How to create links for categories

[lomixture]

Hi all,

I am a longtime user of Service Manager but a large update went live in our org during my mat leave, and I am going round in circles trying to resolve it. Unfortunately all other trained team members jumped ship whilst I was off so I am the only one trained at present...and not even fully trained nowadays!

Our orgs decided to use links to show our categories for our customers to click on in the front end, but I cannot for the life of me work out how to find the link for the category?! The image below is a screenshot of the design bar within the new pages/domains (I find this very confusing tbh) but how/where do I get that address from?

I have created all the categories within the Service Portfolio but I can't make them appear anywhere  please help!

[Conor]

Hi @lokent

Congratulations on the maternity leave and welcome back! 

This could be as simple as publishing the links after you've saved them, once you've added in the portal config have you clicked the publish button at the top of the config section?

Easy way to tell is if you can see the items on the design mode, but not on the portal outside of design mode?

 

[lomixture]

@Conor

Thank you for your reply, I've just realised the reason it wasn't showing was because I was trying to use a published category in a configuration that wasn't switched on! Doh!

Whilst I've got you ... why are these two services showing in the top right corner but none of the other ones are?! I'm guessing its something to do with pages or domains but there's really no reason for them to be there for everyone to see :S

Thanks!

[Conor]

@lokent that is to do with service subscriptions. If you are logging in as yourself you may have different subscriptions to your average end-user so while you see them your end users may not (unless they have been subscribed to a service that is part of that domain). 

They will only be visible to end-users who are subscribed to the service, or part of a group that is subscribed to the service (or a service linked to that domain - if you mean the HR & Sandpit domains? either way it's the service subscriptions driving the visibility of either domains or services)

 

[lomixture]

@Conor I do mean the HR and Sandpit, but looking in them at the back end on the Service Portfolio page, they have no difference in subscriptions than any other service.

As an example, this image is of the Facilities service (used by whole force, not visible in top corner)

 

And this is the HR service (used by the whole force, but in the top corner)

 

I have tested this, by going to speak to someone who I know has the most basic of customer access and they can see the HR but not the Sandpit. The sandpit has a list of subscribers on it (a group of individuals who use it for testing things) which I assume is why noone else can see it? However, if we want people to be able to access the catalog items within HR (even if we are making them links), do they not also need full access to the service as a whole?

I guess I'm worried if I put people's name's on the subscriber list and it disappears for the general customer in the top corner, would they then still be able to access the linked categories as per my first post?

Feels like I'm talking in riddles...

[lomixture]

Also why is it only those two that are showing in that corner and not the Facilities, Finance, IT etc etc? Have I built something accidentally which we as an org aren't using?

[Conor]

@lokent Firstly if a user has access to the service then they will be able to click on the linked categories, as soon as you filter it by user it could get complicated so I'd leave the subscriber list open to everyone if it's for the whole business

The domain settings are also important here (admin portal -> Service Manager -> Service Domains).

If the domain is set to be 'Public' then it will be shown regardless of service subscription

If the domain is set to Not be public then it will only be shown if the end-user is subscribed a service that is part of that domain.

 

In the above domain settings my test end user can see the 'Working from Home' domain regardless of service subscription. They can click any links that are on the domain page, but they cannot access the service / logging page associated with the catalogue item (because they are not subscribed to the relevant service).

The user is not specifically subscribed to anything so will only be able to see services that are open to all, as yours are. In my case the user can only see one IT domain related service, and so while it is not 'Public' they can see the domain at the top because they have visibility of that IT Service. As soon as I limit the IT service (i.e. not available to everyone) then the whole domain disappears from the top as the user is no longer subscribed to that service.

You are exactly right about the sandbox domain, if the domain is not public then only subscribers to one of the sandbox domain services will be able to see that domain at the top. 

Hopefully this makes sense? I also feel I'm talking in riddles. If you want all end users to see Facilities /  Finance / IT / etc. domains then you can set the domains as public and they will be there regardless of service subscriptions, but they may not have anything to click on unless there are services available to them.

[lomixture]

Perfect sense, thank you!

I'm back at the same problem as earlier though, as to how do I get to the weblink for the category to create the link icon in the service? 

How do I get it from here in the Service Portfolio:

 

To link here in the customer view?

 

I can't figure out how to open up the Report an Issue (appreciating its in draft in the screenshot) to actually get the web address for that form.

[Conor]

There are a couple of ways to get the URL for a links widget. You could make it available to access on the Employee portal, open it, copy the URL, and then put that URL into the links widget, and then hide the service option again.

Or you could use the Leaver notification item in your screenshot above to get the prefix for the URL from the existing link (as it's the same service everything up the catalog item ID will be the same), and then if you hover over the catalog item with your mouse in the service portfolio view you will get the ID, and then simply amend the last part of the URL with the relevant catalogue item ID

 

[lomixture]

Thank you so much, @Conor! I've learned more in this thread than I have after hours of trawling the wiki. Best keep you on speed dial  

Have a great day!