SAManage IT Management Blog

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The need for mobile help desk software functionality is becoming increasingly urgent, and SAManage can empower your help desk technicians to be more productive and efficient – even when they’re on the road.

Over the past several years, the mobile workforce has expanded to include everyone from executives to IT teams.  Today’s IT support professionals now travel more frequently, or are based out of satellite offices, to best support the needs of the end user base.  But in order to ensure that they can always rapidly handle service requests and stay on top of support issues, no matter where they are, they need automated help desk tools that are fully portable.

Web-Based Mobile Help Desk

SAManage offers a wide array of mobile help desk capabilities, allowing IT support professionals to easily and efficiently receive, respond to, and track tickets via Blackberries, iPhones, and other popular mobile appliances.  With powerful, yet convenient features, companies can create a true mobile help desk by allowing team members at remote or off-site locations to use any mobile device to:

• Receive immediate notification through email alerts when new support requests are created
• Correspond and collaborate with users about open or pending service requests
• Request additional information from users, to clarify issues and facilitate faster resolutions
• Review issues in progress and retrieve asset configuration or history of changes

Activating Email Notifications

Activating the mobile help desk capabilities within SAManage is quick and easy.  Simply enable email access on your mobile device, using the address already linked to your SAManage account, to get email notifications when new help desk tickets are assigned to you or when a new reply to a ticket was received.  Or, if you’d like to create a unique email ID specifically for your mobile device, you’ll just need to make sure that you re-set the default email assignee in SAManage to the new email address.

Use Your Phone’s Web Browser

Additionally, you can use your phone’s Web browser to utilize the SAManage IT management service by navigating to https://app.samanage.com.  Login to your account to access your help desk.  This allows you to not only leverage the help desk capabilities, but to access other areas of the SAManage service, such as computer and software inventory, the contracts repository, and detected risks.

Visit our Web site to learn more about our mobile help desk features, as well as our other SaaS IT management solutions.

SaaS-based IT Management Software

Discover how SaaS IT Management software can help you gain instant visibility into your assets and know exactly what you have.
Sign up for a free trial of SAManage IT Management service.

One of our users recently shared this valuable tip with us – a great way to continuously track changes to assets using the custom search feature.

To monitor changes to assets via custom search, just follow these steps:

1. Search for the asset or software you are interested in tracking - for example, “Skype”
2. When your search results appear, click on the RSS icon and generate an RSS feed of the results
3. Subscribe to that RSS feed to monitor results via your favorite reader (note: you can also subscribe to other views within the SAManage service)

Once you’ve completed these steps, any modifications to your IT assets will appear as changes within that feed.  Review the feed regularly to be instantly notified of any new systems, or any updates to existing ones.  If you want further details on any particular asset, simply click on the item to retrieve its complete information and history in SAManage.

Use RSS feeds to monitor your IT

Using this combination of custom search and RSS to monitor changes in your IT environment can be very helpful, providing you with faster alerts when conditions change, and giving you greater visibility into what’s going on within your assets.  You’ll be instantly notified when important events take place, such as:

• A new computer gets installed or removed
• A PC gets reassigned to another department or user
• A new audit event is created for an asset
• A new risk is detected
• A new help desk ticket is created

Visit our Web site for more valuable tips on getting the most our of your SaaS IT asset management solution.

SaaS-based IT Management Software

Discover how SaaS IT Management software can help you gain instant visibility into your assets and know exactly what you have. Sign up for a free trial of SAManage IT Management service.

Companies dealing with unallocated computers (PCs they own, but are not currently in use) often find themselves struggling to administer these important assets.  Unallocated computers can exist for a variety of reasons.  For example, when staff members leave a firm, their computers may be put into storage until replacement employees are hired.  Or, a business may buy computers in bulk to obtain a large discount from the vendor, then keep those PCs on hand as spares to replace computers that break or become outdated, or for when new workers are brought on board.

Why track unallocated computers?

Even though they are not being utilized at the present time, unallocated computers still need to be effectively managed, much in the same way as those assets that are currently in use.  Losing track of unallocated PCs can result in a variety of issues, including:

• Overbuying. Companies who cannot accurately monitor their unallocated computers may find themselves wasting money by purchasing equipment they do not need.
• Equipment shortages. When IT teams cannot account for unallocated assets, they often struggle to address emergency situations, which can ultimately lead to lost productivity.  For example, if they do not know where unallocated computers are located, they cannot provide an employee with an immediate  replacement if their PC suddenly breaks, or has to unexpectedly go in for repair or service.
• Becoming outdated. Unallocated PCs are often forgotten when important upgrades, patches, or enhancements take place.

