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4.IMPLEMENTING POLICY

Policy Implementation

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This Module gives a description of Module -Policy Implementation of Service Desk Manager R12.5 -Arshad.Havaldar

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Page 1: Policy Implementation

4.IMPLEMENTING POLICY

Page 2: Policy Implementation

4.1 POLICY IMPLEMENTATION • A Key component of configuring your Service Desk is implementing policies that best

matches your business process

• CA SDM provides a pre defined policy implementation that is appropriate for some sites & Serves a s a Good Starting point for Others.

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4.2 NOTIFICATIONS • CA Service Desk Manager creates a notification message that does the following:

■ Identifies the ticket activity or the notification event

■ References the ticket

■ Includes other optional information

■ Can identify potential contacts

• You can view a notification message for a ticket because of a system action.

• A system action includes opening, closing, or modifying a ticket through its history information

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ACTIVITY NOTIFICATIONS • An activity is an action that someone performs, such as resolving a ticket, sending a managed

survey, running the Knowledge Report Card, and so on

• Activity notifications identify the types of activities that can cause notification to occur automatically for tickets

• Typically, activity notifications signify the start or completion of an action about which you want to notify key personnel, such as when tickets are escalated, transferred, or monitored

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OBJECT CONTACT NOTIFICATIONS • Object contact notifications let you notify recipients based on the current value of a field on the

ticket

• For example, you can identify the To field to ensure that notification goes to the person currently identified in the To field, even if the value has changed since the ticket was defined

• Instead of identifying a person to notify, as in a notification method, you identify an object

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NOTIFICATION METHODS• Notification methods describe how notification messages are delivered to users

• Notification methods are scripts that are invoked based on activity notifications

• Notification methods can be assigned for each contact record.

• The standard notification methods for CA Service Desk Manager are as follows:

■ Email sends messages by electronic mail directly to the recipient through Simple Mail Transport Protocol (SMTP) mail. Messages are also sent to the recipient notification log.

■ The notification function sends messages to the recipient notification log that the recipient can access when CA Service Desk Manager is running.

■ Pager email sends email to an address maintained by a paging system provider. The email text typically displays on an alphanumeric pager.

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• The pdm_mail utility is used in notifications to send emails by sending email information to the pdm_mail_nxd process

• You can also create your own notification methods

• To create a notification method, create a shell script that includes notification variables, and then enter the new notification method into CA Service Desk Manager

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EMAIL NOTIFICATIONS• Email notifications help analysts communicate with employees and end users

• Notifications let you communicate with stakeholders for a ticket as follows:

■ Email notifications can show all recipients of the notification, advising the user of who the interested parties are.

■ Analysts can send a manual notification to a temporary email address that is currently not associated with a contact. A temporary address is helpful, for example, when an end user is out of the office or having difficulty accessing their standard email account.

■ Analysts can send attachments with a notification to communicate additional details to a user.

• A temporary email address is an address that is not associated with a contact in the system. {Used in OOO/Limited Access To Email}

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NOTIFICATION RULES • A notification rule sets guidelines for the system to follow when sending notifications

• You can define notification rules for requests, incidents, problems, change orders, issues, contacts, configuration items, and global and specific tenants

• Each notification rule contains the following components:

• Condition Macro

Configure to represent the desired values of one or more fields on a service desk ticket. The condition is evaluated at different points during processing to determine whether an action occurs.

• Message Template

Contains a prototype of the message that is generated and sent to contacts when the notification is sent. A notification rule must contain a message template and they can be reused.

• Object Contacts

Displays the object contact derived from ticket information, such as assignee, end-user, group, and so on. If the condition is met, these object contacts receive notification.

• Contacts

If the condition is met, these contacts receive notification. Contacts are the database records that represent the users of the system.

• Contact Types

Displays the contacts type that you want to receive the notification by default, for example, Analysts, Employee, Customer, and so on

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ARTIFACTS IN MESSAGES• You can use the ARTIFACT keyword to specify how artifacts are handled in outbound

messages, message templates, notifications, and auto-replies.

• The ARTIFACT keyword uses the following values:

■ NONE—Specifies no validation of artifacts. This value is the same as not using the keyword.

■ PROTECTED—Validates a ticket against the hash for confirmation.

■ SECURE—Decrypts the ticket number

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NOTIFICATION METHODS & PHRASES • Notification phrases let you add a standardized piece of information or text to a number of

different notification messages, without having to enter and maintain the text or formulae separately in each notification template.

• Phrases standardize text for use in multiple message templates

• Notification phrases can also be used in the automatic responses to incoming email messages

• You can set up a default set of Available Recipients that the Manual Notification composition page presents for requests, incidents, and problems

• Adding an Object Contact Recipient adds the individual contact names that the Object Contact represents to the Recipients list (consolidating any duplicate entries)

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PREVIOUS ASSIGNEE NOTIFICATIONS • You can define Previous Assignee or Group values for an activity notification that detects

changes to key fields when a ticket is saved

• Previous values let you notify a previous assignee when a ticket is transferred, or notify both the current and previous groups when the priority of a ticket is escalated

• There are several contacts that you can specify for each object type (request, incident, problem, change order, or issue), which notify the current and previous contacts when an activity occurs.

