Dramatically reduce the number of calls to your helpdesk with the HelpMaster Pro Client Web Interface by empowering your clients to achieve a measure of self-service for their technical support needs. The Client Web Interface allows your clients to log, view and update helpdesk jobs in HelpMaster Pro using a web-browser viewing pages over the internet, or your corporate intranet. When clients wish to report a helpdesk incident, browse their history or just find a knowledge base article, they simply open their web-browser on their computer, browse to the "Helpdesk" web page, login and start using.

The HelpMaster Pro Client Access Module allows clients to perform the following actions through a simplified, web-based interface :

Any jobs that the client logs will appear in the job queue of your helpdesk technicians to action. For more information about the Client Access Module, refer to the on-line help

Controlling how clients log jobs

Clients can also be forced to conform to work flow procedures, for example by making use of custom data that clients must complete in order to log a job/incident, ensuring that clients have provided all the n ecessary data for the job. This can greatly simplify the way the jobs are allocated as this can be combined with priority manager to process jobs in certain ways depending on the custom data.

Clients are also controlled through the use of templates. All facets of a job can be set through a template and the client simply selects the relevant template. Then, only the details and the name of the template are exposed to the clients (along with any public custom data fields). The client completes the details and the template is processed exactly how the administrator intended it, controlling who the incident is assigned to, who is informed, the incident priority, any non-public custom data, etc. This means great power for administrators, while providing complete simplicity for clients.

What the Staff see

The first thing the staff will notice is the familiar feel of interface when compared to the desktop. In fact, every effort has been made to make the staff interface as close to the desktop as possible, greatly simplifying life for staff members who will not need to learn another interface.

The Staff interface has great power including the following features:

Find any job in the database with the powerful HelpMaster Job finder (allow for searching on almost any criteria) Access to search for and manipulate clients Access to search for and manipulate sites Ability to search for assets Ability to log jobs / action jobs based on templates Power to link entities so that clients, template actions, other jobs, assets, and reminders can be linked to jobs Full custom data support for jobs, clients and sites HTML editing access to knowledge base to adjust articles/add content on the run

Knowledge for all

Perhaps one of the most powerful facets of the Web Interface is the ability to make the knowledge base available to clients. This means that rather than talking clients through a solution to a common issue, they can retrieve this solution themselves by searching the knowledge base, reducing the workload placed on staff members. They may also be referred to the knowledge base by staff members. Of course, setting which knowledge base articles are exposed to clients and which are not as easy as ticking or clearing a checkbox.

The further benefit of this is the fact that a web enabled knowledge base means that this information is now available to staff on the go. If certain information is required while working on site, staff members can log in through the web interface and have complete access – as if they were working on their personal desktop. If they need to add to or change an article, or even upload a picture, this can be done with ease.

Is there a separate interface for Staff and Clients?

The answer to this is both yes and no. Firstly, in order to simplify installation and administration, the two former programs – the Client Access Module and the Staff Support Module – have been rolled into a single application. This simplifies matters with a single installation, and across the board administration (while there are still some administration options that remain unique to either clients or staff).

On the other hand, the two modules provide very different interfaces. This is determined at the time of logon as both clients and staff are presented with the same logon screen. Once logged in, however, the home pages, menus, and most of the actual functionality screens are completely different for clients and staff – giving clients as little control as possible, and staff as much control as the administrator deems necessary. The staff screens have been based around the HelpMaster Pro Desktop screens to provide a familiar interface, even keeping the colours banners.

How is the Web Interface licensed?

The web interface is licensed on a per seat basis separately for both clients and staff. After the product itself has been licensed, Client Access Licences need to be allocated to each client requiring access. For staff members, each logon simply counts as one concurrent logon to the database, meaning that the number of staff members that can login will depend on the number of HelpMaster licenses the database has.

For more information on licensing, please see our licensing page.

What Technology Does It Use?

The HelpMaster Pro Web Interface uses a combination of Microsoft technologies. The hosting platform used is Microsoft’s Internet Information Server (version 5 or above), which acts as the server side of the application.

The Web Interface itself is programmed in Visual Basic .NET, the newest member in the family of Microsoft Visual Basic technologies, and therefore makes use of the .NET framework, also installed on the server, which acts as a foundation on which the application runs. Finally, the application makes use of Microsoft Internet Explorer as a client side technology on which the Web Interface runs.

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