Web Help Desk. Administrator s Guide Version 8.2. 2005 MacsDesign Studio

Web Help Desk Administrator s Guide Version 8.2 2005 MacsDesign Studio

Table of Contents Chapter 1: Database 1 Select a Database 1 Database Setup 1 MySQL 1 SQL Server 2000 1 Oracle 2 PostgreSQL 8 2 OpenBase 2 Backup Strategies 2 Chapter 2: Installation 3 MacOS X 3 Pre-Install Requirements 3 Installation 3 Windows 2000 3 Pre-Install Requirements 3 Installation 3 Linux 4 Pre-Install Requirements 4 Installation 4 Solaris 4 Pre-Install Requirements 4 Installation 4 Apache Integration 5 Existing Tomcat Integration 5 Microsoft IIS Integration 5 Chapter 3: Getting Started 6 Preferences 6 General 6 Users 6 Tickets 6 Locations 8 Billing 9 E-Mail 9 Techs 9 Technician List 9 Tech Groups 10 Locations 11 Location List 11 Location Groups 12 Assets 13 Models 13 Chapter 4: Managing Clients 14 Manual Web Entry 14 Data Import 14 LDAP Synchronization 15 Mapping Attributes 15 Synchronizing LDAP Connections 16 Chapter 5: Tickets 17 Web-Based Ticketing 17 Client Info 17 Asset Info 17 Ticket Details 18 Other Ticket Options 19 E-Mail Ticketing 20 Reporting by E-Mail 20 Updating by E-Mail 21 Task Management 22 Creating Tasks 22 Task Elements 22 Triggering Tasks 22 Search Tickets 22 Refining Search Results 23 Saved Queries 23 Ticket Bulk Actions 23 Ticket Assignment Logic 25 Chapter 6: Asset Management 26 Adding Assets 26 Manual Web Entry 26 Data Import 27 Search Assets 27 Refining Search Results 28 Saved Queries 28 Purchase Orders 28 Define Vendors 28 Create a New Purchase Order 28 Add Line Items 29 Purchase Order Import 29 Chapter 7: FAQs 30 FAQ View 30 New FAQ 30

Table of Contents Question View 30 Import FAQs 30 Chapter 8: Parts and Billing 31 Billing Preferences 31 Invoicing 31 Custom Logo 31 Billing Rates 31 Billing Terms 31 Managing Parts 31 Parts List 31 Importing Parts 32 Adding Inventory 32 Importing Inventory 32 Using Parts 33 Invoicing 33 Service Time Blocks 33 Chapter 11: Client Interface 46 Request 46 Help Request 46 Select Asset 46 History 47 FAQs 47 Profile 47 Logout 47 Chapter 9: Reports 35 Overview 35 Creating Reports 35 Individual Technician Report 35 Individual Report for All Technicians 37 All Technicians Open Tickets Report 38 All Technicians Average Open Time Report 39 Tech Group, Location, Location Group, Department, and Problem Type Reports 40 Technician Billing Report 40 Tech Group, Location, Location Group, Department, and Problem Type Billing Reports 40 Chapter 10: Surveys and Messages Managing Surveys 42 Survey Manager 42 Sending a Survey 42 Viewing Survey Results 43 Ticket Detail View 43 Survey Reports 43 Messages 44 Creating Messages 44 Viewing Tech Messages 44 Viewing Client Messages 45 License Key Expiration Message 45

Chapter 1: Database 1 Select a Database Before installing the Web Help Desk, you should decide on which database the application will use. JDBC drivers for all supported databases are installed by default. Supported Databases: FrontBase (included on MacOS X and Windows 2000) MySQL 4 or 5 SQL Server 2000 Oracle 8i/9i/10g PostgreSQL 8 OpenBase If installing on MacOS X or Windows 2000 and you wish to use the embedded FrontBase database, you may skip ahead to Chapter 2. Database Setup MySQL Create a new database named whd and assign a user to it named whd, having select, insert, update, delete, create, drop, references, index, alter and lock tables privileges. Refer to your MySQL database administrator or the MySQL documentation for details. Expand your server tree, then expand the Security folder and right-click on the Logins icon. Select New login... Create a new login named whd. Select SQL Server Authentication and set a password of your choice. You can leave the Database default to master and the Language at <Default>. Save this login. In the SQL Server Enterprise Manager, right click on the Databases folder and choose the New Database menu item. SQL Server 2000 Open the SQL Server Enterprise Manager and select your server from the tree. Right-click on your server and select Properties. Select the Security tab, and make sure your authentication is set to SQL Server and Windows. In the new database properties panel, type the name whd then click OK.

CHAPTER 1 Database 2 Expand the whd database folder, then right-click on the Users folder. Select the New Database User... menu item. Add the whd user to the database. PostgreSQL 8 As the postgres admin user, create a new whd user and a new database called whd. Grant all permissions to the whd database for the whd user. OpenBase Create a new database called whd and enable automatic start on reboot. For the default Admin user, set the password to one of your choosing. Refer to the OpenBase documentation if you more explicit instructions. Make sure to check the db_owner checkbox for the user. Click OK to save. Backup Strategies Having a regular backup schedule is very important to protect your data in the event of a catastrophic hardware failure. The Web Help Desk can automatically make scheduled backups on the embedded FrontBase database. Backup for all other supported databases must be handled separately from the Web Help Desk. The backup should always be moved to a separate hard disk or tape. Oracle Create a new table space and user account having select, insert, update, delete, create, drop, index, and alter privileges. The user account should be named whd and the password can be set to one of your choice. You will need the SID value for the table space to make a connection from the Web Help Desk.

Chapter 2: Installation 3 MacOS X Pre-Install Requirements MacOS X 10.2 or later If not using the embedded FrontBase, your database of choice should be setup as described in Chapter 1. Installation Mount the WebHelpDesk-<version>.dmg disk image in the Finder and double click on the WebHelpDesk.pkg installer. The application will be installed into: /Library/WebHelpDesk Utilities to start and stop the Web Help Desk and the Front- BaseManager application are installed into: /Applications/WebHelpDesk The application is configured to start automatically after installation and on reboot. However, if you do need to stop or restart the application for any reason, you can use the start and stop options in /Applications/WebHelpDesk. By default, the Web Help Desk serves web pages on port 8081. If you would like to configure the Web Help Desk to work with Apache, or run on port 80 directly, follow the instructions described in the Apache Integration section. Connect to the Web Help Desk by going to the URL: http://localhost:8081/helpdesk The application will attempt to connect to the FrontBase embedded database by default. You will be prompted to update the database to the latest version. Login to the application, using the default account: E-Mail Address: admin Password: admin Windows 2000 Pre-Install Requirements If not using the embedded FrontBase, your database of choice should be setup as described in Chapter 1. Installation Launch the WebHelpDesk-<version>.exe application and follow the on screen instructions. By default, the application will be installed into: C:\Program Files\WebHelpDesk The Web Help Desk is configured to start automatically on reboot. However, if you do need to stop or restart the application for any reason, go to Start > Programs > Web Help Desk and use the stop/start options. By default, the Web Help Desk serves web pages on port 8081. The application can be configured to run on port 80, but IIS must be stopped. Refer to the Microsoft IIS Integration section at the end of this chapter for more information. Connect to the Web Help Desk by going to the URL: http://localhost:8081/helpdesk The application will attempt to connect to the FrontBase embedded database by default. You will be prompted to update the database to the latest version. To login to the application, use the default account: E-Mail Address: admin Password: admin Tip: In a new installation, the application will not prompt you for a database connection or license name and key. It will automatically use the embedded database and start up in demo mode. If you don t want to use the embedded database, you will need to go to Preferences > General > Database to update your settings. You must restart the application to use the new database connection. To enter your license name and key, go to Preferences > General > Server Settings. Tip: In a new installation, the application will not prompt you for a database connection or license name and key. It will automatically use the embedded database and start up in demo mode. If you don t want to use the embedded database, you will need to go to Preferences > General > Database to update your settings. You must restart the application to use the new database connection. To enter your license name and key, go to Preferences > General > Server Settings.

CHAPTER 2 Installation 4 Linux Pre-Install Requirements RPM Package manager The application has only been tested on RedHat Linux, but should work on other distributions. Database setup as described in Chapter 1. Installation Decompress and install and install the RPM: gunzip webhelpdesk-8.x.x-1.noarch.rpm.gz sudo rpm -ivh webhelpdesk-8.x.x-1.noarch.rpm The RPM installs and starts the Web Help Desk at: /usr/local/webhelpdesk The application is configured to restart automatically upon reboot. However, if you do need to manually stop and start the application, using a shell: cd /usr/local/webhelpdesk sudo./whd stop sudo./whd start By default, the Web Help Desk serves web pages on port 8081. If you would like to configure the Web Help Desk to work with Apache, or run on port 80 directly, follow the instructions described in the Apache Integration section. If no Apache integration is required, connect to the Web Help Desk by going to the URL: http://localhost:8081/helpdesk Provide your settings to at the database configuration screen. You will be prompted to update the database to the latest version. To login to the application, use the default account: Solaris Pre-Install Requirements Database setup as described in Chapter 1. Installation Extract the package using gnutar: sudo gnutar xvfz webhelpdesk-8.x.x.tgz -C /usr/local/ The application will be installed in: /usr/local/webhelpdesk If your Java home directory is not /usr/j2se/jre, edit the JAVA_HOME variable in webhelpdesk/conf/whd.conf to point to your Java home directory. To configure the Web Help Desk to start up automatically at boot, execute the following commands: cd /usr/local/webhelpdesk/bin sudo./install_autostart To remove the autostart configuration: sudo./remove_autostart Start the application with the following command from within the webhelpdesk directory: sudo./whd start By default, the Web Help Desk serves web pages on port 8081. If you would like to configure the Web Help Desk to work with Apache, or run on port 80 directly, follow the instructions described in the Apache Integration section. If no Apache integration is required, connect to the Web Help Desk by going to the URL: http://localhost:8081/helpdesk E-Mail Address: admin Password: admin Tip: In a new installation, the application will not prompt you for a license name and key. It will automatically start up in demo mode. To enter your license name and key, go to Preferences > General > Server Settings.