■ Assignee—Person assigned to handle the ticket.

■ Assignee Previous—Person previously assigned to handle the ticket.

■ Group—Group assigned to handle the ticket.

■ Group Previous—Group previously assigned to handle the ticket.

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CONFIGURATION ITEM NOTIFICATIONS

• A configuration item notification lets you define an activity notification that is associated with a specific CI that is associated with a specific CA Service Desk Manager ticket

• This feature lets you track information about the users, organizations, and vendors of a CI

• You can specify the CI object contacts on the Notification Rules Update Recipients page, such as CI Maint Org, CI Primary Contact, and so on

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SURVEY NOTIFICATIONS

• For an activity notification, you can define separate survey notification details for tickets, managed surveys, knowledge documents, and knowledge comments and send it to the customer who initiated the activity

• Using survey notifications, you can do the following:

■ Specify a new survey or use one of the default survey's available with the product.

■ Use notification methods that describe how notification messages are delivered to users.

■ Define a survey message for the customer

• When a customer receives notification of a survey, the message body automatically includes a URL that they can access from their web browser to find and fill out the survey form

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NOTIFICATION LOG READER • The Notification Log Reader displays the notifications received for the logged-in user by date,

urgency, and status

• With the Notification Log Reader, you can do the following:

Change the sort order and set menu options to have the Notification Log Reader appear automatically when new messages are received.

Double-click a notification message to request that CA Service Desk Manager display the detail page for the ticket associated with the notification

Monitor notification messages by entering specific selection criteria to query the database for analysis or for selection of notification messages based on data entered in the fields. For example, you can list only those notification messages that have not been cleared by changing the Message Status field to Not Cleared.

Clear notification messages to keep your list of notifications to a manageable size

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4.3 EMAIL ADMINISTRATION• Email lets you communicate with end users, such as employees or customers

• End users can reply to email notifications to update or create tickets using email from a computer, or other device such as a mobile phone or smartphone

• The following features handle email communication to and from the end user:

■ Email Notifications—Handles outbound email

The Mail Daemon (pdm_mail_nxd) sends outbound mail notifications, using Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP).

You configure the mail server SMTP options using Options Manager, Email.

You can use default email notification methods (or configure new methods) to send mail directly to the recipient through SMTP mail

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MAIL BOXES & MAIL BOX RULES

• Handles inbound email.

• The Mail Eater (pdm_maileater_nxd) retrieves inbound email for ticket creation and updates, using Post Office Protocol (POP3) or Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP or IMAP4).

• CA Service Desk Manager mailboxes define email accounts (inboxes).

• Mailbox rules define how each mailbox handles inbound mail

• Mailbox rules let you configure any actions, replies, or both, that must occur for messages retrieved from a mailbox.

• Mailbox policies protect your organization against certain types of email abuse

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MULTIPLE MAILBOXES• CA Service Desk Manager can process and manage multiple mailboxes

• Each mailbox can have its own definition, instead of using a single global set of definitions

• Multiple definitions let individual tenants use separate mailboxes, or let an individual tenant or organization use different mailboxes, and have different behaviors for each mailbox

• Each mailbox uses the following tables:

usp_mailbox—Defines the mailbox.

usp_mailbox_rule—Specifies a set of rules for each mailbox

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ARTIFACTS• An email artifact refers to something that arises from the mail process

• Mailbox rules let you specify the artifact and the value that the Text API uses

• For example, you can define a rule for incidents as Incident:{{object_id}}%. When a rule finds Incident:1234, the Text API uses %INCIDENT_ID=1234 (1234 is the ref_num for the Incident)

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SERVICE LEVEL AGREEMENTS • A service level agreement (SLA) or service type is an agreement between a service desk and

its customers and usually describes the level of service to be provided by the service desk.

• The service types defined with CA Service Desk Manager are designed to help the service desk personnel meet their service level agreements and keep the records they need to verify that their service level agreements have been met.

• For example, a service desk that operates on a ―pay per service basis may not receive full ‖payment for service that does not meet an agreed upon level of service.

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SLA USAGE• In CA Service Desk Manager, you set up service level agreements (SLAs) using service types

and events to do the following:

■ Use events to monitor tickets.

■ Use service types to track vendor and organization commitments and schedules as they relate to specific tickets.

■ Establish date and time controls for processing events and service types.

