[debian-edu-commits] [Debian Wiki] Update of "DebianEdu/Documentation/ITIL/Support" by PetterReinholdtsen

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The "DebianEdu/Documentation/ITIL/Support" page has been changed by PetterReinholdtsen:
https://wiki.debian.org/DebianEdu/Documentation/ITIL/Support?action=diff&rev1=28&rev2=29

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  As mentioned in the introduction, it is recommended to begin by establishing an office for centralized operations to allow you to manage tickets. The benefits of this come quickly and are visible, which is important for customer and user satisfaction.
  
- Once the office is up and running with a sensible workflow for tickets (user requests and troubleshooting) you will move on to the biggest challenge for the organisation. As a rule, this is either change management or problem solving. Organisations with "cowboy" system administrators who come up with smart ideas and implement them without much testing, often begin with change management. For organisations suffering recurring outages, problem solving comes first.
+ Once the office is up and running with a sensible workflow for tickets (user requests and troubleshooting) you will move on to the biggest challenge for the organisation. As a rule, this is either change management or problem solving. Organisations with "cowboy" system administrators who come up with smart ideas and implement them without much testing, often begin with change management. For organisations suffering recurring outages, problem solving comes first.
  
  Whatever you choose to start with, a certain amount of configuration management will be necessary. Managing configuration is critical to delivering the software and services for the user. Software must work as expected. In order to make beneficial changes, one must know the configuration of the different programs.
  
@@ -28, +28 @@

  
  All enquiries should be logged, and an email confirmation should be sent. It is important that the user should feel safe, and information about what might be the problem should be communicated to them. When the enquiry arrives at the service desk, a brief description of the incident should be logged. The enquiry may be from the ICT contact at the school, or from someone with an agreement to use the service desk. The event logging should happen as soon as possible, and it should be assigned a case number. The user should get a confirmation by email copy that the matter has been received and assigned an appropriate case number.
  
- Previously, enquiries were written in paper logbooks. Today software is used to record the enquiries in a "Request Tracker". It is crucial for operations to log enquiries. This is basically for error handling, user requests, and prioritization of the various incidents. Log entries are important to prevent recurring errors. Because operational events are periodically reviewed, an assessment of fixes and priorities can be made. The log also provides a basis for improving the service by debugging problem services and applications based on what users perceive as problematic.
+ Previously, enquiries were written in paper logbooks. Today software is used to record the enquiries in a "Request Tracker". It is crucial for operations to log enquiries. This is basically for error handling, user requests, and prioritization of the various incidents. Log entries are important to prevent recurring errors. Because operational events are periodically reviewed, an assessment of fixes and priorities can be made. The log also provides a basis for improving the service by debugging problem services and applications based on what users perceive as problematic.
  
  Thus the log of requests is a basic and necessary tool for both users and the service desk. There are several freely available systems for logging requests with good documentation <<FootNote(RT Essentials: http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/rtessentials/chapter/index.html
  )>>. Skolelinux Drift uses RT <<FootNote(RT: Request Tracker: http://www.bestpractical.com/
  )>> to handle requests.
  
- One important thing when starting up support is not to get too tough a start. Do not try to achieve everything at once; bet rather on "quick wins" that keep the user informed, and aim for quick response times. It is also important to clarify who the service desk should forward events to, if they can not solve the issue themselves. The support desk must also check whether there will be disruptions for the user. This makes it quick and easy to give feedback.
+ One important thing when starting up support is not to get too tough a start. Do not try to achieve everything at once; bet rather on "quick wins" that keep the user informed, and aim for quick response times. It is also important to clarify who the service desk should forward events to, if they can not solve the issue themselves. The support desk must also check whether there will be disruptions for the user. This makes it quick and easy to give feedback.
  
  For users it is important that incidents are dealt with. For the service office it is important that the incidents are handled correctly according to the service level agreement, and that work requested beyond what was agreed to is handled between management at the school and the system administration organisation.
  
