14. 12. 2023
Service Management
17. 01. 2017
Patrick Zambelli
Downloads / Release Notes, Service Management
EriZone 5 has been released!
EriZone has evolved over the last years, becoming a comprehensive Service Management solution to address enterprise requirements.
The most significant enhancements of the latest version regard the areas of Service Level Management and Service Catalogue Management, as well as the introduction of new functionalities to automate and reuse processes and activities. Besides technical extensions, the graphical user interface was completely redesigned resulting clearly structured and more easy to use.
Enhancements in the area of Service Level Management and Service Catalogue Management
The measurement of the achieved service levels and their comparison with the agreed SLAs form the basis for optimizing the quality of the delivered services.
In EriZone 5 the data structure for the management of services and categories, that represents the fundamental element of SLA Management as well as of the mechanism to dispatch tickets to the correct competence center, was completely redefined.
NB: In EriZone the category of the request defines the ticket-type (Incident, Service Request etc.).
The new data structure primarily implies the following new possibilities:
Defining and measuring the service levels of each category: Besides measuring the SLA compliance for each service, it is now possible to define and measure SLAs for the various ticket-categories. Example: As IT Operations Manager, you will have the possibility to define and measure specific SLAs for each category (incident, information request etc.). In this way, it is easier to define the priorities of the tickets.
Assigning the same category to multiple services: By having the possibility to assign the same category to diverse services, it is now possible to reduce the number of categories that have to be managed. As a result, the entire handling of the service catalogue becomes clearer and less cumbersome.
Assigning the same category to certain customer groups: The category „reorder smartphone“may for example be visible only for the customer group “manager”, this should avoid improper requests. Moreover, it is possible to load customer groups from Active Directory.
Specific allocation of requests to competence centers: Considering the combination of service and category, each request can be quickly allocated to the correct competence center. Moreover, the automatic ticket dispatching can be regulated by further parameters, to automate also the dispatching to the 2nd level support or to advanced ticket processes (acquisition process, authorization process etc.).
Redesign: new graphical user interface
EriZone 5 comes up with a completely new look and feel. The graphical user interface (GUI) has been redesigned to provide a modern and clear design where intuitive icons and the newly arranged toolbar make it more appealing and easy to use.
Thanks to the new responsive design, besides the optimized browser view, the new layout adapts itself to all display sizes and allows an easy way to operate on all devices.
To meet the different preferences of the users, EriZone 5 provides a light as well as a dark theme, between which users can easily switch. Moreover, the clear and contrasted design provides barrier-free access.
Additionally, the activities of data input on the different forms is accelerated through the new autocomplete functionality.
Automation: simplified control and standardization of activities and processes
Controlling activities
In EriZone 5 it is possible to start an Activity Management process that consists of a set of related activities. For each activity, a so-called activity ticket is created whereat also dependencies and sequences can be defined. In this way, necessary sets of activities, for example in case of a new hire, can be automated. The resulting timesaving can be achieved also by automating processes outside HR.
Reusing process definitions
The Process Bundle module, which is the underlying concept for guaranteeing the reusability of process definitions, was enhanced. A so-called process bundle defines ticket conditions (as for example service, category, ITIL process etc.) which automatically trigger a certain process or sub-process. Thanks to the reusability of process definitions, the IT department is able to concentrate on the management of just a few core processes, which in turn leads to timesaving and improved clarity.
Deriving child processes
New functionalities increase the flexibility of the process module. Child processes can now be automatically started from normal processes whereat it is possible defining to take over the properties from the parent ticket, or to newly set them. This simplifies for example the realization of an authorization process, the derivation of tickets for the 2nd level support and the configuration of sub processes.
Centralized access to CI data managed in different systems
The companies’ configuration items (abb. CIs) are usually managed in different systems whereat the complete collection of all CIs is generally known as Configuration Management Database (CMDB). EriZone 5 provides a centralized CMDB, where data from various sources can be received and stored. Thus, it becomes possible to access the complete list of all relevant CIs from each ticket, independently on which system they were originally managed. As relevant are intended those CIs that stand in connection with the currently executed activity. Moreover, it is possible to display a link to the original data source inside the EriZone CMDB, to allow a quick and simple navigation to the data on the external system. Furthermore, the selection through interlinked dropdown lists merely shows contextual contents avoiding excessively long selection lists.
Thanks to the centralized EriZone CMDB, processing times can be optimized by the fact that service desk employees can access all substantial information directly from the service management software.
Patrick Zambelli
Project Manager at Würth Phoenix
After my graduation in Applied Computer Science at the Free University of Bolzano I decided to start my professional career outside the province. With a bit of good timing and good luck I went into the booming IT-Dept. of Geox in the shoe district of Montebelluna, where I realized how a big IT infrastructure has to grow and adapt to quickly changing requirements. During this experience I had also the nice possibility to travel the world, while setting up the various production and retail areas of this company. Arrived at Würth Phoenix I started developing on our monitoring solution NetEye. Today, in my position as Consulting an Project Manager I am continuously heading to implement our solutions to meet the expectation of your enterprise customers.
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