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KACE Asset Management Appliance 7.1 - Administrator Guide

About the KACE Systems Management Appliance (K1000) Getting started
Configuring the appliance
Requirements and specifications Power-on the appliance and log in to the Administrator Console Access the Command Line Console Tracking configuration changes Configuring System-level and Admin-level General Settings Configure appliance date and time settings Verifying port settings, NTP service, and website access Configuring network and security settings Configuring Agent settings Configuring session timeout and auto-refresh settings Configuring locale settings Configure data sharing preferences About DIACAP compliance requirements Configuring Mobile Device Access Enable fast switching for organizations and linked appliances Linking Quest KACE appliances Configuring history settings
Setting up and using labels to manage groups of items Configuring user accounts, LDAP authentication, and SSO Using Replication Shares Managing credentials Configuring assets
About the Asset Management component About managing assets Adding and customizing Asset Types and maintaining asset information Managing Software assets Managing physical and logical assets Maintaining and using manual asset information Managing locations
Setting up License Compliance Managing License Compliance Setting up Service Desk Creating and managing organizations Importing and exporting appliance resources
Managing inventory
Using Device Discovery Managing device inventory
About managing devices Features available for each device management method About inventory information Tracking changes to inventory settings Managing inventory information Finding and managing devices Provisioning the K1000 Agent Manually deploying the K1000 Agent Using Agentless management Adding devices manually in the Administrator Console or by using the API Forcing inventory updates Managing MIA devices Obtaining Dell warranty information
Managing applications on the Software page Managing Software Catalog inventory
About the Software Catalog Viewing Software Catalog information Adding applications to the Software Catalog Managing License assets for Software Catalog applications Using software metering Using Application Control Update or reinstall the Software Catalog
Managing process, startup program, and service inventory Writing custom inventory rules
Deploying packages to managed devices
Distributing software and using Wake-on-LAN Broadcasting alerts to managed devices Running scripts on managed devices Managing Mac profiles
Patching devices and maintaining security
About patch management Subscribing to and downloading patches Creating and managing patch schedules Managing patch inventory Managing Dell devices and updates Maintaining device and appliance security
Using reports and scheduling notifications Monitoring servers
Getting started with server monitoring Working with monitoring profiles Managing monitoring for devices Working with alerts
Using the Service Desk
Configuring Service Desk Managing Service Desk tickets, processes, and reports
Overview of Service Desk ticket lifecycle Creating tickets from the Administrator Console and User Console Creating and managing tickets by email Viewing tickets and managing comments, work, and attachments Using the ticket escalation process Using Service Desk processes Using Ticket Rules Run Service Desk reports Archiving, restoring, and deleting tickets Managing ticket deletion
Managing Service Desk ticket queues About User Downloads and Knowledge Base articles Customizing Service Desk ticket settings Configuring SMTP email servers
Maintenance and troubleshooting
Maintaining the appliance Troubleshooting the K1000
Appendixes Glossary About us Legal notices

Configuring Service Level Agreements

Configuring Service Level Agreements

Enable Service Level Agreements

Service Level Agreements (SLAs) are the rules used to calculate the expected resolution time, or due dates, for Service Desk tickets based on ticket priority.

You can set the expected resolution time for each ticket priority, and you can enable SLAs to take the defined business hours and holidays into consideration when calculating due dates. For example, if tickets with a priority of Low are set to be resolved in two days, and a Low priority ticket is submitted the day before a holiday, the holiday is excluded from the two-day resolution time when calculating the due date.

In addition, if notifications and email events are enabled, email is sent to users specified in the SLA Violation email event when tickets are overdue. The frequency of email notifications is configured in the SLA settings, and notifications are sent according to that frequency, even if that frequency includes non-working hours or holidays.

Enable Service Level Agreements

Enable Service Level Agreements

Service Level Agreements (SLAs) define the time allowed to resolve tickets in each queue. If you have multiple Service Desk queues, you configure SLA settings for each queue separately.

SLAs are based on the priority values defined in the queue, so these values should be defined before SLAs are configured. See Customize ticket priority values. In addition, SLAs can use business hours and holidays only if those hours and holidays have been defined. See Configuring Service Desk business hours and holidays.

