Adding Knowledge Records

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Last updated: Apr 23, 2024 by Mayuresh Balaji Kamble (Unlicensed)Version comment
12 min read

SummitAI Service Management Help

Knowledge Management

You can add new Knowledge Records (KRs) to the Knowledge Base that are useful to the other Analysts and the End Users. After a KR is approved and published, the End Users or other Analysts can see the KR, which pops up as a suggestion to them if they come across similar issues. You can also create KRs using the resolved Incidents (see: Viewing and Updating Incident Details of Incident Management).

Now, while creating a Knowledge Record, you have another option to store the uploaded attachments on the Microsoft Azure Blob Storage rather than local web server. Using MS Azure Blob Storage mechanism, even the large files (more than 8 MB) can be uploaded as an attachment, which is the limitation while using the local web server. It will allow you to upload and store the large attachments such as Training Vides, Project Reports or Logs of Server on MS Azure Blob Storage.

Note:

For Public KB articles the attachments on blob will not be supported.

To add new KRs:

  1. Select Knowledge > User > New Knowledge Record.

  2. On the NEW KNOWLEDGE RECORD page, select the Tenant and Workgroup for which you want to create the KR. Type in the details for the other required fields under the GENERAL, ADDITIONAL INFORMATION, and ACCESS tab. For more information about the fields under these tabs on the NEW KNOWLEDGE RECORD page, see Field Description.


    Figure: NEW KNOWLEDGE RECORD page

  3. Click SUBMIT. A new KR is created.

    Note:

    The KR needs to be authorized, approved and published so that it is available to the End Users or Analysts.

To save KR as Draft:

  1. Follow Step 1 and Step 2 of To add new KRs.
  2. Click SAVE DRAFT to save the Knowledge Record in Draft status. You can also edit or update the existing information of KR in Draft status later.

  3. You can view the list of KRs in Draft status by clicking SHOW LIST on the ACTIONS panel.

    Note:

    You can also send the Knowledge Records in Draft status for review to the reviewers before submitting the KR for authorization.

     To send KR for Review
    1. Open a Draft KR.
    2. On the ACTIONS panel, click REVIEW.



    3. Select Open For Review check box.
      1. Specify the Review End Date and Reviewers.
    4. Click SAVE DRAFT.

Field Description

The following table describes the fields on the NEW KNOWLEDGE RECORD page:

Field

Description

Tenant

Lists the Tenant/Customer name. Select an option from the list.

Note: Based on the organization's requirements, the Administrator configures the name of this field.

Workgroup

Lists the Workgroups under the selected Tenant. Select a Workgroup for the KR.

Life Cycle Status

Displays the Life Cycle Status values configured for a KR's life cycle. This value is displayed based on the KR life cycle stage. When the KR page is opened for creating a KR, you can see Life Cycle Status as None. The Life Cycle Status value is a read-only field. The value displayed in this field is based on the Status value.

Status

The Status is displayed based on the KR's progressive stage. When the KR page is opened for creating a KR, you can see the Status value as New. After the KR is created, you can see the Status value as Submitted.

After the Workgroup Owner authorizes the KR, the Status is changed to Authorized. The Workgroup Owner can select the Status option as Not-Authorized to reject a KR. The Status displays the following options after the approval of KR by the configured Approver. For more information about configuring KR Approvers, see Configuring Knowledge Record Approvers.

  • Approved: The KR Approver has approved the KR.

  • Rejected: The KR Approver has rejected the KR.

  • Published: The KR Approver has published the KR.

  • Retired: This options is displayed only after the KR is retired and no more available to the End Users and Analysts.


 GENERAL Tab

You can provide the general information about the KR under the GENERAL tab

Figure: GENERAL Tab

The following table describes the fields under the GENERAL tab:

Field

Description

Classification

Select a Classification to which you want to associate the KR. You can also click the Search icon to search for a Classification.

Category

Select a Category to which you want to associate the KR. You can also click the Search icon to search for a Category.

Owner

Type in the name of the Owner. The Owner can update the details of the KR added.

