payment is done. 1. Click the PO Name link of the Purchase Order to add payment. 2. From the PO details page, click Actions drop down -> Add Payment option. The Add Payment details dialog pops up. 3. Enter the Pay Amount ($). This field is mandatory. . 4. Select the Date of Payment from the calendar icon 5. If required, enter relevant comments in the Comments field.

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6. You can also enable notification if there are any dues in the payment by enabling the check box. 7. Select the Payment Due Date from the calendar icon. 8. Select the technicians from the list for payment notification. Click >> button. 9. Enter the Days before which the notification should be sent to the selected technicians. 10. Click Save. Once the payment is done, you can notify the same to the PO approvers. 1. 2. 3. 4. Click Actions drop down -> Payment Done option. The Payment Done dialog pops up. Enable Send Mail Notification check box. Enter the email address in the To field. If required, you can modify the Subject content manually and type in the message text for mail notification in the Description field.

5. Click Send. The status of the PO changes to Payment Done.

Closed PO
Once all the items have been received, the PO moves to the closed status. All the items that have been received from the PO will be added as assets automatically and the assets that are created from a particular PO will be associated to that PO. Clicking the Associated Assets link under the tasks block will display all the assets that were created from the PO.

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Contracts
Creating a New Contract
1. Click on the Contracts tab in the header pane. This brings up the Contracts view list page. By default, the list of all Active contracts will be displayed. Click New Contract button. [OR] Click Quick Actions -> Contracts under Create New block. This opens New Contract page. 2. Specify the Contract Name and relevant information about the contract in the Description field. 3. Select the Maintenance Vendor from the combo box. If the maintenance vendor is not available in the list, click Add New link next to the Maintenance Vendor field. This opens vendor details page. 4. In the vendor details page, specify the Name, Description & Contact Person of the vendor. Save the changes. 5. Specify the support details of the contract in the Support field. If you have any attachment to attach to the contract, click Attach a file button to attach a file.

6. Select the Assets that are covered under the contracts from the Maintained Assets list. 7. To add more resources to the list, click Select Resources link. This opens Select Resources page. Specify the Resource Name or Product Type or Product in the search field. Click Search button to get the result. Select the required resources by enabling the check box. Click Add Items button to add the selected items. Click View Resources>> button to view the selected resources. Click Add Resources to Contract button to add resources to the Maintained Assets list. 8. Specify the Active Period of the contract. Specify the From and To date of the contract from the calendar button. This is a mandatory field. Specify the Maintenance Cost in $. 9. Select Enable Notification option by enabling the check box. On enabling you get the User list & Notified User list. 10. To notify users regarding contract expiry select the user from the User list and click forward >> button to move the user to the Notified User List. 11. You can also specify the E-mail IDs of the users to be notified. 12. Specify the days before which the information has to be notified in the Notified before field. 13. Save the details.

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Renewing Contract
1. Open the Contracts view list page. By default, the list of all Active contracts will be displayed. 2. To renew the expired contracts or a contract about to expire, select the corresponding filter option from the Filter Showing combo box. Example: All Expired Contracts or Contracts Expiring in next 7 days. 3. Click the Contract Name you wish to renew. This opens View Contract page. 4. Click Actions tab and click Renew Contract option. This opens Renew Contract form with the Original contract rules. The contract name is appended with the word renewed. You can edit the name but ensure that the contract name is unique and does not have the old name. \ 5. Enter the description of the contract in the Description field and choose the maintenance vendor from the combo box. 6. If you have any information on the type of support, enter the same in the Support text area. To attach any document to the contract, click Attach a file link and attach files. 7. Select the Assets that are covered under the contracts from the Maintained Assets list. 8. Specify the Active Period of the contract. Specify the From & To date of the contract from the calendar button. Specify the Maintenance Cost in $. 9. Select Enable Notification option by enabling the check box. On enabling you get the User list & Notified User list. To notify users regarding contract expiry select the user from the User list and click forward >> button to move the user to the Notified User List. Specify the days before which the information has to be notified in the Notify before field. And save the details. 10. To notify others about the renewal, select the check box, Notify others about this contract renewal. 11. Select the check box, to disable notifications of the old contract. 12. Save the details.

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Other ServiceDesk Administrator Functions


Preventive Maintenance
You can create a Preventive Maintenance Task for regular maintenance such as changing printer toner every month or perform a regular service shutdown. On scheduling the maintenance task a new request is created on a specified time and sends it to the technician as a reminder to complete the task. A reminder can also be set to remind you of the task but you will not be able to get the log details of all the preventive maintenance tasks for future reference. You can create a Preventive Maintenance Task in two steps, 1) Task Template and 2) Task Schedule. Task Template Select the Incident Template from the combo box. Specify the Request Type. Specify the Impact, Impact Details, Mode, Level, Urgency, Priority, Group, Technician and Category and click the Next button to go to the Task Schedule step.