CHAPTER 2 Installation 5 Provide your settings to at the database configuration screen. You will be prompted to update the database to the latest version. To login to the application, use the default account: E-Mail Address: admin Password: admin Tip: In a new installation, the application will not prompt you for a license name and key. It will automatically start up in demo mode. To enter your license name and key, go to Preferences > General > Server Settings. Apache Integration By default, the Web Help Desk runs on port 8081. If you don t need Apache, and would prefer to run the application on port 80, do the following: Stop Apache Set the DEFAULT_PORT variable in webhelpdesk/ conf/whd.conf to 80 Restart the Web Help Desk To configure the Web Help Desk to work with Apache, perform the following steps: In your Apache configuration file (httpd.conf ), enable the mod_proxy module by making sure the following lines are uncommented: LoadModule proxy_module AddModule mod_proxy.c Add the following lines at the end of your Apache configuration file (httpd.conf): ProxyPass /helpdesk http://localhost:8081/helpdesk ProxyPassReverse /helpdesk http://localhost:8081/helpdesk Restart Apache Existing Tomcat Integration To simplify installation, the Web Help Desk comes bundled with its own copy of the Apache Tomcat application server. However, if your deployment server already has Tomcat installed and you wish to use it in place of the included copy, move the following two directories to your existing Tomcat/ webapps directory: webhelpdesk/bin/webapps/helpdesk webhelpdesk/bin/webapps/whdreminderdaemon If you are running Tomcat and Apache, you will need to add the ProxyPass entry described in the previous section. Microsoft IIS Integration By default, the Web Help Desk runs on port 8081. If you don t need IIS, and would prefer to run the application on port 80, do the following: Stop IIS Set the DEFAULT_PORT variable in C:\Program Files\webhelpdesk\conf\whd.conf to 80 Restart the Web Help Desk The recommended method for running the Web Help Desk along with IIS is to update any external links to the Web Help Desk to include :8081 after the host name (e.g., http://www. company.com:8081/helpdesk/webobjects/helpdesk ). Open a web browser and connect to the Web Help Desk using http://localhost:8081. Log in as an admin user and go to Preferences > General > Server Settings. Append :8081 to your Server DNS Name or IP Address setting. Update any links to the Web Help Desk to include :8081 in the URL: http://<host>:8081/helpdesk/webobjects/helpdesk Tip: There is an open-source adaptor to enable a direct connection between IIS and Tomcat, but currently this configuration is not officially supported. If you would like more information, see http://jakarta.apache.org/tomcat/tomcat-4.1-doc/jk2/jk/iishowto. html.

Chapter 3: Getting Started 6 Preferences Log in as an Administrator and click on the Preferences tab. Date and Time Define your date format, hours of business, and icalendar time window. Business hours are used in all date related ticket calculations. Database Specify the database vendor, machine name or IP address and connection account. Tip: Pop-up help is available throughout the preferences. Mouse over any preference label for a detailed description of the setting. General Server Settings Specify you server DNS name or IP address and define timeout lengths for Clients and Techs. Update your license key and create a custom login message. Other settings include an auto-login option and the text character set used for display and storage in the database. Logs Specify the logging level of the application (default is Error). Enable sending the log to a remote server for monitoring with the Chainsaw log tool. Logs are stored in WebHelpDesk/log/ helpdesk.log. System Displays system environment information: application version, Java version and memory used. Users Client Options Specify the client login attribute (e-mail or user name), define which client fields are editable and required, and list which domains you want to accept e-mail from. Client Custom Fields Create custom fields for your clients and define viewing/editing permissions for clients and techs. Custom fields are always visible to administrators. Tip: On a new installation the application assumes you are running on the default port of 8081. If you have configured the application to run on port 80, you should remove the :8081 from the Server DNS or IP Address setting. Custom Logo Upload a customized logo used in the web application and client e-mail. Logo should be 259 x 61 pixels in size. Global Options Specify settings that affect the entire application, like the use of Departments or enabling Parts and Billing. Default Tech Permissions These options serve as default values for any new Technician account. Each technician can have his/her own unique preference values specified in their detail record. Important options include: Editing options on assets, models, parts and purchase orders Ticket related editing options Tickets Ticket Preferences Set the default priority for tickets and enable file attachments. Other important options include: Enable clients to set ticket priority Lock the ticket to the client s assigned location so that service locations remain private

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 7 Field style for rooms (text or popup menu) See the online help pop-ups for more information. Custom Fields Create custom fields for your tickets and define viewing/editing permissions for clients and techs. Problem Types Define what categories of issues your Web Help Desk will support. By default, the application has two problem types defined: Sample Problem and E-Mail Report. The Sample Problem can be renamed or deleted. Any new e-mail based ticket is assigned to the E-Mail Report problem type, which cannot be deleted. Click on the New button to define another problem type. A problem type can be defined at the top level, or as a child beneath any other level. Create internal problem types that are not visible to clients by unchecking the Visible to Client option. By checking Model Required, a ticket with this problem type must have a hardware model selected by the client. Specify which locations the problem type is visible from (default is all ). Custom fields can be linked to the problem type. The default option is to display All custom fields additional options include Specific and None. The Lead Technician will receive any 2nd level escalations for tickets of this type. If the problem type isn t added to any Tech Groups, the Lead Technician will be assigned all tickets of this type automatically. Assign the survey to be linked to tickets using this problem type. In the Problem Type list view, you can expand a Parent/Child grouping by clicking on the triangle icon next to the Parent type name. Parents with no children will not have a triangle. Status Types Ticket status falls into two main states: Special and Other. By default, the Web Help Desk defines the special states as Open, Closed, Resolved and Cancelled. These types cannot be deleted, but they can be re-named. The application creates one other type by default: Pending. In the sample above, the Kid Pix problem type is defined as Child of the Desktop Support Parent, which was previously created. Assign the problem type to a Tech Group (optional at this point can be assigned when tech groups are created). Define the default priority that tickets of this type will be assigned. Specify if a detailed description of the problem is required in the ticket when the problem type is selected Provide any default text you want to appear in the ticket s problem description when the problem type is selected. The pending state can be deleted or re-named. You can also add as many additional other states as you wish. All states, besides Closed and Cancelled, have the option of enabling alert e-mail messages. In addition, there are general settings to allow clients to re-open closed tickets and to automatically close tickets that have been in Pending state for a particular time period. Clients can be periodically reminded about tickets using by enabling the Client E-Mail Reminders option. The reminder interval applies to all status types with Client Reminders enabled.

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 8 Priority Types & Alerts The application defines four priority types by default: Urgent, High, Medium and Low. Additional priority types can be created and the names and display order for each priority can be changed. Each priority type may have its own set of Alert Conditions that are used in conjunction with a ticket s status to determine what the current alert status is. When a condition in each alert level is reached, you have the option of triggering e-mail events, sending a message to the assigned tech, the tech s supervisor or the group manager for the ticket s problem type. The alert repeat interval can also specified for each priority type. Custom Fields Define custom fields and specify view/editing permissions for techs. Tip: Client permissions cannot be set for asset custom fields because they are never visible to clients. Asset Types The application defines a single Sample Type asset type by default. To add additional types, click on the New button at the bottom of the list, or click on an existing type to edit. Each type can be linked to one or more models common types include: Desktop, Laptop, Printer, etc. Each priority has a Due Time value that is used by a ticket to automatically calculate the due date and time. The due date and time can be overridden within each ticket if desired. Status Types Define the various status that an asset can be categorized with. Common types include: Deployed, Storage, Donated, etc. Any status type can be additionally flagged as Retired which means that assets using this status won t be available for use in new tickets. Tip: If the status type for the ticket has alerts disabled, no alert level changes will be observed regardless of the alert settings. Assets Asset Options Specify if asset numbers should auto-increment and set view/ editing permissions for technicians. Warranty Types Specify the warranty options available for your models. Warranties can be named whatever you like, and the expiration can be defined in days, weeks, months or years. Lease Types Leases are only used in purchase orders (POs) for orders defined as Lease (vs. Purchase ). The lease periods defined in this tab are available in the PO, and the period is used by any assets linked to the PO to calculate their lease expiration date. Locations Custom Fields Define custom fields and specify view/editing permissions for techs. Tip: Client permissions cannot be set for location custom fields because they are never visible to clients.

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 9 Billing Options for Billing are available only if Parts and Billing is enabled in Preferences > General > Global Settings. There are four sub-tabs available: Invoicing, Custom Logo, Billing Rates and Billing Terms. Billing preference values are used in calculating ticket cost and for invoicing. The Invoicing > Preferred Client Contact Info controls which address will be used on the invoice: Help Desk uses the Client s assigned Location address, while Personal Address will use the address defined in the client s profile. Tabs to upload a logo, define billing rates and billing terms are also available. Receiving E-Mail In order to receive and update tickets via e-mail you must provide: E-Mail address for submitting tickets (POP or IMAP) Mail server address Account user name and password The account is checked for new mail every minute. Tip: Your logo will be automatically scaled to a width of 3 inches in the PDF file. A medium to high resolution file is suggested. E-Mail Sending E-Mail The Web Help Desk can send and receive e-mail notifications. In order to send e-mail, the you must provide the following settings: SMTP server address Helpdesk e-mail address (the from address for all mail) Other options include a setting to send mail in either plain text or HTML format. You can also specify if clients can see an estimated due date for the ticket, and show or hide action links which allow clients to update or cancel a ticket via e- mail. Additional options include the ability to set the ordering of information in the mail message (Client info, Ticket info, Notes), and specify how many notes should be included in the mail message. See the help pop-up items for a more detailed description of each option. Custom Greetings Create customized greetings for your mail messages. Greetings are linked to specific ticket status types. SMS mail text can also be customized. Techs This module is used to create new Tech/Admin accounts and to link techs with specific problem types by creating Tech Groups. Click on the Techs tab to work with this module. Technician List The application starts with a single Administrator account which can be edited but not deleted. Click the New button to create a new Tech or Admin account, or click on an existing name to edit the account.