Expiry Date

Specify the expiry date for the KR that you are adding. Click the Calendar icon to select an appropriate expiry date for the KR. After the specified expiry date, the KR is not available to the End Users and Analysts.
KR expiry alert notifications are sent to the Workgroup Owners. If the Workgroup is not selected, you need to manually specify the Owner. If the Workgroup is selected, the configured Owner for the respective Workgroup is auto-populated.

Attachments

Specify the reference file path to add additional reference materials. You can also click Browse to choose an appropriate file to attach as a reference material for the KR.

Note: You can delete the Attachment only when the Life Cycle Status of the KB is Maintenance.

The attachment file can be uploaded and stored on either local web server or MS Azure Blob Storage.

Blob Storage file upload will allow you to upload the large files (more than 8 MB) also apart from the small files using Blob Storage. These files will be stored on the Microsoft Azure Blob Storage instead of local web server. 

Prerequisites:

  • Ensure you have pre-existing hosting premises on Microsoft Azure, as this feature is supported on Software as a service (SaaS) implementation only.
  • Create a Blob Storage Account. For more information on requirements, click here. 
  • Manage the storage account access key. For more information, click here.

Blob Storage File Upload

To initiate the file upload using Blob Storage, new Config keys are required to be added in Web.config/app.config file.

 Config Keys

The below config keys are required to be added to the Web.config file.


The following table describes the Key and Value description for the above Web.config configuration.

Key Value Description
StorageAccount:Name

Specify the created Blob Storage Account name on Microsoft Azure in the value field for the key "StorageAccount:Name".

For more information on how to Create Blob Storage Account and requirements, click here. 

Blob:key

Specify the key generated for the Blob Storage Account in the value field for the key "Blob:key".

For more information on how to Manage storage account access keys, click here.

App:EnableBlob

Specify the value as True if you want the attachment to be store on Blob Storage.

Specify the value as False if you do not want the attachment to be store on Blob Storage. In this case, attachment storage will fall back to classic local web server.

Note:

By default, the key value is False.

Blob:ContainerName

Specify the Blob Container name in the value field for the key "Blob:ContainerName" where all the KB attachments will be stored.

Note:

Blob Container will be created automatically with the same name as configured in web.config file for the "Blob:ContainerName" key.

SASToken:expireTimeInHour

Specify the expiry time in hours to upload the large files.

For Example: If expiry time is mentioned as 2 hours then validity period to upload the large files will be 2 hours. You need to upload the large file within 2 hours. 

SASToken:expireTimeInMintus

Specify the expiry time in minutes to upload the small files.

For Example: If expiry time is mentioned as 15 minutes then validity period to upload the small files will be 15 minutes. You need to upload the small file within 15 minutes. 

SASToken:expireTimeInMintusForUrl

Specify the expiry time in minutes to till when the Blob storage URL will be available to download the uploaded files.  

For Example: If expiry time for SAS token is mentioned as 2 minutes then the Blob Storage URL has validity of only 2 minutes. 

Note:

  • The Submit button will be disabled till the file upload is completed.

  • The green progress bar will be displayed with percentage completion of the file upload as shown in the following screenshots to upload a large file (Hit-Check.mp4).

     Screenshot


    Figure: Progress Bar - Uploading


    Figure: Progress Bar - Successfully Uploaded 


    Figure: File Uploaded


Once you click on the uploaded file, it will open in another tab with Blob Storage URL. You can download the attached file from Blob Storage URL by clicking the download icon. This Blob Storage URL will get expire as per configuration done for "SASToken:expireTimeInMintusForUrl" key in Web.config file.

Reason for  KR

Specify the reason for creating the KR.

Note: You can edit this field only when the Life Cycle Status of the KB is Maintenance.

Question

Specify a problem statement or query. When you are typing information in this text box, a validation takes place to ensure that no duplicate KRs are created in the Knowledge Base.

Video Iframe URL

Type in the video Iframe URL. Follow the listed down steps to copy the URL from iframe tag:

  1. Use the site (example:  YouTube) to find the video you want.
  2. Click the Share button below the video.
  3. Click the Embed button next to the link .
  4. Copy the iframe source code given and paste it into the Video Iframe URL field of NEW KNOWLEDGE RECORD page.
 Refer Screenshot


 icon

Click this icon to preview the multimedia content in new pop-up.