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Task Schedule Select the type of schedule you wish to execute by enabling the radio button.

Notification Rules
Notification Rules are helpful when an event occurs and it has to be immediately notified to the technicians. Example: When Purchase order is overdue or Audit changes during discovery or Software under Compliance during discovery or when prohibited software is identified during discovery. These notification rules are self-explanatory. To set the notification rules select the relevant notification rules by enabling the check box. Except for Purchase order Overdue, You can assign technicians to notify of the fault for all the other notification rules. To assign technician select Choose button, this brings up the Choose Technician Name page. Select as many as technicians from the list using ctrl or shift keys.

Leave Type
Leave types is the type of leave taken by the technician such as sick leave, casual leave and so on. This is essential while marking leave for the technicians in Scheduler. Click the New Leave Type link on the right hand side of the leave type list view page. Specify the Name of the leave type and enter relevant Description for the same. Click Save on adding the details.

Survey Settings
Survey settings enable you to configure the default values for welcome message, email content, survey success or failure message, and thank you message. You can also choose to enable or disable a survey. If you enable a survey you can schedule the periodicity of conducting the survey. Select the check box to Enable User Survey. Enter the values for the following fields under the Survey Details block:

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Welcome Message: The welcome message gets displayed in the survey page as soon as the user opens the page. Email Content: Specify the purpose of the email in the Email Content text field. This content will be displayed in the mail sent to the requesters. $RequesterName & $SurveyLink are variables which changes based on the requester & application URL. Success Message: This will be displayed once the survey has been successfully answered. Failure Message: This message will be displayed if the survey fails and the user has already taken the survey. Thanks Message: This message will be displayed just before the submit button in the survey form. Schedule Survey To schedule a survey, choose any one the radio buttons provided in the Schedule Survey block. On selecting any one of the option a survey mail will be sent based on the options selected, the option are, A request is closed: For closing every one request a survey mail will be sent Requests are closed: Specify the number of requests to be closed for all the available requests in the text box. Once the specified number of requests is closed and a survey mail will be sent. Requests from a requester are closed: Specify the number of requests to be closed for a requester in the text box. Once the specified number is reached a survey mail is sent to the requester. This text box can take only integer values as input.

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Define Survey
Define Survey allows you to add various questions that would be a part of the user survey. Along with adding questions, you can also add the satisfaction levels that will be displayed as answers to each of the questions from which the user has to choose the best answer that will describe their experience. To add the survey questions, click the + Add Question button under the Questions tab. This opens the questions pop up window. Enter the questions in the text area provided. Click Save. The question is added to the survey and is displayed in the Define Survey page under the Questions tab.

Click the Satisfaction Levels tab to add the satisfaction levels for the survey. Click + Add Level button. The Satisfaction Level window pops up. Enter the value of the satisfaction level in the text area provided. Click Save. The level will get appended to the end of the list. You can move the same up or down the list of satisfaction levels, by clicking Move up or Move Down links.

Survey Results
You can view the survey results filled in by the requester from this page. A survey is defined and a survey mail is sent to the requester. By sending the survey mail you can request the requester to answer the survey questions to improve the service provided by service desk team. The survey replies by requesters will be listed under this section.

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Self Service Portal Settings


Self-Service Portal settings has fifteen different settings to be configured in ServiceDesk Plus such as, Default Currency, Display Language, Calendar Customization, My Reminder(s), Requester List, Request Feature List, Dynamic User Addition, User Login Addition, Override users based on Email ID, Enable Local Authentication Login, Email from New Users, Quick create Settings, Auto Assign Asset, Requester Details, Solution Settings, Remote Control Access, Alias URL and Customize ServiceDesk.

Backup Scheduling
You can configure back up scheduling, to take back-up of all the files on a regular interval. 1. Click Edit Scheduling link and Enable backup scheduling by clicking the enable button. To disable the scheduling click disable button. 2. Select the number of days from the combo box to schedule the backup process. For every n number of selected days the backup will be taken for the available data. 3. Select the date to start the backup on invoking the calendar icon from Start Backup on field. Also, select the time in hours and minutes from the combo box. This is a mandatory field. 4. In case of backup failure specify the notify email address in the given text field. This is a mandatory field. 5. You can take a backup of either the entire Database or only the File Attachments or both. Select the check box accordingly. 6. Specify the location to store the backup data in Backup Location field. 7. Save the changes.

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