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 10 Account Info Provide name and contact information for the account and define the account type. If creating a Tech account, you must provide a Supervisor, which can be either an Admin or another Tech. When a ticket is overdue or escalated, the assigned Tech s Supervisor may receive an e-mail. You may optionally specify a weekly work schedule. The schedule is used when determining if a technician is available for the auto-assignment of tickets. A backup tech can be specified to receive any auto-assigned tickets when the tech is unavailable due to schedule or vacation. Tech Groups Assign the Tech to one or more Tech Groups. You must have already defined your Tech Groups to use this tab. Location Groups Assign the Tech to one or more Location Groups. You must have Locations and Location Groups setup before you can use this option. Tech Groups The main purpose of creating Tech Groups is to match a group of related Problem Types with one or more Techs who are qualified to handle the problems in the group. Tickets can be auto-assigned to a tech, the group manager the problem type lead, or assignment can be left at the group level. Group level assignment provides a queue of tickets for techs to select from. Permissions All new Tech accounts inherit the permissions defined in Preferences > Users > Default Tech Permissions. These values can be left as is for the new account, or they can be edited to customize the behavior for each Tech. Administrator accounts always have full access. Permissions are divided into four main sections: Ticket, Client, Asset and Other. Tech Group List Selecting the Tech Group sub-menu option presents a list of your groups. By default, the application has one group: E-Mail Reports. This group contains only the E-Mail Report problem type and cannot be deleted. To create an additional group, click on the New button, or click on an existing group name to edit. Tech Group Info Provide a group name and choose if a ticket with any of the group s problem types will be auto-assigned to a tech. Auto-assign options include: Group Tech, Group Manager or Problem Type Lead. If auto-assign is disabled, you have several e-mail options when new tickets for the group are created: None, All Group Techs or Group Manager. Also required is the selection of a Group Manager. This can be either a technician or administrator account. The manager

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 11 receives all 1st level escalations for tickets belonging to the tech group if Preferences > Tickets > 1st Level Escalation > Tech Group Manager is selected. E-Mail ticketing can also be enabled at the tech group level. This feature allows you to define a unique mailbox for the tech group. Any new messages delivered to this mailbox will have tickets created based on the assignment rules defined for the tech group and will use the E-Mail Problem Type defined for the group. Tip: If you have a problem type that will always be assigned to a specific tech, don t add the problem type to any tech group. Instead, define the specific tech as the Lead Tech for the problem type and any tickets of that type will automatically be assigned to the tech. Locations Click on the Locations tab this module is used to define support locations and to organize locations into Location Groups. Location List The application defines a single Sample Location at installation. To add an additional location, click on the New button at the bottom of the list, or select the name of an existing location to edit. Assigned Techs Use this tab to assign the technicians to the group. A technician can be in any number of tech groups. To remove a tech from the group, click on the small - button in the tech s row. Problems Supported Specify the problem types for the group. A problem type can only be assigned to one Tech Group. As problem types are assigned, they disappear from the list of available types. If a problem type has children, you cannot assign the parent type only the children are available for assignment. Location Basics Provide a name and optional address for the location. Each location can be assigned one or more Administrative Contacts a Client account that can view all tickets for the location, as well as create tickets for themselves. Admin Contacts may also be allowed to editing permission on all tickets for the location. Admin Contacts can also be sent a copy of all e-mail updates sent to clients at the location. A default ticket priority can be set for the location. If billing is enabled, the location can be designated as a parts storage option, and a default billing rate can be specified. To facilitate service level agreements (SLAs), a default priority for the location can be defined. Tech note work time can be displayed to clients at the location.

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 12 Room Editor If Preferences > General > Use Rooms is enabled rooms can be linked to the Location by clicking on the Room Editor tab. Add rooms by clicking on the New button at the bottom of the list. Remove rooms by clicking the - button on the room s row. Assigned Locations Define the locations for the group. Each location can only be assigned to one group. As locations are assigned, they disappear from the list of available locations. To remove a location from the group, click the - button on the location s row. Tip: Locations and rooms are created automatically when using the Asset or Client Importer. If you plan on importing assets or clients, you may want to hold off using the web interface for creating locations and rooms and let the importer do it for you. Location details would need to be added via the web interface after importing. Location Groups This sub-module is used to define groups of Locations and link them to the Techs that will handle their tickets. The application defines a single Sample Location Group at installation, to which the Sample Location was added. To add an additional location group, click on the New button at the bottom of the list, or select the name of an existing group to edit. Assigned Techs Use this tab to assign the technicians to the group. A technician can be in any number of location groups. To remove a tech from the group, click on the small - button in the tech s row. Tip: If you wish to have jobs routed to a different Tech for every location, you must create a separate Location Group for every location. Only group locations together if you want the Techs in the group to handle jobs from multiple locations. Group Name Name the location group and assign a Group Manager. The group manager can be any a tech or an administrator, and will receive all 1st level ticket escalations if Preferences > Tickets > 1st Level Escalation > Location Group Manager is selected.

CHAPTER 3 Getting Started 13 Assets The Web Help Desk can be used as a complete asset management solution, however if you want to include basic asset information in tickets, you must at minimum define Asset Types, Manufacturers, and Models. Chapter 6 deals with asset management in detail. Model Editor Add models for the manufacturer under this tab. You must provide a model name and an asset type. If you plan on using the full asset management options of the application, you should assign a default warranty as well. If you need to add additional asset or warranty types, go to Preferences > Assets. Models Use this sub-module to define the models your help desk will support. Before adding specific models, you need to create Manufacturers to link the models to. The application defines a singe Sample Manufacturer by default. To add a new manufacturer, click on the New button at the bottom of the list, or click on the name of an existing manufacturer to edit. Manufacturer Info Provide a manufacturer full name and short name the short name is used in all drop down menus for any models linked to the manufacturer. Any additional information beyond the full and short names is optional. Tip: Manufacturers and models are added automatically when using the Asset Importer. If you plan on importing assets, you may want to hold off creating your manufacturers and models and let the importer do it for you. You will still need to go back to each entry and fill out details using the web interface.

14 Chapter 4: Managing Clients Manual Web Entry Individual clients are added to the application by going to the Clients > Search Clients and clicking on the New Client button. All clients must have at least a last name and an e-mail address to be saved successfully. A client can be assigned to a primary location, room and department. Once the client record is saved, the client can be assigned to additional rooms. Personal address information can be stored in the client record expose the fields by clicking on the triangle in the label row. By default, clients log in using their e-mail address, but clients may instead log in with a user name if enabled at Preferences > Users > Client Options > Client Login Attribute. New account confirmation is mailed to the client if enabled at Preferences > Users > Client Options > E-Mail Client When Account is Created. Data Import Importing is an efficient way to populate your client list. The import is facilitated by a template available at Clients > Import Clients. Click on the Download Template link and open the client_import_template.txt file in Excel. When adding client rows to the spreadsheet, it is very import to leave the column header and all columns in order and intact. If you do not wish to import data for a particular column, it is fine to leave the cells empty for the column. If you delete the headers, columns, or change the column order, the import will receive an error message. When e-mail is the client login attribute, there are two required columns for any client import: Last Name E-Mail Address The importer adds a new client for each unique e-mail address it encounters and synchronizes data based on the sync key you select. The sync attribute is client e-mail address by default, but you can also choose user name or one of your custom fields. If you have Location, Room or Department information contained in the data file, the importer creates new Locations, Rooms and Departments for any uniquely named values. Once your template is prepared, make sure to save as the file as tab or comma delimited, then use the Choose File button to navigate to your file. Click the Import button to upload the template and import the clients. When the upload is complete, go to Clients > Search Clients to check your upload results. Tip: Passwords for web entry clients are created automatically using the value set at Preferences > Users > Client Options, or the value can be set manually.

CHAPTER 4 Managing Clients 15 LDAP Synchronization The Web Help Desk can be configured to use multiple LDAP directories as a source for client data. To optimize performance, the Web Help Desk downloads client data from the LDAP directory to the Web Help Desk database; consequently, changes to LDAP data require the Web Help Desk database to be re-synchronized. Synchronization can be performed manually or at scheduled intervals. Creating an LDAP Connection LDAP connections are specified at Clients > LDAP Connections. To create a new LDAP connection click on the New button or click on an existing LDAP connection name to edit. In the Connection Basics, provide an optional connection name and the required host and Base DN parameters for the LDAP connection. If the LDAP directory is a Microsoft Active Directory, be sure to select the Microsoft Active Directory checkbox. You can also select SSL for secure connections and several authentication options are available. Mapping Attributes Besides importing basic client information, LDAP synchronization can also be used to map values stored in your directory to Web Help Desk entities like Location and Department or to custom fields. To map these attributes, select an LDAP connection, then click on the Attribute Mappings tab. You may select to use either the default schema (user for Active Directory, inetorgperson for others), or a custom schema. If a custom schema is selected, a popup menu will appear containing schemas provided by the LDAP directory. The LDAP attributes to which the Web Help Desk entities may be mapped are determined by the selected schema. Clients can log into the Web Help Desk using either e-mail address or a user name as defined in Preferences > Users > Client Options. If a custom schema is selected, name, e- mail, and phone attributes may be mapped; otherwise, these attributes are automatically mapped to the givenname, sn, mail, and telephonenumber attributes of the default schema. Tip: For most directories anonymous access is all the Web Help Desk requires to import your client data. Active Directory, however, requires authentication to read the directory. The connection account should look like admin@yourdomain.com, where the domain name matches the dc values in your Base DN. You must also provide a password for the account. LDAP synchronization does not import any passwords into the database, so your directory must store password information if you want to use it with the Web Help Desk. To authenticate your clients, the application performs an LDAP bind with your directory passing the user supplied password as part of the bind. Tip: There is an option to ignore all client passwords, which is helpful if your directory doesn t store passwords and client privacy isn t an issue. The option is set in the whd.conf file located at <install path>/webhelpdesk/conf/whd.conf. Tip: If your LDAP does not define separate first and last name attributes, but combines them into one, choose the Full Name option in the Name Attribute. The last word in the name value is used for the client s last name and the rest of the value is used for the first name. The location, room, and department attributes have checkboxes indicating whether new corresponding entries should be added to the Web Help Desk database if they don t already exist. In order for the LDAP location, room, and department data to map to existing Web Help Desk entities, the values of the LDAP attributes must exactly match the names of the mapped Web Help Desk entity. For example, if mapping the LDAP l attribute to the Web Help Desk Location entity, you must be sure that you created your locations with the exact same names as the l entries in LDAP. Note that once new location, room, and department entries have been added, they will not be modified by subsequent

CHAPTER 4 Managing Clients 16 LDAP synchronizations. Some LDAP implementations do not allow the discovery of Schemas and Attributes. In that case, the Detect Schemas & Attributes button will not be shaded, and the drop down menus will be replaced with text fields where mappings can be entered manually. Synchronizing LDAP Connections Once an LDAP connection has been defined, you must synchronize it with the Web Help Desk database. Although password authentication is performed directly against the directory using an LDAP bind, all other client data is referenced from cached copies contained within the Web Help Desk database. You can perform a manual synchronization of the LDAP data by clicking on the Sync Now icon in the list of LDAP connections. If more than one LDAP connection has been defined, an additional synchronization icon is provided in order to sync all connections at once. You may use the Auto-Sync Schedule setting of each LDAP connection to define when automatic synchronizations should take place. Tip: You can combine LDAP sync with client import to populate values that are not available in your LDAP directory. For example, if your LDAP directory only stores client name and e-mail, you can still use it to create WHD client accounts and for authentication. To populate values like Location, Room and Department, you can use an import template and sync to the client s e-mail address.