@@ -106, +106 @@

  ||'''Overall for a school'''||'''50 client machines (concurrent users)'''||'''6 - 10 h'''||||
  ||'''Overall for all schools'''||'''10 schools, 500 client machines (concurrent users)'''||||'''2 ¼ positions'''||
  
- Experience shows that the scope of work of the ICT contact is affected by the number of concurrent users. The term "concurrent users" is new to many. To illustrate with an example: A school may have 250 students but not more than 50 computers. Then a maximum of 50 students can use computers at the same time. This is much less than the total 250 users who have an account on the system. It is these 50 logged in users that provide work for IT service. The other 200 people not logged in give little extra work.
+ Experience shows that the scope of work of the ICT contact is affected by the number of concurrent users. The term "concurrent users" is new to many. To illustrate with an example: A school may have 250 students but not more than 50 computers. Then a maximum of 50 students can use computers at the same time. This is much less than the total 250 users who have an account on the system. It is these 50 logged in users that provide work for IT service. The other 200 people not logged in give little extra work.
  
  Therefore, it is common to calculate IT costs from the maximum number of concurrent users. Other calculation methods are also possible, for example when paying for proprietary software. But since Debian Edu has no license costs, the number of concurrent users is the most crucial figure for operating costs. To calculate costs from user accounts provides little or no meaning for a school.
  
@@ -132, +132 @@

  
  The purpose of the ICT service is to prevent disturbances like shutdowns or software issues. Users will experience few problems with the ICT system if the ICT service has enough resources to handle operations, equipment and for enquiries to the Service Desk. Small or big problems will cause interruptions for users, so good handling of incidents is necessary.
  
- In parachuting they call near-accidents "incidents". It is perhaps not quite the same in computer operations when something is not working. The purpose of dealing with incidents is to restore services as quickly as possible so that everything works normally. If something goes wrong, it must have the least possible impact on users. What is a "normal service" is agreed through an operating agreement describing the service level.
+ In parachuting they call near-accidents "incidents". It is perhaps not quite the same in computer operations when something is not working. The purpose of dealing with incidents is to restore services as quickly as possible so that everything works normally. If something goes wrong, it must have the least possible impact on users. What is a "normal service" is agreed through an operating agreement describing the service level.
  
  Statistics of incidents is important, especially if several people work within the organisation. When several people work together, it is easy to lose track of the work. Statistics will point out problem areas that must be addressed more thoroughly than a quick fix from the service desk. For example, there may be many requests to replace forgotten passwords, so it may be wise to let the teacher change passwords for pupils in their class.
  
@@ -218, +218 @@

  
  == Problem Management ==
  
- Problem management is an "investigative" process. Known bugs are most often handled directly by the service desk. This is the most common form of event handling. To investigate unknown errors requires both common sense and instinct. Good operating people use instinct to go straight to the problem, find the solution and restore service as quickly as possible so that everything works normally.
+ Problem management is an "investigative" process. Known bugs are most often handled directly by the service desk. This is the most common form of event handling. To investigate unknown errors requires both common sense and instinct. Good operating people use instinct to go straight to the problem, find the solution and restore service as quickly as possible so that everything works normally.
  
  '''Problem management is;'''
  
@@ -391, +391 @@

  
  A variety of applications in addition to browser and office suite are installed in schools. Educational programs for learning, browser plug-ins, and programs for multimedia are needed. The systems also have network set-up and changed settings in specific programs. When you have many servers and perhaps thousands of clients, the need for effective tools for deployment, soon makes itself felt. Such tools are standard in Debian Edu.
  
- Build management is about ensuring that you always install the required software packages, services and proper settings both of individual programs and for the network. Many people have heard about the so-called "images". One installs the operating system with all needed programs and configures the network. Then one uses an image program to make a copy of the hard disk. This "disk image" can then be copied to other computers.
+ Build management is about ensuring that you always install the required software packages, services and proper settings both of individual programs and for the network. Many people have heard about the so-called "images". One installs the operating system with all needed programs and configures the network. Then one uses an image program to make a copy of the hard disk. This "disk image" can then be copied to other computers.
  
  It is not necessary to build such disk images. Debian Edu is based on Debian which has an excellent package management system. There is no need to compile applications, as ready-made packages can be installed directly from the Internet. It is enough to work out what changes you want to the default set-up of Debian Edu or the main program archive in use. Then you make one or more scripts to run on each machine that get everything installed and set up.
  
- For most situations, scripting is an easy way to "build" and roll out programs and configurations. But there are situations where building disk images may be the solution, e.g. for installation on many laptops.
+ For most situations, scripting is an easy way to "build" and roll out programs and configurations. But there are situations where building disk images may be the solution, e.g. for installation on many laptops.
  