 See Screenshot

Preview pop-up
Figure: Preview pop-up


Answer

Specify the solution details or resolution steps for the problem. This field is a Rich Text Editor, which allows the user to do various formatting, such as font and size, text color, background color, alignment, indent, etc.

Keywords

Specify one or more comma separated keywords related to the KR. These keywords are used internally by the application to display the KR while the End User or Analyst is raising an Incident. If for an incident, the End User type in a problem statement in the Description text box and if that text is matching to a specific KR’s keywords, the respective KRs are displayed on the LOG NEW INCIDENT page.

Image

Upload an image for the KR.

Image Label

Specify a name for the uploaded image for the KR.

Add KR To Service Catalog

Select this check box to add the KR to the Service Catalogs. If selected, all the Service Catalogs are listed in the tree view. Select the check box corresponding to the Service Catalog for which you want to add the KR. While logging Service Requests under this Service Catalog, the users will find this KR (see: Logging Service Requests and Logging Service Requests for Users of Service Request Management.


Note: Right-click on any one of the Service Catalog and select Set As Mandatory option to make the KR mandatory for the selected Service Catalog.

Self-Help Article

Select this check box  to configure a Knowledge Record as Self-Help Article. This helps CINDE (see: SummitAI for ITSM Online Help) while fetching the Knowledge Records based on End Users' queries and displays the Self-Help articles on top of the list. This helps the End Users to resolve their queries by themselves. By default, the Self-Help Article check box is selected.

Public Article

If selected, the Knowledge Record can be shared with the users who do not have access to the SummitAI application.

Note: The Public Articles open up in a new tab on your browser instead of a pop-up page within the Application

Version Number

Displays the version number of the knowledge record.

Active

Indicates the status of the KR.

  • If selected, the KR is available to be displayed in the KR list.

  • If not selected, the KR is not available to be displayed in the KR list.

 ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Tab

You can provide the attribute responses and additional questions related to KR under the ADDITIONAL INFORMATION tab.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Tab
Figure: ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Tab

 RELATIONSHIP Tab

You can link related Incidents, Change Records, Problem Records, CIs, Service Requests, Events, and so on, to the KR using the Link list under the RELATIONSHIP tab. You can also remove the relationships using the De-link button.

RELATIONSHIP Tab

Figure: RELATIONSHIP Tab

 ACCESS Tab


Figure: ACCESS Tab

Field

Description

Important Record

Select this check box to mark the record as an important Knowledge Record. For example: The record can be marked important because of the information that it carries.

Restricted to Analysts

Select the check box when you want the KR to be displayed only to the Analysts.

Introduced New “Restrict Knowledge Record list view as per workgroup access” option in the tenant level configuration

If “Restrict Knowledge Record list view as per workgroup access” option is enabled, then the functionality works as follows:

You can restrict KA access for Analysts based on the workgroup on the Knowledge Record page. For more information, see Configuring Knowledge Management Module.

Earlier, by default, the “Restricted to Analyst” option restricts the Knowledge Articles to all the analysts. There was no control of limiting KAs to specific analysts. For example, if the end user has analyst access they will be able to view all the Knowledge Articles.  

You can restrict the KA to the analysts based on workgroup and by selecting the “Restricted to Analyst” checkbox option. The Knowledge Articles are now accessible to Analysts based on the Workgroup they belong to. Analysts can view the Knowledge Articles only if they have access to that Workgroup.  

To achieve this, new option is introduced in “Access” Tab of the Knowledge Article page. For more information, see the following screens. 

You can publish the KR for Analysts based on the workgroup on the Knowledge Record page. A new ‘Workgroup’ option is introduced under the “Restricted to Analysts” option. 

If you enable “Restricted to Analysts” option, the Customers and Locations options are hidden, and you can view the Workgroup option. You can select the workgroup to provide access to the Analysts for KRs, as shown in following screens.

Earlier if “Restricted to Analysts” option unchecked: 


Figure: KA page – Workgroup Selection

If “Restricted to Analysts” option is selected:


By default, the ‘All’ workgroup option is selected in the ‘Selected workgroup.’ You can choose the workgroup as per your requirement. 

If "All" is removed from the selected workgroup, and the user chooses the Workgroup from the ‘Available Workgroup’ of the New Knowledge Record page, it is displayed in the ‘Selected Workgroup.’ 