17 Chapter 5: Tickets Web-Based Ticketing New tickets are created at Home > My Tickets or Group Tickets and Tickets > Ticket Search. Click on the New Ticket button at the top-left of the list or the New button on the bottom-right of the list. Client Info By default, new web-based tickets open to the Client Info tab. Tickets do not require a client, unless specified at Preferences > Tickets > Client Required. Use the Client Lookup search panel to find clients by name, e-mail, location or department. Search results are displayed below. To assign the client, click on the hyper-linked name. If only one match is found for the search criteria, that client is automatically assigned to the ticket without having to select it from the list. Asset Info Click on the Asset Info tab to link an asset to the ticket, or supply a model if a defined asset is not available. An asset or model is not required in a ticket. If assets are disabled at Preferences > General > Global Settings > Use Assets the Asset Info tab will be hidden from in the ticket detail. Tip: To search by partial name or e-mail, use an asterisk (*) as a wildcard. Once a client is selected, his/her contact information is displayed in full on the upper left section of the Client Info panel. If a mistake was made, you can click the Clear button to remove the client assignment. The client record can be edited in a popup window by clicking the Edit button next to the client name. Any assets assigned to the ticket s client are displayed, or an asset can be looked up by asset number, serial number, model, location or room or custom field. To assign an asset, click on the hyperlinked asset number. The assigned asset can be edited by clicking the button containing the asset number. To remove an assigned asset from the ticket, click the - button at the right side of the assigned asset. Multiple assets can be assigned. In addition to client info, a list of active (non closed or cancelled) tickets for the assigned client is displayed on the right side of the panel. If an issue has already been reported in a previous ticket, clicking on the ticket number or problem report replaces the new ticket with the selected one. Tip: A ticket is not required to have an assigned asset or model. If the issue you are reporting doesn t need this information, the Asset Info tab can be skipped entirely.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 18 Ticket Details Saving a New Ticket The Ticket Details panel is where you define the ticket s problem type and provide a subject and problem description. A problem description can contain a maximum of 4000 characters. The ticket s Location and Room can be specified here as well if the assigned client or asset had location information, that will already be reflected in this panel. A problem type and description are required before the ticket can be successfully submitted. You may also create a tech note with time and billing info for the ticket, and set the job status. If the status is set to Closed the ticket is automatically assigned to the current tech regardless of any auto-assign rules in effect. Clicking the Continue... button saves the ticket to the database. Status, Priority and Due Dates All new tickets are assigned with the Open status type, and the ticket s priority is set according to the value specified in Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options. The priority may also be set based on the ticket s problem type or location. If both location and problem type have a default priority setting, the location priority takes precedence. The due date is calculated based on priority, but can be manually overridden. If the priority is changed, the due date is re-calculated on the fly. The ticket can also be scheduled for work at a specific date and time range due dates and scheduled dates are displayed in the calendar view (web and icalendar). Assigned Tech and Escalation If the ticket s problem type belongs to a tech group, and auto-assign is enabled for the group, the application will assign a technician to the ticket. The ticket is escalated to the Tech Group Manager of the ticket s problem type by clicking on the round escalate button next to the assigned tech s name. If the manager is already assigned to the ticket, it will be escalated to the ticket s problem type lead technician. If auto-assign is disabled for the ticket s tech group, the ticket will not be assigned to a specific tech, but will belong to the tech group s pool of tickets. For more information on the application s auto-assignment logic, click here. Ticket Notes Technicians add information to a ticket using a tech note. A ticket can have any number of notes, and notes can be added by any technician. Notes are date and time stamped when saved and the tech who entered the information is automatically associated with the note. The amount of time that was spent on the work can be added to the note using the Work Time drop down options. By default, notes are visible to clients and are colored blue. Notes can be hidden from clients, and appear gray in color. Clients can also add notes, which appear yellow. Client and tech notes can store a maximum number of 4000 characters per note. If Preferences > General > Global Options > Parts & Billing Enabled is checked, a billing rate for the work can be specified. If the ticket s location has a billing rate set, new tech notes will use it by default. A tech note can also be used to create a new FAQ the problem report is used as the question and the tech note is used as the answer. New FAQs created from tech notes are set to unapproved status by default and use the ticket s problem type as the FAQ category.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 19 Other Ticket Options Hot Tickets A ticket can be designated as a Hot Ticket by clicking on the hot ticket button (red thermometer). Once a ticket has been designated hot, other tickets related to the hot ticket can be linked. When the problem is resolved, closing the hot ticket will automatically close all linked child tickets. Tip: Clicking the Save button at the bottom of the ticket will save any open tech note as well as any changes made to other ticket fields. A tech note can be saved independently from the rest of the ticket fields by clicking the note s Save button. Using FAQs in Notes A link to an existing FAQ can be embedded into a tech note using the Insert FAQ Link button when editing the note. Clicking this button opens a FAQ search popup window. Once the FAQ you wish to link is found, click the Link button on the right side of the FAQ row. This copies a link tag into the current tech note. If you happen to know the FAQ number by memory, you can skip the lookup and enter the tag yourself. The format is: <faq id=x> where x is the FAQ number. To view the current hot tickets, click on the Hot Tickets tab on the right side of the ticket detail. Clicking on Link will make the current ticket a child of the selected hot ticket, while the View hyperlink replaces the detail view with the selected ticket. A ticket with a linked parent hot ticket adds a row in the Job Details to display the parent ticket number. The link can be broken by clicking on the round delete button. Clicking on the ticket number switches you to the parent hot ticket. Ticket E-Mail Recipients E-mail to the client, assigned technician (or group techs if unassigned) or other addresses via the Cc: field can be sent when the ticket is saved. Select the recipient checkboxes and add Cc: addresses (comma separated) if necessary, then click the Save & E-Mail button. No mail is sent when clicking the Save button. Print View To display all of the ticket information in a printer-friendly view, use the Print button at the top of the ticket. Clicking the button opens the ticket in a separate window suitable for printing.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 20 Import Tickets module. Edit Tasks allows the tech to create and edit tasks created at Tickets > Task Manager. Editing Permissions Administrators are free to re-assign technicians, change ticket status and delete tickets. Technicians can have various levels of access depending on their individual preferences set by an Administrator. Any newly created technician inherits the permissions defined in Preferences > Users > Default Tech Permissions. These defaults may be overridden by an Administrator by editing the permissions of an individual technician record. The ticket related preferences are: Limit Tickets to Assigned Location Groups allows the tech to create, view and edit tickets belonging only to locations in the tech s assigned location groups. Limit Tickets to Assigned Tech Groups allows the tech to create, view and edit tickets belonging only to Tech Groups to which the tech is assigned. Change Others Ticket Status allows the tech to change the status of tickets not assigned to themselves. Edit Ticket Dates enables the changing of the report and close dates on a ticket. Edit Problem Report allows the tech to update the text of the reported issue. Allow Re-Assignment enables the tech to re-assign the ticket to any other tech. Disabling this option allows the tech to only re-assign jobs to themselves. Change Priority allows the tech to change the priority of tickets assigned to themselves or, if Edit Other s Tickets is enabled, the priority of any ticket. Close Tickets enables the tech to set tickets to the Closed status type. Delete Tickets exposes the ticket Delete button to the tech. Import Tickets allows the tech to access the Tickets > E-Mail Ticketing Reporting by E-Mail Tickets can be created by sending an e-mail message to the dedicated help desk e-mail address. A ticket is created for each new message sent to the address provided the sender s e-mail address exists in your Client list. If the sender is not a registered user of the application, the sender can be added to your client list along with a new ticket, or an error e-mail can be sent in reply. Preferences for handling e-mail tickets are located at Preferences > E-Mail > Receiving E-Mail. All settings in this panel are ignored unless Enable E-Mail Tickets is checked. All tickets created from this mailbox are designated as an E-Mail Report problem type and therefore belong to the E-Mail Reports tech group. The e-mail account may be either POP or IMAP (Exchange Server must enable IMAP), and can connect via SSL if required. The receiving preferences can be configured to ignore requests coming from a list of accounts several are created by default at installation. E-mail may also limited to particular domains. When Create New Tickets From Replies is enabled, the application will parse the subject of the e-mail to determine if the message is in response to an existing ticket, and if so, append the message body as a note. Please pay special attention to the popup help related to this setting. E-mail tickets can be targeted to a specific tech group by enabling a separate mailbox for each tech group. Select the checkbox at Techs > Tech Groups > [select a group] > Enable E-Mail Tickets to expose e-mail receiving preferences for that group. The e-mail address must be different from