Creating an “Asset Pool” in SAManage

Here are some tips on effective ways to monitor unallocated computers with SAManage:

1. Create a new department, called “unallocated computers” or “computer pool“, then assign any PCs that are currently in stock – but not in use – to that department.
2. Frequently review unallocated PCs by running a report of all assets by department, then selecting the one (“unallocated computers” or “computer pool”) to which all unused PCs were assigned.  This will provide an at-a-glance view of the status and location of all unallocated computers, and allow IT staff to “drill down” on the history and related activities of each one individually.
3. When an unallocated computer is assigned to a user, update the asset status and department to the new department (i.e. “accounting” or “sales”), effectively taking it out of the “computer pool”.

Visit our Web site to learn more about SaaS IT asset management from SAManage, and how it can help your company better track and manage its unallocated computers, and other important technology systems throughout their lifecycle.

Ready for next generation IT Management?

Discover how you can gain instant visibility into your assets, know exactly what you have and what risks exists in your network.

Get started today: Sign up for a free 30-days trial of SAManage IT Management service.

When implementing new solutions, there are many benefits to the software-as-a-service (SaaS) deployment model.  But, one of the key reasons why on-demand or SaaS systems are superior to their on-premise counterparts is their ability to improve collaboration and information sharing across an entire business.

The SaaS approach makes it easy for multiple users within a company to distribute and access data via the Web and easily enable online collaboration.  Any authorized user, in any location around the world, can instantly share data with any other authorized user, including:

• Colleagues in remote offices or business units
• External stakeholders such as customers, suppliers, and business partners
• Mobile staff members, like field service technicians and sales reps
• Off-site team or department members and support personal

The type of unhindered data sharing that is facilitated by the SaaS model can increase organizational productivity in multiple ways.  It can accelerate core business activities by making the information needed to support processes and workflows more readily available.  It can also eliminate the time workers waste searching for and collecting the information they need to perform their jobs, or asking others to retrieve data for them and waiting for the results.  This allows them to focus on their core tasks, instead of data gathering and streamline their day to day tasks.

The ability to instantly share information with online collaboration is increasingly important when it comes to IT asset management.  SaaS IT asset management makes it easier to better track and maintain asset inventory, because it ensures that everyone involved in the processes of conducting IT audits and maintaining inventory logs, as well as those responsible for ensuring optimum asset utilization, have all the data they need, right at their fingertips.  All they need is a Web browser to access complete, timely asset details.

When all stakeholders across a business have complete visibility into what assets exist, where they are located, and how they are used, the tracking and management of technology investments is as accurate and efficient as possible.  Procurement professionals can ensure software license compliance by capturing and monitoring related software licenses and contracts.  Internal help desk teams can review  asset repair and service histories, and gather current asset configuration information, to more rapidly troubleshoot end user issues.  And, IT departments can instantly detect and proactively mitigate risks to the technology infrastructure while delegating users to generate their own reports and extract the exact information they need.

Visit our Web site to learn more about how SaaS IT asset management can enhance the sharing of vital asset information across your business, and dramatically increase the value you derive from your technology investments.

Windows 7 will be available on October 22nd, and many companies want to immediately take advantage of the many enhancements and new features it will offer, such as more intuitive taskbars, improved device management, and a more powerful search facility for files.  With an IT asset management system in place, you can more effectively plan and execute your Windows 7 upgrade effort, to ensure the smoothest and most efficient transition possible.

With these simple steps, performing your Windows 7 upgrade will be fast and problem-free:

• Conduct a full hardware inventory, to determine which hardware components will be impacted by the upgrade, and to identify their current configuration and see what operating system they are currently running.
• Check the Windows 7 system requirements at the Microsoft website.
• Identify any gaps between what currently exists, and what you need, then correct them before the Windows 7 upgrade takes place.

How can hardware and software asset management tools help simplify and accelerate this process?  First, they provide faster – and more accurate – visibility into what you currently have.  Manually logging your inventory, then comparing it to your requirements, can take days, or even weeks, and may result in errors.

Second, they enable you to more proactively and precisely analyze your environment and determine what is missing.  In fact, without an IT asset management system in place, companies often discover that their hardware is inadequate too late in the game.  This can not only delay your Windows 7 upgrade project, it can drive up your costs.

But, most importantly, taking IT inventory with an IT asset management solution can help enable more effective management of your new Windows 7 operating system long after the upgrade has taken place.  Patches, bug fixes, and other updates can be tracked across the entire environment, to ensure that all hardware is kept current at all times.

Visit our Web site to learn more about SaaS IT asset management, and how it can help facilitate smarter planning and implementation of your Windows 7 upgrade.

Ready for next generation IT Management?

Discover how you can gain instant visibility into your assets, know exactly what you have and what risks exists in your network.

Get started today: Sign up for a free 30-days trial of SAManage IT Management service.

In order for IT asset management to be effective, the identification and tracking of key components must be performed frequently and regularly. This post will highlight some IT asset management best practices with SAManage, based on the experience and knowledge learned from our customers.  These best practices IT asset management will help ensure the long term success of your IT Asset Management program, and help you boost return on your technology investment.