Note: It is mandatory to select the Workgroup. In any case, it should not be empty.

The Workgroups belonging to Tenant/Department are displayed in the ‘Available workgroup.’ The selected workgroups are displayed in the ‘Selected workgroup.’ 

Example

If the selected Tenant is Information Technology, the workgroups belonging to the chosen tenant are displayed in the ‘Available workgroup’ as follows: 

  • ALL 
  • Hardware 
  • Software  

To configure the workgroup: 

  1. Select the workgroup from the Available Workgroup. 
  2. Use the right arrow > to move the selected workgroup to the Selected Workgroup.  
  3. The selected workgroups are displayed in the Workgroup field in the right panel of the Knowledge Record page. 

Note:

E-mail notification on Knowledge Articles access is sent to the analysts based on the following: 

  1. Sends to selected workgroup analysts. 
  2. If “All” workgroups selected sends to all workgroup analysts. 
  3. If Software and Hardware workgroup selected, sends to only selected workgroup analysts. 
  4. If 2 workgroups are selected and analyst belongs to both the workgroups, the notification sent to analyst only once.

Restriction to Knowledge Articles is applicable in the following pages: 

  1. Service Portal / End User Dashboard – if you specify the keywords in search option, the auto prompt suggestion is visible only for the analyst who has access to KA. For users, the suggestions don’t prompt. 
  2. New Incident page (KA Auto suggestions) - When the analyst types a symptom, the KR suggestions are displayed to the logged-in analysts based on the workgroup access. 


  3. Knowledge Dashboard page – the list of KA is displayed based on the workgroup access of analysts. 
  4. Knowledge Article List page.

    • The following table depicts the Persona and workgroup based access to KAs, considering the following as workgroups in the table:

      • Software
      • Hardware
      • Support
      • Help Desk
      • Hospitality
      • HR

      User Personas 

      Analyst 

      Author for Workgroup 

      Analysts for Workgroup 

      KA Author Permission 

      KR List displays the KA of the below workgroups 

      Remarks (View) 

      End User A 

      No 

      • Software 
      • Hardware 

      NA 

      Author for

      • Software
      • Hardware 
      • Software 
      • Hardware 
      • All KA created by End User A
      • KA created by other authors for
        • Software
        • Hardware

      Analyst B

      Yes

      NA

      • Support
      • Help Desk

      NA


      Note: By default, persona will have access for all the workgroups since persona is an Analysts

      • Support
      • Help Desk
      • All KA created by Analyst B
      • KA created by other authors for
        • Support
        • Help Desk

      Analyst C

      Yes

      • Hospitality
      • HR
      • Software 
      • Hardware 

      NA


      Note: By default, persona will have access for all the workgroups since persona is an Analysts


      Also, persona is exclusive author for Software and Hardware workgroups


      • Hospitality
      • HR
      • Software
      • Hardware


      • Only KA created by Analyst C
      • KA created by other authors for
        • Hospitality
        • HR
        • Software
        • Hardware


      Note: This restricts to analysts based on the workgroup only if the Tenant level configuration is enabled, if not enabled it functions as current way with no changes in the KA list view.

  5. Incident Details page - Knowledge base is visible in the Action panel to Analysts only if they have access.

Customers

To control the access of KRs based on the Customers, you can associate a KR to a specific set of Customers.
To associate a KR to a set of Customers, select the Customers you want to associate to a KR from the Available Customers list and click to move to the Selected Customers to list.
To remove any Customers from the Selected Customers to list, select the Customers and click .

Locations

To control the access of KRs based on the Location, you can associate a KR to a specific set of Locations.

  • To associate a KR to a set of Locations, Select Specific Locations option from Locations drop-down list. Search and Select the required locations.



  • To associate a KR to all Locations, Select All Locations option from Locations drop-down list.
Restricted to Distribution List

Select the check box and group from the drop-down list to restrict the KB for selected user group.


ACTIONS

This section explains all the icons displayed on the ACTIONS panel of the NEW KNOWLEDGE RECORD page.

SHOW LIST

Click SHOW LIST to display the KNOWLEDGE RECORD LIST page showing all the available KRs (see:Viewing List of Knowledge Records).