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 21 the one specified in the general e-mail receiving preference, and must have a default E-Mail Problem Type defined for tickets created from that mailbox. Techs can also update tickets by e-mail. In addition to adding notes, techs can change the status of the ticket by clicking on one of the status links at the bottom of the message. This will create a reply e-mail with a pre-formatted subject line the application uses to carry out the action. For example: Ticket:1532 Action:TechUpdate Hidden:NO Status:Pending EmailClient:NO Reassign:sally@mycompany.com MinutesWorked:30 BillingRate:Standard This subject tells the application to add the body of the message to ticket 1532 as a tech note visible to the client, change the status of the ticket to Pending, don t send the client an e-mail confirmation, reassign the ticket to another tech (Sally), set the work time for the note to 30 minutes and the billing rate to Standard. To use the reassign option in the subject, you must supply the full e-mail address of the tech. The specified billing rate must match an existing rate name. If the tech is an administrator, a Delete Ticket button is also available in the e-mail message. Updating by E-Mail Clients receive an e-mail confirmation on e-mail tickets based on the preference set at Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options > E-Mail on Client Update. Action links can be enabled in the e-mail reply which allow the client to add notes or cancel the ticket. Action links are enabled at Preferences > E-Mail > Sending E-Mail > Include Action Links and appear as buttons in an HTML e-mail or as hyperlinks in plain text e-mail messages. It is important that an e-mail reply has its subject line left intact, as the Web Help Desk uses the subject to determine if the e-mail triggers a new ticket or an update to an existing ticket. Only the client that created the ticket or a client that has been carbon copied (Cc:) on the ticket can update it via e-mail. If enabled, any files attached to the message are added to the ticket as attachments.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 22 Task Management Creating Tasks A Task is a container for one or more ticket templates called Elements. A task can be scheduled to repeat at daily, monthly or yearly intervals. A task may also have a Client associated with it the Client would be assigned to all tickets created by the task. To create a new task, go to Tickets > Task Manager. Click the New button at the bottom of the Task list. Triggering Tasks Tasks run automatically on their scheduled date or they can be triggered manually using the green Play button next to the task name. Running a scheduled task manually will set the last run date to the current date, and set the next run date based on the schedule interval. Search Tickets Tickets > Search Tickets provides two search options: Basic or Advanced mode. Basic searching is a simplified sub-set of the search criteria available in the advanced search mode. At a minimum, the Task must have a name in order to be saved. If tickets created by the task should have a client assigned, use the search feature to find and select the assigned client. Selecting Yes for the Scheduled option exposes a Start Date field and a frequency selector. A scheduled task can be made repeating or can be run once and deleted. When the Task is saved, the Task Elements tab becomes active, and new ticket templates can be added. Task Elements To add an Element to the Task, click the New button at the bottom of the Element list. To save the Element, you must provide a problem type, subject and detail for the ticket to be created. Optionally, location, room, department, technician, priority and asset number can be added. If the Task needs to create multiple tickets when triggered, continue adding additional Elements as needed. Tip: To clear the current search criteria, click on either the Basic Search or Advanced Search tab. Search results are sorted by clicking on a column header. The sort order of a column is reversed by clicking on the header again. Download the search results in PDF format by clicking on the Tickets PDF button, or download the results as a tab separated text file suitable for viewing in a spreadsheet by clicking on the Download TSV button. The buttons can also act on a subset of the search results checked off in the left column.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 23 To edit a ticket, click on the hyperlinked ticket number or problem report text in the search results list. After saving any changes to the ticket, clicking the back arrow button on the save confirmation dialog returns you to your previous search results list. You can also return to the search results by using the back arrow button on the top left of the ticket detail or by clicking the Cancel button at the bottom of the ticket. Saved Queries Search criteria that you plan to re-use can be saved as a named query using the Advanced Search tab. To save a query, define your search criteria, then provide a name in the Save Query as: field. By default, a query can only be seen by technician who creates it. Selecting the Shared checkbox allows all techs to use the query. Tip: Shift-clicking on the save button in a ticket will both save and return you to the ticket list view. Alt-clicking will save the ticket and create a new one. Refining Search Results The search results list can display a large amount of ticket data. To control what information is displayed use the Column Set widget to control column visibility. The widget is located at the upper right corner of the search results list. Click the + button to add a new set, or the pencil button to edit an existing one. To run a query, select the query name from the Query drop down list at the top of the search results display. The query will be run automatically upon selection. To re-run the same query, use the play button. To remove the selected query from the list, click on the - button. To subscribe to an icalendar made up of tickets captured by the query, click on the calendar button. Tip: In Advanced Search mode, you can use the Technician, Status and Priority select list options to search for multiple criteria in your search or query. Column sets are saved individually for each Tech by name. Each column set can specify a different PDF download option (Invoice or Ticket format) and full text option. Ticket Bulk Actions Bulk actions allow you to run a saved set of ticket changes against one or more tickets in a search results list. To create an action, click the + button. A bulk action template looks similar to the Ticket Details tab of a normal ticket. The template allows you to assign a client, create tech notes, change status, etc. any set of values you can change in a normal ticket can be specified in the bulk action template. Once changes have been made, you have the option of running the action against any tickets you ve selected from the search results list without saving the template, or you can save the template by name to be run at any time in the future. Bulk actions can be private or shared, and can be edited and re-named.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 24 Tip: To select all the tickets in the search results list, click on the small checkbox in the column header for the selection column. To edit an existing action, select the action from the popup menu, then click the pencil button. To run a saved action, select one or more tickets from the search results list, then the appropriate action from the popup menu. Click the run button you will receive an alert that summarizes what changes will be made to the selected tickets with a chance to cancel the action.

CHAPTER 5 Tickets 25 Ticket Assignment Logic New Ticket Web Help Desk Ticket Assignment Logic Is the Ticket's Problem Type in a Tech Group? Yes No Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Problems Supported Assign to Lead Tech for the Problem Type* Preferences > Tickets > Problem Types > [Problems Type] > Lead Technician Assign to Lead Tech for the Problem Type* Preferences > Tickets > Problem Types > [Problems Type] > Lead Technician Problem Type Lead Auto-assignment enabled for the Tech Group? Yes Tech (with load balance) Auto assign to? Get techs in the Tech Group Filter out any techs not currently scheduled or on vacation Is the ticket's Location in a Location Group? Yes No Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Tech Group Info > Auto Assign Enabled Tech Group Manager Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Tech Group Info > Auto Assign Enabled > Auto Assign To Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Assigned Techs Techs > Technician List > [Technician] > On Vacation No Locations > Location Groups > [Group] > Assigned Locations Place in pool of tickets for the Tech Group Assign to Manager of the Tech Group* Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Assigned Techs To set whether all group techs, the group manager only, or no one gets an e-mail, see Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Tech Group Info > E-Mail New Tickets To Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Tech Group Info > Group Manager Techs > Technician List > [Technician] > Specify Work Schedule Filter out any techs not in the Location Group Locations > Location Groups > [Group] > Assigned Techs * If the assigned Tech is marked as "On Vacation" the ticket is assigned to the "Backup Tech" for the original assignee. To enable Departments, check Preferences > General > Global Options > Use Departments Must the tech belong to the ticket's Department? Yes No Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Preferences > Auto-assigned Tech Must Belong to Department Filter out any techs not in the Department Locations > Departments > [Department] > Assigned Techs Are any techs remaining? Yes No Assign to Manager of the Tech Group* Techs > Tech Groups > [Group] > Tech Group Info > Group Manager Assign to tech who has fewest open tickets*

Chapter 6: Asset Management 26 Adding Assets Asset management is an optional extension to the Web Help Desk. The asset management features can help keep track of what you own, where it is located and who is using it. In addition, the software can store purchase order information and link it to assets in your inventory. This combination makes it easy to know where you purchased your assets from and when warranties expire. Using the integrated asset management tools enhances the help request ticketing functionality of the application, but it is not required. There are two methods for adding asset information: Manual Web Entry Data Import Manual Web Entry New assets are added by going to Assets > Search Assets and clicking on the New Asset button at the top of the search results list, or on the New button on the bottom right of the list. Asset Basics Asset basics are the what, where, and who of the asset. If enabled at Preferences > Assets > Asset Options > Auto Increment Asset No., the application will auto-enter an asset number that increments your highest number by one. You are free to change this number to match the actual value on the asset you wish to add. Besides the asset number, the only other required information is the model. An asset can have one or more clients assigned. Parent/Child Relationships Once an asset has been inserted into the database, the option to create a Parent/Child relationship is available to the asset. Parent/Child relationships are a powerful way to group assets together. For example, you may issue several assets to an employee that you wish to group: computer, monitor, printer and scanner. You could treat the computer as the parent while the other assets act as children. After adding all four assets to the system, return to the parent computer, and add the other assets as children to it. Click New in the Child Assets field and supply a valid asset number to the Child ID field that pops up. Repeat the process for the other assets you wish to add as children. Children automatically inherit the Location, Room, and Deployed values from the parent. If the parent has only one assigned Client, the child will inherit that as well. To remove a child asset from the list, click on the - button next to the child asset. Important concepts: A child asset can have multiple parents. You cannot make an asset that has children (a parent) into a child asset. Children will automatically update their location information if the parent changes provided there is only one client assigned to the asset. Asset Details Additional asset information can be added by clicking on the Asset Details tab on the asset editor, then on the edit mode button to display fields. There are several pre-defined fields to store information, including serial number and version as well as any custom fields defined in Preferences > Assets > Custom Fields. There is also the option to relate the asset with a specific purchase order, or to enter the purchase date manually. The warranty expiration date is calculated based on the PO date (if a valid PO number is entered), or the manually entered purchase date, and the warranty type specified for the asset.

CHAPTER 6 Asset Management 27 There are four required columns for any asset import: Asset Number (alphanumeric) Asset Type Manufacturer Model Asset History Lists the change history of the asset including: creation date, location/room change, client add/remove, status change, sync date. The history includes the date and the tech that made the change. Ticket History Provides a list of all tickets created for the asset and provides a link to a ticket detail view for editing. Data Import Importing is an efficient way to populate your assets. The import is facilitated by a template you download from the Web Help Desk. To download the template, go to Assets > Import Assets. Click on the Download Template link and open the asset_import_template.txt file in Excel. When adding asset rows to the spreadsheet, it is very import to leave all columns in order and intact. If you do not wish to import data for a particular column, it is fine to leave the cells empty for the column. If you delete columns, or change the column order, your import will be stopped with an error message. The importer adds a new asset for each unique asset number it encounters and synchronizes data for any existing asset matching a number in the import file. The importer adds new asset types, manufacturers, models, locations, rooms and departments for any uniquely named values. Otherwise, the importer links the asset to the existing entities that match the names provided in the file. Once your template is prepared, make sure to save as the file as tab or comma delimited, then use the Choose File button to navigate to your file. Click the Import button to upload the template and import the assets. When the upload is complete, go to the Search Assets screen to verify your import. Search Assets Searching can be done in either Basic or Advanced mode. Basic searching provides a simplified sub-set of the search criteria available in the advanced search mode. Search results are sorted by clicking on a column header. Download the search results in PDF format by clicking on the Results to PDF button, or download the results as a tab separated text file suitable for viewing in a spreadsheet by clicking on the Results to TSV button.