Weekly Tasks

1. Review new assets. Any new assets that have been logged into inventory must be assessed. This includes both new computers added to your inventory and new software installed across your network. Related: new computers in the last week and new software installed in the last week
2. Review of asset utilization. Investigate any assets that are not operational, or are not being actively used.  Indicate their status (i.e. in repair, in service for periodic maintenance, etc.), and estimate how long it will take to put them to use once again. Related: computers in repair
3. Identification of missing assets. Locate any assets that are not reporting frequently, or have not reported within the last week.  Determine whether or not they are lost, or if they are still in use.  If they are not being utilized, indicated whether they can be reallocated, or if they should be rendered obsolete. Related: computers not reporting in the last week
4. Review risks & license compliance. Review new risks detected in the last week as well as risks that existed before and were not yet resolved. Remind users to take action to remove these risks. Review license compliance standing and impact of this week’s inventory changes on your license standing. Related: risks and license compliance

Monthly Tasks

1. Review asset locations. Locate assets that were moved between your physical locations and are now located in a new site. Update the asset’s new location as well as current user to make sure you can track the asset when needed. Related: assets by sites and by departments and by domains
2. Review duplicate assets. Locate computers that were reinstalled and appear as duplicate in the system. Mark the old entry as the duplicate will take it out of your inventory. Related: duplicate computers
3. Disposed assets. Check old assets to determine which ones have reached the end of their life-cycle, and need to be disposed of and replaced. Mark all disposed assets in your inventory to have them removed. Related: disposed computers
4. Update contracts and licenses. Thoroughly review any new contracts or software license agreements – or any extensions or amendments to existing ones – that have been executed in the last month.  Be sure they have all been captured in SAManage.  Include the license count (for software purchases) and attach any important documents such as packing slips and invoices.  This will guarantee that your records are in good order and you are fully prepared in the event of an IT audit. Related: contracts and software licenses

IT asset management is not a one-time activity – it is an ongoing process. With the right tool in place and with implementing the right IT asset management best practices to fully utilize the tool, you can optimize the value you derive from your IT systems and enhance your overall IT system administration best practices.  Visit SAManage for more valuable tips and best practices, or to learn more about on-demand IT asset management.

Online IT Asset Management

Discover how you can gain instant visibility into your assets, know exactly what you have and what risks exists in your network.

Get started today: Sign up for a free 30-days trial of SAManage IT Management service.

Unauthorized software utilization is at an all time high. In fact, in the Sixth Annual BSA-IDC Global Software Piracy Study, released last month, it is estimated that more than one-fifth of all software currently running on PCs has been installed illegally. These findings are likely to prompt software vendors to be more proactive – and as a result, companies of all sizes will be at an increased risk of a potential software audit.

The laws surrounding software licensing are clear – each and every license agreement allows for a specified number of concurrent users, named users, CPUs, etc. Anything above and beyond those outlined specifications is considered non-compliance. And, any lack of software license compliance uncovered during a software audit will result in stiff financial penalties.

Software license management solutions can help companies ensure adherence to licensing agreements by allowing them to track software allocation and installation, and compare it their purchase contracts. With these innovative, feature-rich systems, software license compliance is made easy through unhindered visibility into all software-related activities across the enterprise.

With or without a software license management system in place, your organization will need to be prepared to prove software compliance if and when you are subject to a software audit. Some tips to follow:

1. If you receive a letter indicating that you are under investigation, cooperate fully. Your cooperation could garner leniency from the vendor’s legal representation if you are found to be non-compliant.
2. Compile all documentation required to prove software compliance. For example, you may be asked to provide dated purchase receipts, packing slips, invoices, copies of license agreements, software documentation, and the original CDs shipped to you by the vendor.
3. Be prepared to make your IT resources available to auditors, as a software audit can take anywhere from a few days to several weeks, depending on the complexity of your environment, and will require assistance from internal staff.
4. It may also be wise to call in a consultant, attorney, or other professional who specializes in software compliance issues.  There are many legal implications that can arise when a software audit takes place, and you’ll need to make sure risks and problems are dealt with correctly.  So its best to have an expert on your side from the start.

But perhaps the best tactic to take when it comes to software compliance is to avoid any surprises that may come up if an external software audit takes place, by performing your own internal audits on a regularly scheduled basis. Software asset management solutions from SAManage streamline and automate all software audit-related processes, allowing your staff to efficiently perform frequent checks, to ensure full adherence to licensing agreements at all times.

What is Software Asset Management?

Learn how companies can improve IT efficiency and ensure license compliance with Software Asset Management.

Download our quantifying the value of software asset management white paper.