1.
Go to the Service Desk Queue Detail page:
a.
Log in to the K1000 Administrator Console, http://K1000_hostname/admin. Or, if the Show organization menu in admin header option is enabled in the appliance General Settings, select an organization in the drop-down list in the top-right corner of the page next to the login information.
b.
On the left navigation bar, click Service Desk, then click Configuration.
c.
On the Configuration panel, click Queues.
d.
To display the Queue Detail page, do one of the following:
▪
Click the name of a queue.
▪
Select Choose Action > New.
2.
Scroll down to the Service Level Agreement section. A row is displayed for each priority value defined for the queue. See Customize ticket priority values.
3.
For each Priority, such as High, Medium, and Low, specify the following settings:

Option

Description

Enabled

Whether the SLA is enabled for the priority. Select the check box to enable the SLA, clear the check box to disable it.

* 
NOTE: If the Service Level Agreement is enabled for a Priority, the ticket due date is calculated automatically based on the Resolution Time defined for that priority. Any user who has Modify Permission on the DUE_DATE field is able to override this automatically calculated date.

Resolution Time

The time, in hours or minutes, for the enabled priority. This time period is used to automatically calculate a ticket's due date and time based on the date and time the ticket is submitted.

Use Business Hours/Holidays

Whether to use the configured business hours and holidays when calculating ticket due dates for each priority. Select the check boxes to use these settings. See Configuring Service Desk business hours and holidays.

Notification Recurrence

The time, in hours or minutes, for email notifications to be sent. A recurring email notification is sent when a ticket has passed its due date and is not yet resolved. The email is sent to the users specified in the SLA Violation email event, if configured in the Email on Events section. See Configuring email triggers and email templates.

* 
NOTE: To send a single email notification with no recurrence, enter 0.
4.
Click Save.

Configuring Service Desk ticket queues

Configuring Service Desk ticket queues

Configure ticket queues
Rename Service Desk titles and labels
Enable or disable the conflict warning

Service Desk tickets are stored in queues on the K1000 appliance. Most organizations need only a single ticket queue. You can customize this single queue, or create and manage additional queues, as needed.

See Managing Service Desk ticket queues.

Configure ticket queues

Configure ticket queues

You can modify the settings of ticket queues as needed.

1.
Go to the Service Desk Queue Detail page:
a.
Log in to the K1000 Administrator Console, http://K1000_hostname/admin. Or, if the Show organization menu in admin header option is enabled in the appliance General Settings, select an organization in the drop-down list in the top-right corner of the page next to the login information.
b.
On the left navigation bar, click Service Desk, then click Configuration.
c.
On the Configuration panel, click Queues.
d.
To display the Queue Detail page, do one of the following:
▪
Click the name of a queue.
▪
Select Choose Action > New.
2.
Specify the following settings:

Field

Description

Name

The name of the Service Desk queue. This name appears in the From field when users receive email messages from the Service Desk.

Email Address

A fully qualified email address for the server. Users typically do not reply to this address.

If you want to allow users to reply to K1000 Management Appliance email, specify an email address in the Alternate Email Address field.

Alternate Email Address

Support@mydomain.com

The primary email address your users send email to. The K1000 Management Appliance also uses this address to send email from the Service Desk. Confirm that the domain name is correct for your email service. For information on creating POP3 email accounts, see Create and configure POP3 email accounts.

* 
NOTE: As a valid email address, this address is subject to the same spam and security vulnerabilities as any other email address.
3.
Optional: Specify POP3 settings.

To use a POP3 email server, you need to enable SMTP Server and POP3 in the appliance network settings. See Changing appliance network settings.

Option

Description

POP3 Server

The hostname or IP address of the POP3 server. If you specify an IP address, enclose the address in brackets. For example [10.10.10.10].

POP3 Username

The username of an account that has access to the POP3 server.

POP3 Password

The password of the specified server account.

4.
Select the SMTP Settings check box, then provide the following information for an external SMTP server.

To use a SMTP server, you need to enable SMTP Server in the appliance network settings. See Changing appliance network settings.

* 
NOTE: If you do not use a POP3 email server, you can use the K1000 appliance's built-in SMTP server to accept incoming email messages from your internal email server.

Option

Description

SMTP Server

Specify the hostname or IP address of an external SMTP server, such as smtp.gmail.com. External SMTP servers must allow anonymous (non-authenticated) outbound email transport. Ensure that your network policies allow the appliance to contact the SMTP server directly. In addition, the mail server must be configured to allow the relaying of email from the appliance without authentication. If you specify an IP address, enclose the address in brackets. For example [10.10.10.10].

SMTP Port

The port number to use for the external SMTP server. For standard SMTP, use port 25. For secure SMTP, use port 587.