CHAPTER 6 Asset Management 28 To edit an asset, click on the hyperlinked asset number. After saving any changes to the asset, clicking the OK button on the save confirmation dialog returns you to your previous search results list. You can also return to the search results by using the Cancel button at the bottom of the asset detail. To re-run the same query, use the round search button. To remove the selected query from the list, click on the round delete button. Tip: Using the back button in the browser and selecting another asset will redisplay the original asset. To ensure consistent behavior, make sure to use the application buttons for navigation. Refining Search Results The search results list can display a large amount of asset data. To control what information is displayed, the search panel provides a Column Selection tab where the visibility of each column can be controlled. Tip: In Advanced Search mode, you can use the Status and Priority select list options to search for multiple criteria in your search or query. Purchase Orders Using the purchase orders feature of the Web Help Desk can simplify the tracking of where and when you purchased or leased your assets. The feature is not meant to replace your company s current PO system. It is designed to make linking a specific PO number (and its associated vendor and date information) to your assets a simple matter. Define Vendors Before adding a new PO, one or more vendors must be entered into the database. Vendors are managed by going to Assets > Vendors. To add a new vendor, click on the New button at the bottom of the list. To edit an existing vendor, click on the hyperlinked vendor name. Tip: Most text search fields can use wildcards like * to help find results when you don t know the exact matching value. Saved Queries Search criteria that you plan to re-use can be saved as a named query using the Advanced Search tab. To save a query, define your search criteria, then provide a name in the Save Query as: field. By default, a query can only be seen by the technician who creates it. Administrators have the option of defining shared queries, and only an administrator can delete a shared query. To run a query, select the query name from the Query drop down list at the top of the search results display. The query will be run automatically upon selection. Create a New Purchase Order Once vendors are in the database, a new purchase order can be created. Click on Assets > Purchase Orders and click on the New button at the bottom of the search display list. Fields in a purchase order include: PO Number (must be unique in the database) Request Date the date the purchase order was entered Invoice Date the date the vendor shipped the product (used to help calculate warranty / lease expiration date) Vendor Originator Name lookup, by last name, the client who made the PO request. Deliver To lookup, by last name, the client the purchased items should be delivered to

CHAPTER 6 Asset Management 29 Attachments - link any supporting documentation Notes Only the PO Number and Vendor are required to save the purchase order. Tip: An asset can also be associated to a PO from within the asset detail view. You must have a free line item defined in the PO in order to link the asset. If you were to add a new imac G5 asset, you could associate it with the PO in the example above, because the imac G5 line item is free (not linked) to any asset number. Purchase Order Import The Order Type field has a toggle button that switches between Purchase and Lease. Toggling to lease exposes an additional option the lease length drop down. After supplying purchase order information, click Save to enter it in the database. Purchase orders can be imported at Assets > Import POs. At a minimum, the import template must provide the PO Number and Vendor for the import to succeed. Line items may be added to the PO import by providing a line item number, asset type, manufacturer and model. If the model/type doesn t already exist in the database, it will be added. Line items can also be linked to specific asset numbers. If the asset number doesn t exist, a new asset is created with the number. Add Line Items Once a purchase order is saved, the line item editor becomes visible. Line items must define a model, and may contain part number and price information. Line items can also be associated with a specific asset by providing a valid asset number. If you attempt to link a line item to an asset number that doesn t exist, or is already linked to another PO, you will receive an error message. Add new line items by clicking on the New button on the editor. To edit existing line items, click on the hyperlinked model name. Remove line items by clicking on the - button. Duplicate a line item by clicking on the + button. The line item editor also allows you to specify the Tax and Shipping amounts for the PO.

Chapter 7: FAQs 30 FAQ View Search existing FAQs or create a new FAQ by going to FAQs > FAQ View. FAQs can be filtered by number, category, location, model, and question/answer text. A FAQ is edited by clicking on its hyperlinked number, and the search results list is sorted by clicking on a column name. Attachments linked to each FAQ are downloaded by clicking on the file name link. New FAQ Create a new FAQ entry by clicking on the New button at the bottom right of the search results list. A FAQ must have a category and contain both a question and answer. FAQs can be linked to specific models and locations and contain one or more file attachments. A FAQ must be Approved to be visible by Clients only an Administrator can approve a FAQ. question, and uses the tech note as the FAQ answer. FAQs added this way are always created as unapproved. Creating a FAQ from the note also saves the tech note entry. Question View Clicking on FAQs > Question View provides a method to search tickets by category and problem report to find good candidate questions to turn into a new FAQ. Clicking on the hyperlinked question text creates a new FAQ using the text as the FAQ question and the problem type as the FAQ category. Import FAQs FAQs can be imported using a provided template available at FAQs > Import FAQs. The template can be saved as either tab or comma delimited text, and must supply the the three required values for each FAQ. The audience option controls who can see the FAQ Everyone means the FAQ is visible to Clients and Techs, while Techs Only makes the FAQ private, and can be further limited to specific Tech Groups. A link to another FAQ can be added by using the Insert FAQ Link button. It is also possible to create new FAQ directly from a tech note within a ticket. The Create FAQ button uses the ticket s problem type and problem report for the FAQ category and

Chapter 8: Parts and Billing 31 The Web Help Desk can be used to track parts, inventory and billing on tickets. This functionality is enabled by default, but can be disabled by going to Preferences > General > Global Options > Parts & Billing Enabled. Disabling the feature will hide the main Parts tab, the ticket detail Parts & Billing tab, billing preferences and the billing reporting option. Billing Preferences Invoicing Specify company contact information and tax rates for labor and parts. Define what the main Billing Entity will be Department or Location. The contact information of the Administrative Contact for the ticket s billing entity will be displayed on any PDF invoices generated for a ticket. In addition, the Administrative Contact for the billing entity is able to view all tickets for the location or department they are linked to. Billing Rates Define billing rates to use in your tickets. You can define as many billing rates as required. For invoicing purposes, a rate can be defined as a travel rate by enabling the Travel Rate checkbox. To control where the rate shows up in the drop down list, use the Display Order setting. Billing Terms Define terms options for your invoices. Create as many billing terms as you need for your requirements. Managing Parts Parts List Parts are added to the Web Help Desk one by one or as an imported TSV (tab separated values) file. To view parts in the system or add new parts, click on the Parts tab. You are placed at the Parts & Inventory sub-menu option by default. Parts may be searched by number, description or manufacturer. You can also decide which Client contact information is displayed on the invoice the help desk Location address, or the client s personal address. Custom Logo Upload your company logo for display on invoices. The logo is scaled to 3 inches in width by the PDF generator, but the file should be high resolution for best results. To add a new part, click on the New button at the bottom of the parts search results list. A part must have an alphanumeric Part Number, a Manufacturer (defined in Assets > Models), Description and both cost types. Click Save to add the new part.

CHAPTER 8 Parts and Billing 32 Adding Inventory The part detail view also shows a history of when inventory was added for the part. Importing Parts To import a list of parts, download the template at Parts > Import Parts. Every column must have a value for each row for the import to successfully complete. The columns are: Part Number (alphanumeric) Manufacturer Name Part Description Our Cost Customer Cost After adding data to the template, be sure to save as tab delimited text, then use the Choose File button to select the file on your computer. Click the Save button to upload the file and import the parts list. Inventory is added directly via the web interface, or can be imported from a file. Before adding inventory, make sure the corresponding parts are already added. To add inventory using the web interface, go to Parts > Parts & Inventory, then search by part number, description or manufacturer for the parts you wish to add inventory. If no search criteria are provided, all parts are returned. Click on the Inventory tab above the search results. For each part you wish to add inventory, provide a storage Location and a count to be added. Any rows where the count is zero are ignored. Negative values are allowed for the part count if you need to make inventory adjustments. Click the Save button at the bottom of the inventory add list to complete the inventory update. Inventory can also be zeroed for all parts at a specific location using the Zero All Inventory For Location popup. Tip: If there are no Locations available in the location popup, you must go to Locations > Location List. Select a location from the list, then enable the Store Parts checkbox. Importing Inventory Inventory may also be added using tab delimited file at Parts > Import Inventory. Download the import template, then supply the following required values: Tip: Do not delete the header row of the template, or you will receive an error message. Also, make sure that your costs do not contain any commas (i.e. 1,999.00) or currency symbols. Do not use Excel s currency number formatter on your prices. Part Number (alphanumeric) Location Name Count Do not delete the first row of the template, or you will receive an error message. After adding data to the template, save as a tab delimited text, then use the Choose File button to select the file on your computer. Click the Save button to upload the file and import the inventory. When importing parts, the application synchronizes values for any existing parts. This makes importing an easy way to quickly update pricing information. Any part number that doesn t exist in the database will be added during the import.

CHAPTER 8 Parts and Billing 33 Using Parts Use parts in a ticket by clicking on the Parts & Billing tab of a ticket detail. Search for a part to add to the ticket by number, description or manufacturer. Selecting the part from the search results adds a new line item to the part list for the ticket with a default quantity of one. You can select a larger quantity and override the default price listed if required. If one or more line item parts is defective, you can mark down the number of DOA parts for the line item. The cost of the DOA parts is removed from the ticket, and will show up in a separate area in your billing reports. You can remove an entire parts line item and return the parts back to inventory by clicking on the - button on the right. Changes in the Parts & Billing tab are not finalized until you click the Save button. Additional fields available include Billing Terms, PO Number, Shipping, Discount and a Tax Free option. Service Time Blocks If you offer support to your client locations based on pre-defined service time blocks, you can enable this functionality at Preferences > Billing > Invoicing > Enable Location Service Time Blocks. You must have Location specified as your Billing Entity to see this option. Once enabled, blocks of service time can be allocated to each location at Locations > Location List > [Edit Location] > Service Time Blocks. Invoicing Generate a PDF invoice or quote directly from a ticket by clicking on the Download button at the top of the Parts & Billing view of a ticket. The default PDF type is Invoice, but you may select either Quote or Ticket from the drop down menu as the description for the PDF. The document is generated by the application and downloads directly to your machine. All relevant contact information, tech notes and billing line items are included. Create a new time block by clicking on the New button. Time blocks are created in days, hours or minutes. A time block can be set to expire at a specific date and time.