Nowadays, every organization’s network is susceptible to a wide variety of threats. For example, there is the IT compliance exposure that stems from the proliferation of illegal or unlicensed software applications across a business. And then there are the IT risks associated with security breaches, viruses, and other related hacker-initiated activities.

When hazards like these present themselves, the results can be disastrous. So, more and more companies are relying on IT asset management solutions to keep their networks protected.

The ability to proactively avoid these, and other network threats is crucial to both business performance, and the preservation of financial integrity. For example, the fines that software vendors impose for failure to ensure IT compliance can be staggering. And, the loss of information and decreased productivity caused by the existence of spyware, malware, unauthorized applications, viruses, and other IT risks often translate directly into lower revenues and declining profits.

Additionally, renowned analyst firm Gartner believes that, because IT has become increasingly central to business processes, and the smooth functioning of IT networks is vital to company performance, IT risk management should be viewed as a mission-critical business initiative, not just an IT effort.

IT asset management service from SAManage provide a highly effective way to instantly detect potential IT risks. With the right technologies in place, they can be corrected, or even avoided, before they create major problems for your business. Solutions from SAManage make it easy for you to proactively detect risks to your computers and other assets by providing you with complete visibility into all components within your architecture. You can see what assets you have, where they reside, who is using them, how they are configured, and more – in real-time. So you can identify IT risks the moment they emerge, and implement the needed steps to protect yourself against them.

Learn more about IT asset management systems from SAManage, and how they can help you ensure software license compliance and prevent risks to your network.

Your new help desk software is a click away! With no software to install or servers to provision, you can implement your new SAManage help desk in just a few clicks and immediately improve your service levels.

Using the new help desk, IT help desk teams can receive support requests through a personalized support portal, distribute tickets among team members and associate tickets with assets (computers or software). By providing quick access to asset’s current hardware configuration and service history from a single console, help desk teams can reduce the time it takes to resolve support requests and provide a better service to their users.

Here are just some of the things you can do with your new help desk service:

• Empower your users to submit support requests via your personal support page.
• View all pending tickets, sort tickets by state, type, owner or due date.
• Add comments and resolutions to each ticket to capture knowledge.
• Receive email notifications on ticket updates and better communicate with the requester.
• Automatically assign tickets based on ticket types to spread the workload among your team members.
• Associate tickets with assets to track end-to-end asset service history.

Using the Help Desk – End Users

Your users submit new tickets and check on ticket status through your organization’s custom help desk portal. You can customize the portal with your organization name and logo. Then set up a simple, easy to remember URL address (such as helpdesk.acme.com) that redirects visitors to the your portal URL.

That’s it! publish the new URL address to your users and ask them to use it to submit requests to your new help desk.

Help Desk Portal

All that is required from the user to create a new support request is an e-mail address and a summary and description of the issue. The user can optionally select the ticket type and related asset name. Users can also set the priority to indicate the urgency of a request or enter a requested due date. Once the new ticket is submitted, the user automatically receives a confirmation e-mail, and the new ticket shows in your help desk.

Your new help desk software by SAManage makes it easy to communicate with your users. Each confirmation e-mail include a link to the help desk portal where the user can view all his tickets, check on a ticket status, and submit new tickets. When a ticket is updated with new comments or a ticket’s status changes, the requesting user receives an e-mail summarizing the changes to his ticket. That way, your help desk users are always up-to-date with the status of their support requests and can quickly provide any additional information that may be required. Automating the communications with users allows your support team to be more productive, freeing more of their time to work the issues.

Using the Help Desk – Support Specialists

Your support specialists use the new help desk software to effectively resolve support requests. Specialists can assign tickets among team members to share the workload and align the help desk with your internal support process. Specialists can update the ticket status, add comments, or request additional information from the user. When a ticket status changes or a new comment is added to a ticket, both the ticket owner and the ticket requester get notified via e-mail so they can take immediate action.

Each ticket has an audit log of all changes throughout its lifecycle, so you can easily see what steps were taken to resolve the problem:

Ticket comments and audit

When the support specialist is ready to resolve the ticket, he changes the ticket state to closed, select the resolution type and enters the description. The ticket resolution is a description of the steps taken by the specialist to resolve the issue in the ticket. Once the ticket is resolved, the ticket requester gets a notification email letting him know that the ticket is now closed with the resolution as entered by the specialist:

Help Desk Ticket Resolution

The ticket resolution and the steps taken by the specialist to resolve the issue are saved as a solution in the help desk software, so the knowledge is captured and can be later  retrieved to resolve similar issues in the future. More on that in future posts.

This post is part of a series on using your new Help Desk Software by SAManage. To learn more about SAManage IT Management service, visit our website and sign up for your own account.

SaaS-based IT Management and Help Desk Software

Discover how on-demand IT Asset Management and Help Desk software from SAManage can help you gain instant visibility into your assets and improve your service levels.

Sign up for a free trial of SAManage.