SMTP Username

The username of an account that has access to the external SMTP server, such as your_account_name@gmail.com.

SMTP Password

The password of the specified server account.

5.
Click Save to create the queue and configure additional settings.
6.
Specify User Preferences:

Field

Description

Allow all users as submitters

Allow anyone who is a user on the K1000 Management Appliance to submit tickets through this Service Desk queue.

Restrict Submitters by Label

Select submitters by label only. Available only when Allow all users as submitters is not selected.

Allow all users as approvers

Allow users on the appliance to approve tickets through this Service Desk queue.

Restrict Approvers by Label

Select approvers by label only. Available only when Allow all users as approvers is not selected.

Owner Label

Confirm that All Ticket Owners is the label selected.

This label designates the users who are allowed to own and manage tickets — typically, your IT staff. You must have a Ticket Owner who is responsible for managing the ticket through its life cycle.

Accept email from unknown users

Allow unrecognized users to create tickets.

If Accept email from unknown users is enabled in the queue configuration, any email sent to the Service Desk queue is allowed to set the Submitter field of a ticket, provided that the username passed in the @submitter token is that of an existing user, or the current email address if it is an unknown user.

If Accept email from unknown users is disabled, the preceding process works only when the email address of the sender is already associated with a Service Desk user account.

Allow ticket deletion

Allow ticket owners and administrators to delete tickets. This setting is useful if you do not want staff to delete tickets. You can periodically select this check box to clean out old tickets, then clear it again to prevent ticket deletion.

Allow parent ticket to close child tickets

Enable the system to automatically close child tickets when parent tickets are closed.

Allow users with an Administrator role to read and edit tickets in this queue (Administrator Console only)

Grant read and write permissions to all users who are assigned to the Administrator role.

Default ticket owner comments to Owners Only visibility

Automatically select the Owners Only check box when comments are added to tickets.

Enable ticket conflict warning for ticket owners

Display a dialog, to administrators and ticket owners, that summarizes conflicts between the changes they are submitting and the changes submitted concurrently by other users. When administrators and ticket owners click Save or Apply Changes on the Ticket Detail page, the dialog appears if other users have edited and saved the ticket while it was open for editing. This enables administrators and ticket owners to choose whether to discard their changes, or overwrite the changes made by other users if there are conflicts.

* 
NOTE: By default, this warning is enabled on new queues and disabled on queues that were created in K1000 version 6.3 or earlier.

The dialog is displayed only if other users have modified the ticket, and it is displayed to administrators and ticket owners only. The dialog is not displayed to other users.

* 
NOTE: The dialog summarizes all changes made by other users. However, the current user's changes are summarized only if they conflict with changes made by other users.
7.
In the Archive Preferences section, select settings for ticket archival. Click the Settings link to enable ticket archival.
* 
NOTE: If Ticket Archival is turned off, see Enable ticket archival.

Option

Description

Archive closed tickets older than

The age of tickets to be archived. For example, if you select 3 months, tickets are archived when three months have passed since the tickets were opened. To prevent tickets in the queue from being archived, select Never. Archived tickets can be restored to the queue if necessary. See Restore archived tickets.

Delete archived tickets older than

The age of tickets to be permanently removed from the archive. For example, if you select 6 months, archived tickets are deleted from the archive when six months have passed since the tickets were opened. To prevent tickets in the queue from being deleted from the archive, select Never. Deleted tickets cannot be restored to the queue.

8.
In the Ticket Defaults section, select the default values for new tickets. For example:
◦
Category: Software
◦
Status: New
◦
Impact: 1 person cannot work
◦
Priority: Medium
* 
NOTE: If any of these fields are marked as Required in the Customize Fields and Layout page, the default value is ignored and users are required to select a value from the drop-down list.
9.
In the Email on Events section, select the categories of users who will receive email when the specified events occur. Each column represents a type of Service Desk user (role) and each row represents a ticket event. See Configure email triggers.
10.
Optional: Configure Service Level Agreement Settings. Here you can enable Service Level Agreement (SLA) settings based on the ticket priority. When enabled, the due date of the ticket automatically takes into account the resolution time, business hours, and holidays. See Configuring Service Level Agreements.
11.
In the Ticket Rules section, enable the rules to apply to tickets in the queue. You can use any of the pre-defined rules or customize your own. See Using Ticket Rules for more information about how to use and customize ticket rules.
12.
Click Save.
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