  As demonstrated, handling the build process is about facilitating deployment on many computers. In exceptional cases, this may involve building a tailor-made Debian package. But in most situations, everything is ready-packaged. Then you must write and deploy a script which installs additional programs and certain settings. One can also create disk images if you have many similar machines, such as laptops for all students.
  
@@ -427, +427 @@

  
  It may seem like one needs a lot of extra things in place in order to install and maintain the services and programs that are in use. However, if you skip the tools that provide management of upgrades, you give yourself a lot of extra work. The ICT service must spend a lot of time on manual installation on each machine. The danger of making mistakes increases. When things do not work you get disgruntled users, and much time is spent fixing problems.
  
- Many of those administrating big IT systems have inadequate plans for the upcoming changes. Some have no plans at all, but just upgrading the software to the latest releases. Changes made can be perceived as problematic for some users, because functions they are comfortable with could change location on the user interface. For operations it can go completely wrong. For example when they tried upgrading from older to newer version of Windows in the Arendal municipality, mostly everything stopped working. The IT department said they had several computer programs that were held together with "wire and tape." It took half a year to clean it up.
+ Many of those administrating big IT systems have inadequate plans for the upcoming changes. Some have no plans at all, but just upgrading the software to the latest releases. Changes made can be perceived as problematic for some users, because functions they are comfortable with could change location on the user interface. For operations it can go completely wrong. For example when they tried upgrading from older to newer version of Windows in the Arendal municipality, mostly everything stopped working. The IT department said they had several computer programs that were held together with "wire and tape." It took half a year to clean it up.
  
  === Planning and implementation ===
  
  The reason for planning before implementing changes is to avoid weeks or months of delay due to problems. The time used for planning is quickly regained because one avoids additional problems. There will always be people who say they have had no problems with ad hoc changes in the systems; but closer examination reveals that there are problems after such changes, they merely don't get communicated.
  
- In our eyes, ad-hoc solutions are only a detour through changes, and only an emergency measure. An ad-hoc solution is like a temporary repair with "wire and tape." One must in due course clean up such solutions to ensure stable operations without constant surprises. Skipping a planning phase leads to many more ad hoc solutions, and several operational problems when changes or upgrades are done. Therefore it is essential that professionals and management understand the value of a good planned process for changes.
+ In our eyes, ad-hoc solutions are only a detour through changes, and only an emergency measure. An ad-hoc solution is like a temporary repair with "wire and tape." One must in due course clean up such solutions to ensure stable operations without constant surprises. Skipping a planning phase leads to many more ad hoc solutions, and several operational problems when changes or upgrades are done. Therefore it is essential that professionals and management understand the value of a good planned process for changes.
  
  Therefore, we recommend that you convene a meeting for planning, and make a stepwise plan for changes in the system. A stepwise plan will naturally vary according to the change. Upgrading the !OpenOffice.org suite is quite different from upgrading the whole system. When upgrading to a new office application, a 2-3 hour tour of the office suite may be enough for the teacher in each school. When upgrading the entire system one must both provide user training and test that the technical details work as intended.
  
@@ -468, +468 @@

  
  == Tools for operational support ==
  
- The first thing you should ask yourself: "Do we really need software tools?" If that's true, it is crucial to examine the options thoroughly.
+ The first thing you should ask yourself: "Do we really need software tools?" If that's true, it is crucial to examine the options thoroughly.
  
  Taking a glossy brochure, and listening to sales talks, one is totally dependent on such tools. But good people, good process descriptions, good procedures and job descriptions are a basis for good service management. The need for, and how complicated the tools are, depend on the organsation's need for computer systems, and the size of the organisation.
  
@@ -539, +539 @@

  
  == Planning at the start of the implementation of service support ==
  
- A growing number of organisations sees the necessity of service control. It is often a usual practice to base decisions on historical and political considerations, rather than the current organisation's needs. Therefore it is important to ensure that the management commits to participating in and understanding the working methods in the organisation, and go through the existing processes and compare those with the organization's needs and "best practices".
+ A growing number of organisations sees the necessity of service control. It is often a usual practice to base decisions on historical and political considerations, rather than the current organisation's needs. Therefore it is important to ensure that the management commits to participating in and understanding the working methods in the organisation, and go through the existing processes and compare those with the organization's needs and "best practices".
  
  === Implementing service support ===