CHAPTER 8 Parts and Billing 34 The time block list for a location shows the creation date, expiration date (if applicable), creator, block amount and usable time. For non-expiring time blocks, the Time Block and Usable Time values should be the same. For an expired block, the usable value may be lower than the block value depending on how much time was used before the block expired. The location total is the sum of the usable time values for all blocks. Tickets created for a location with at least one service time block will automatically deduct time used in the ticket s tech notes. Tickets created before time blocks were first added will not count against the location service time. If you want to count an older ticket against a location s service time, go to the Parts & Billing tab of the ticket and enable the Count Against Location Service Time checkbox. Likewise, tickets created after time blocks were added for a location can be excluded from counting against the location by unchecking the option. Tip: Re-saving a tech note does not re-deduct the note time from the total service time available. The time used for a location is dynamically calculated based on the current tech note time values of all relevant tickets. The service time available for all locations is shown at Locations > Location List. The amount of service time available for a location is displayed within the Ticket Details of a ticket under the location popup. If the value is negative, it will display in red. If a tech note with time is added for a ticket who s location has negative service time available, saving the note will trigger an alert message as a reminder of the time deficit.

Chapter 9: Reports 35 Overview As of Web Help Desk version 8, the reporting module has been rewritten to provide greater flexibility. It also provides a plugin framework for additional reporting features to be released with subsequent versions. While the new reporting module is more powerful, it is also flexible and simple to use. This tutorial introduces the new reporting features by creating reports with all the information of those provided prior to version 8. Along the way, it introduces new features that can be used to tailor the reports to meet your specific needs. Currently, three report plugins are available: Ticket Report, Billing Report (visible only if Parts and Billing is enabled), and Composite Report. The Ticket Report plugin facilitates reports that have all the information available in previous versions of the Web Help Desk, but with the added power of being able to choose the categories used to define the report axes. It also allows specific items in report categories to be filtered so that the report focuses on a subset of category items for instance, only those tickets assigned to Joe Admin and Sally Tech. New categories are available as well, including Ticket Creator, Alert Level, Alert Condition, and custom fields. If Parts and Billing is enabled, the new Billing Report plugin can be used to generate billing reports like those of earlier Web Help Desk versions, but with more categories to choose from and with the ability to apply filters. The Composite Report plugin enables you to group several sub-reports into a single report that can be generated with a single click. Creating Reports Individual Technician Report We will use the Ticket Report plugin to generate the report. We ll set its Major Category to Status Type, its Chart Type to Pie Chart, its time range to the current month, and we ll include a table that provides statistics for average open time, work time, average work time, and ticket count. We ll also set a Technician filter to limit the tickets included in the report to those assigned to the current user. In the Report Basics tab, enter the Report Name Individual Technician Report Current User and set the Report Type to Ticket Report. After selecting the report type, the Report Details and Report Filters tabs will appear, providing settings specific to Ticket Reports. Click the Report Details tab. Ticket reports are defined by four sets of options: categories, metrics, time ranges, and filters. Categories determine which values various dimensions of the report will represent. We want to display a pie chart with slices representing the number of tickets in each status type, so we will set the Major Category to Status Type. To begin, log in to the Web Help Desk as an administrator or as a tech with permission to view reports, and navigate to Reports > Reports. If no reports have been defined yet, the report list will be empty. Click the New button to define a new report.

CHAPTER 9 Reports 36 Metrics determine which ticket attribute will be used to calculate the length of bars or size of pie slices, and determine which attributes will be included in the table. We want to display a pie chart that shows the ticket count for each status type, along with a table showing statistics for average open time, work time, average open time, and ticket count: average work time, and ticket count for each status type and for all status types combined. Click Preview to see how the report looks so far. Statistics depend upon the tickets in your help desk, but you should see something like this: The Time Range filters the tickets included in the report to those that occur within a given time period. Limiting the report with a time range can significantly increase the report s performance. Time ranges can be Relative or Specific. Relative time ranges are given as amounts of time prior to the present. Specific time ranges are given as fixed dates and times. We want our report to include only those tickets that were opened during the current month, so we will use a Relative date range. If we wanted to include tickets opened within the past 30 days, we could set the From time to 1 Month ago and select Use exact date and time. However, we want to include only those tickets opened during the current calendar month. To do this, we will set the From time to 0 Months ago and select Round back to beginning of time periods. (If we were to have set the From time to 1 Months ago, instead of 0 months ago, the time would be determined by going back one month from the present and then going back to the beginning of that month resulting in tickets for the current month plus the previous month). Adding a Filter The report shows statistics for all tickets opened during the current calendar month, but we want to limit it to only those tickets assigned to the user generating the report. To do this, we will add an Assigned Tech filter that includes only the Report User. Click the Report Filters tab. Since no filters have been added yet, the list will be empty. In addition to specifying the time range, we need to specify the date attribute that it will apply to. We could use the date the ticket was opened, the date it was last updated, the date it is scheduled for work, or the date it was closed. We will select Date Opened. We now have defined a report that includes a pie chart with slices representing the number of tickets in each status type, for all tickets opened during the current calendar month. It also includes a table that lists average open time, work time, Click New to add a filter. Set the Filter Attribute to Assigned Tech. When the Filter Attribute is selected, a list of possible values for the attribute will appear in the Values cell. Select Report user. This is a special value that represents the current user of the Web Help Desk who is running the report. Keep the Filter Type set to Inclusive; otherwise, the filter will allow all values except those that are selected.

CHAPTER 9 Reports 37 Individual Report for All Technicians In the previous section we created a report to show the status type of tickets assigned to the current Web Help Desk user. In this section we will create a similar report that uses a Grouping Category to show a similar report for each technician. Click Save to save the filter settings (and the other report settings). Click Preview again to see the report with the filter applied. Log into the Web Help Desk an administrative user or a tech with permission to view reports and go to Reports > Reports. Click New to create a Ticket Report with the name Individual Technician Report All Techs. Click Report Details and enter the settings shown in the following screenshot. This time the report includes only those tickets assigned to the current user, and a text box appears at the bottom to show that the filter has been applied. Click Done to return to the report list. The report can be edited by clicking the report name, or the report can be run by clicking the Report or Print View buttons. The Print View button opens the report in a separate window. Note that these settings are the same as those used in the individual report for the current user, except that a Grouping Category of Assigned Tech has been added. Also, for brevity we have omitted the statistics table below the pie charts by not selecting any values for Table Metrics. To create an individual report for the current user, we added an Assigned Tech filter. For this report we do not need this filter, as we want to include tickets for all technicians. Save the report settings and click Preview to view the report. Statistics will vary depending upon the tickets in your help desk, but you should see something like this:

CHAPTER 9 Reports 38 All Technicians Open Tickets Report Log into the Web Help Desk an administrative user or a tech with permission to view reports and go to Reports > Reports. Click New to create a Ticket Report with the name All Technicians Open Tickets. Note the Unassigned chart, which in this example has no tickets. This represents all tickets for which no tech has been assigned. If you do not wish this chart to appear in the report, you can add a filter to remove it. Click Report Filters and add a new Assigned Tech filter that excludes tickets having an unassigned tech. Select the Report Details tab. Set the Major Category to Assigned Tech, the Chart Type to Bar chart, the Chart Metric to Tickets, and the Table Metrics to Avg. Open Time and Tickets. Leave the Time Range settings blank; this will make the report include all open tickets, not just those opened during a specific time period. Save the filter and click Preview to view the report again. The Unassigned chart is no longer visible, and a text box appears to show that the filter has been applied. At this point, if you click Preview to view the report you will find that the report shows all technicians and includes all tickets assigned to them even tickets that have been resolved, closed or canceled. We could set the Minor Category to Status Type, which would break each technician s tickets down by status type. Instead, we will create a filter to omit tickets that are closed, resolved, or canceled. Select the Report Filters tab and add a Status Type filter that excludes all except Closed, Cancelled, and Resolved:

CHAPTER 9 Reports 39 Open Time and Tickets. Leave the Time Range settings blank; this will make the report include all open tickets, not just those opened during a specific time period. Note that the only difference between these settings and those of the All Technicians Open Tickets report is that the Chart Metric is set to Avg. Open Time. Save the report settings and return to the ticket list view. Now when the report is run, a text box appears at the bottom indicating that the filter has been applied. For this report, we want to include closed, canceled, and resolved tickets in our calculation of average open time, so we do not need to apply any filters. Save the report and return to the ticket list view. From the report list view you can run the report in the current window or in a separate Print View window All Technicians Average Open Time Report This report is very similar to the All Technicians Open Tickets report we created in the previous section, but uses Avg. Open Time instead of Tickets for its Chart Metric, and does not apply any filters. Log into the Web Help Desk an administrative user or a tech with permission to view reports and go to Reports > Reports. Click New to create a Ticket Report with the name All Technicians Average Open Time. Select the Report Details tab. Set the Major Category to Assigned Tech, the Chart Type to Bar chart, the Chart Metric to Avg. Open Time, and the Table Metrics to Avg.