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SERVICE TYPES AND EVENTS• To keep track of vendor and organization commitments and schedules as they relate to

specific tickets, you can attach events to service types

• Service types provide a flexible and efficient way of attaching events automatically to tickets

• Service types let you do the following:

■ Identify the level of service required for specific tickets automatically

■ Identify service level violation conditions

■ Send warning notifications automatically prior to expiration of service level agreements

■ Set up service level agreement violation reports

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PRE-DEFINED SERVICE TYPES• CA SDM provides predefined service types such as

4 hour Resolution (Priority Code – 1 : warning Notification @ 3.5 hours)

12 hour Resolution (Priority Code – 2: warning Notification @ 11.5 hours)

48 hour Resolution (Priority Code – 3: warning Notification @ 47.5 hours)

72 hour Resolution (Priority Code – 4 : warning Notification @ 71.5 hours)

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EVENTS SETUP• CA Service Desk Manager uses conditions and actions defined as events to schedule,

process, and track tickets and service types automatically

• Each event has three generic behavior characteristics: conditions, actions on true, and actions on false

• Actions identify the processes that occur automatically if the condition is true or false after a specified amount of time.

• Conditions identify the event for which CA Service Desk Manager should be prepared

Caution : Do not use the Options Manager to install automatic events until the events are created. Turning on automatic events before events exist seriously impairs performance

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SERVICE TARGETS• To minimize SLA violations, you can create a set of service target templates to measure each

stage of ticket resolution

• Like Service Types, each service target contains a condition and estimate of completion time

• Service targets let you do the following:

■ Verify that tickets of the same Service Type follow the same service targets.

■ Monitor whether tickets are closed within the required time frames.

■ View information such as the remaining number of minutes before a service target complete

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SERVICE CONTRACTS• The Service Contract defines the SLA for a particular organization, including its Service

Types, Request areas, and Issue or Change Categories.

• A Service Contract also maps Service Types to common reference fields on a ticket, such as Priority and Asset

• Tracking multiple Service Types also helps prioritize tickets

• All applicable Service Types are assigned to the ticket

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TIME TO VIOLATION • When the SLA model is in use, CA Service Desk Manager's Time to Violation (TTV) system

can help you track and prioritize tickets according to their projected violation time

• The TTV system monitors all active tickets and evaluates their SLA events silently, to determine which events set the SLA violation flag

• The delay interval is controlled by the ttv_evaluation_delay Option

• The TTV projections appear on the Service Type tab of each ticket.

• The TTV system is activated with the ttv_enabled Option.

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TIME ZONES AND WORKSHIFTS• To address the complex business demands of automated application execution, CA Service

Desk Manager lets you define as many time zones and workshifts as you want, and to record them for easy reference

■ Time zones identify the time zone where the user, CI, and so forth are located.

■ Workshifts define the period during which event monitoring or the work hours of a service type or SLA are in effect

• Time zone codes define the time zone from which a user usually accesses the system (that is, the user‘s local time zone) or the time zone in which a CI is located

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4.4 SECURITY• Before you allow people to use CA Service Desk Manager, it is important that you set up security to

determine the following:

■ Which users can access the system

■ What level or levels of access users can have

■ How users are authenticated when they log in

• CA EEM {Embedded Entitlements Manager}is a central repository of user information (identities).

• CA EEM defines user authentication and access to other applications

• CA Service Desk Manager only uses CA EEM for authentication

• The CA EEM repository of user records is either of the following sources:

■ An external LDAP directory

■ Its own internal tables in the MDB

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• CA Service Desk Manager and CA IT PAM (Process Automation Manager) communicate using a web services exchange over HTTP

• Authentication is flexible, allowing you to take advantage of external authentication mechanisms, such as Windows, HTTPD user validation or LDAP authentication

• For CA IT PAM authentication, consider the following recommendations:

As an option, you can configure CA IT PAM to use CA EEM as an authentication server

Using CA EEM eliminates the need to pass plain text user names and passwords for authentication purposes

Configure CA IT PAM to communicate using secure communications over HTTPS

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DATA PARTITION ASSOCIATIONS• Data partitions can be assigned to individual contacts, but the preferred method is to assign

data partitions based on access type

• A data partition is a subset of a CA Service Desk Manager database that controls a user‘s access to tickets and other data records based on their content

• To associate a data partition to an access type, you set up data partitions that are meaningful to your site and then select one of the data partitions when you define or modify an access type

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4.5 SURVEYS• Customer surveys let CA Service Desk Manager administrators systematically collect and

analyze customer feedback about service desk performance

• Each survey has the following features that you can define:

■ A name that you can use for searching and reporting purposes

■ An introduction that you can use to explain the purpose of the survey to customers

■ An ordered list of questions for the customer to answer, each of which includes a set of possible answers

■ An optional area where the user can enter free-form comments

■ A completion message to display after the user submits the survey

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• The Managed Survey lets the CA Service Desk Manager administrator select a desired survey sample population and match it to a specific survey

• The purpose of Managed Surveys is to provide a mechanism for managing surveys.

• This function can be useful when for survey forms that need to be monitored from time to time

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4.6 WEB SERVICES• Web Services conform to data exchange standards that do the following:

■ Let applications communicate over HTTP to various servers regardless of operating environment.

■ Let most applications access CA product functionality.

■ Let Web Service clients create tickets, update assets, search the knowledge base, and more