CHAPTER 9 Reports 40 Tech Group, Location, Location Group, Department, and Problem Type Reports Creating individual or all-items reports for tech groups, locations, location groups, departments, and problem types is nearly identical to the procedure for creating individual-technician reports and all-technicians reports (described above). Wherever we set a category or filter to Assigned Tech in the technician reports, we simply replace it with the desired category: Tech Group, Location, Location Group, Department, or Problem Type. Tip: To group problem sub-types together within a single entry for their parent type, create a filter that includes the parent problem type. For example, if there are problem types for Hardware and Software, and each have subtypes that you do not wish to appear as separate bars in the report, create an inclusive Problem Type filter that includes the Hardware and Software problem types. The report will then show a single bar for Hardware that includes all tickets with subtypes of Hardware, and a single bar for Software that includes all tickets with subtypes of Software. If we wish to focus the report on a single technician, we can select the Report Filters tab and create an inclusive Technician filter: Technician Billing Report Log into the Web Help Desk an administrative user or a tech with permission to view reports and go to Reports > Reports. Click New to create a Billing Report with the name Technicians Billing Report, then click Save. Now the report includes an entry for only the selected technician, with a text box indicating the filter is in effect: Select the Report Details tab. Set the Category to Technician. (Note that Billing Reports have only one category setting and do not have any metrics settings.) To make this report include only those tickets that have been closed during the current calendar month, we will set the From: period to 0 Months ago and select Round back to beginning of time periods. We also will set the Date Attribute for Time Range to Date Closed: Save the report and return to the ticket list view. From the report list view you can run the report in the current window or in a separate Print View window. Tech Group, Location, Location Group, Department, and Problem Type Billing Reports At this point, we can click Preview to see a side-by-side comparison of the billing totals for each technician. Creating billing reports for tech groups, locations, location groups, departments, and problem types is nearly identical to the procedure for creating technician billing reports (described above). Wherever we set a category or filter to Technician in the technician billing reports, we simply replace it with the desired category: Tech Group, Location, Location Group, Department, or Problem Type.

CHAPTER 9 Reports 41 Tip: to group problem sub-types together within a single entry for their parent type, create a filter that includes the parent problem type. For example, if there are problem types for Hardware and Software, and each have subtypes that you do not wish to appear as separate lines in the report, create an inclusive Problem Type filter that includes the Hardware and Software problem types. The report will then show a single line for Hardware that includes all tickets with subtypes of Hardware, and a single line for Software that includes all tickets with subtypes of Software.

42 Chapter 10: Surveys and Messages Managing Surveys Surveys are used as a feedback tool from your client users. A survey can be linked to a specific ticket for a single client, or can be used as a general questionnaire sent to a number of clients. Survey Manager Settings Tab Surveys are created and managed at Tickets > Survey Manager. The Settings tab defines which, if any, survey will be used as the default for tickets who s problem type specifies Default Survey as its survey type. To add a question to a survey, click on the New Question button. Enter the question in the specified text area, then select the answer type. The options are: Text (text field) Multiple Choice (check boxes) Single Choice (radio buttons) Popup menu For the non-text options, possible answers are supplied in the Answer Options field, separated by a semicolon. Additionally, an explanation field can be added to each question so the client can add further information. Questions can be reordered by changing the Display Order value. Tip: The diagram above shows the relationship between the Default Survey defined in the Survey Manager settings and the Survey selection in a problem type. If the Survey Manager default is set to None, no survey will be offered for tickets with a problem type using the Default Survey selection. Surveys Tab To create a new survey or edit an existing one, click on the Surveys tab. Click on the New button or on the name of an existing survey to edit the survey details. Each survey must have a title, and may also have a description for techs, client greeting, thank you message and e-mail invitation message. Sending a Survey Ticket Survey Recall that a specific survey is linked to a ticket based on the problem type of the ticket. If a ticket has a survey linked, an invitation to take the survey is sent to the client when the ticket is closed as part of the closed ticket e-mail. Of course, a client cannot be required to take a survey, but incomplete surveys always remain available.

CHAPTER 10 Surveys and Messages 43 search for one or more clients you wish to send the survey. After searching, check off the clients you wish to include, then click on the Send Survey button at the top of the search results list. Tip: The image above is an example of a survey invitation in a closed ticket. Note how the invitation text uses replacement tags from the survey s E-Mail Invitation Message to personalize the feedback text. In addition to receiving an e-mail invitation with a direct link to the survey, a client can access a ticket s survey via the web interface. In the client s History view, any closed tickets with an incomplete linked survey will have a Take button on the right side of the row, while completed surveys will have a View button. A Survey Selector window will popup with survey settings which allow you to select which of your saved surveys to send. In addition, you can set the subject for the e-mail to be sent. The settings also tell you how many client recipients will be included in the mailing. Viewing Survey Results Ticket Detail View When the client clicks on either the e-mail invitation link or the Take button, the survey will open in their web browser. The survey cannot be saved unless all questions requiring a response are answered. One way to view the results of a ticket survey is from the detail view of a closed ticket. If a closed ticket has a completed survey, a round View survey results button will be available at the top of the ticket. Clicking on this button opens a popup window displaying the client s answers. Survey Reports General Surveys A survey does not need to be linked to a ticket. You can create a questionnaire for the purpose of collecting any information you wish. Once created, an e-mail invitation with a link to the survey can be sent to any number of clients. To send a general survey, create the survey just as you would one to be used for tickets. Next, go to Clients > Search Clients and To view summary data regarding both ticket and general surveys, go to Reports > Surveys. Survey reports can be generated by name, date, technician, client and problem type. Each survey question is displayed graphically with a pie chart showing answers by percentage. To view the individual responses to any question, click on the Responses link following each question. All surveys found by the report are listed in a table below the graphs. To view all the answers given by a client on the survey, click on the date/time in the survey search results list. If the survey is linked to a ticket,

CHAPTER 10 Surveys and Messages 44 you can view the ticket by clicking on the hyperlinked ticket number. Using a survey report is the only way to view the results of a general (non-ticket) survey. bottom of the message list. Messages Messaging is a utility you can use to post information to technicians and clients. A message shows up as a sticky note in the web interface and can be targeted technicians, clients or both. Creating Messages A list of all messages is available to administrators by going to Home > Messages. The list shows the message, target audience, which techs have read the message (if applicable), and the scheduled start/stop dates if any. Message text can include HTML tags for formatting or creating links as well as inserted FAQ links. If the message is targeted to techs, the audience can be further refined to include only certain tech groups. A message can be Locked which means it cannot be removed from the read messages list. Messages can be scheduled to start and stop at a specific date and time. If no expiration date is provided, the message remains available indefinitely. Viewing Tech Messages When a new tech message is available, an alert is shown when viewing any option under Home. Clicking on the alert link will open a message viewer window. New messages appear under the New Messages tab, while read messages that have not been deleted appear under the All Messages tab. Administrators can create messages targeted to any group, while technicians must have permission to access the editor and can only create messages targeted to techs. To create a new message, click either New button located at the top or

CHAPTER 10 Surveys and Messages 45 All new messages are automatically moved to the All Messages tab after viewing. To delete a message, click the small x at the upper left. Messages with a lock cannot be deleted. Viewing Client Messages Messages targeted to clients may be viewed by taking the alert link on the login page. If the client doesn t click the public message link at the login screen, all messages will be shown to the client after they login. The client will not be allowed to create a new ticket until they click the Done button at the bottom of the message list. License Key Expiration Message The Web Help Desk uses a tech message to alert you when your license key is due to expire. A message is created once a week for the month preceding the key expiration. License keys always expire at the end of the month. The alert link opens a Public Message View window.

Chapter 11: Client Interface 46 Clients log into the application at the same login panel that technicians use. The Web Help Desk creates a sample client account at installation. To access the account, login as client/ client for the e-mail address/password. By default, clients are sent to the Request module. Request Help Request A request is broken down into two parts. In the first part, Help Request, the client categorizes and describes the problem. The client can also attach files and specify a list of e-mail addresses to Cc: the ticket if enabled at Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options. only the client s profile location can be used for a ticket. Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options > Ticket Must Use Assigned Asset Only allows the client to specify an asset on the My Assets list. Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options > Asset Number Lookup for Client Enables an asset search field so that clients can lookup an asset to use in the ticket by number. Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options > Tickets Require Room Only accepts the ticket submission if the client selects a room. Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options > Include Room Assets in Client Asset List Adds all assets belonging to rooms in which the client is also assigned to the My Assets list. If the problem type selected requires a model, clicking on the Continue... button will display the second part of the request Select Asset if the Client has assigned assets, or Model & Location if no assets are assigned. If the problem type does not require a model and the client has a Location in their profile, the ticket will be submitted when the Continue... button is selected using the client s Location in the ticket automatically. Select Asset If assets are assigned to the client and the selected problem type requires a model, a list of the client s assets is displayed in the My Assets box. An asset is selected by clicking on its hyperlinked number. Additionally, several preferences affect a client s ability to select an asset and location: Preferences > Tickets > Ticket Options > Lock Ticket to Client Location Disables the location popup so that If the asset in question is not listed or you are not using asset management, the model, location and room can be entered manually in the form. If the model is not listed in the system, or the problem does not apply to a specific model, the client may choose the Not Applicable/found option from the model drop down. Clicking Save submits the job ticket. If all required information was provided, the ticket is added to the database and the client receives a Thank You for submitting. The application will always attempt to send an e-mail confirmation to the client s account.

CHAPTER 11 Client Interface 47 History All help requests submitted by a client are visible in the History module of the client interface. History can be searched by ticket number, status or problem reported. To view the details of a help request, click on its hyperlinked ticket number. Profile Tickets that are not Closed or Cancelled can have Client Notes added or additional files attached (if enabled). Closed and cancelled tickets are view-only by default, but the reopening of closed tickets can be enabled at Preferences > Tickets >Status Types > Clients Can Reopen Closed Tickets. Tickets can be cancelled using the Cancel Ticket button on the upper right corner of the ticket detail. An e-mail response is generated for all updated and cancelled tickets. Clients can update their user profile based on the permissions defined at Preferences > Users > Client Options > Client Permissions. Logout Clients exit the application by clicking on the Logout button. Upon logout, they have the option of re-entering the application by selecting the Return to Login button. FAQs Clients can search your FAQ library, filtering their search by model, category, and question/answer text. Any attachments are displayed under the answer text. Clients can rate the effectiveness of each FAQ by selecting a rating value from 1 to 5 stars. The average of all votes is dynamically re-displayed. Tip: If Allow Automatic Login is enabled at Preferences > General > Server Settings, and the client has enabled this option at login time, they will still be prompted for their password on their next login attempt if they use the Logout option. To avoid the password prompt, the client should close the browser window instead of using the logout button.