Serio IT Service Desk & Helpdesk Blog

In case you are not familiar with it, the Serio Inventory Agent (SIA) is a piece of software that runs on workstations (and sometimes servers).

It’s job is twofold: provide network auditing information, and to service the Command Centre product when it wants to get information about a server machine. This post is about the first of these two, when using the Serio Inventory Agent for network auditing purposes. Specifically, what do you do if a particular machine refuses to return any information?

This post will offer a series of steps for you to follow. I’d also remind you that you don’t need to use network snapshots at all to gather this data, and could instead use the file based Inventory Agent (see below).

Troubleshooting Steps

I’ll call the machine you are trying to get information about (the remote computer) the Target Machine, and the machine you are using to query from your Workstation Machine.

1. Is the machine switched on? From time to time we have people call us reporting that they can’t get data from a particular Target Machine, when the Target is either off or otherwise disconnected from the network. Sometimes it’s because the IP address that they think the machine has is not the one it actually has, and their test Ping is actually pinging another machine. Regardless, don’t overlook this simple check, and remember you can get info when a machine is switched off by using the file based Agent.

2. Is the SIA installed? Is the SIA actually installed on the Target Machine (we’ve had a number of cases where it isn’t, but users were trying to query it anyway). Go to the machine, or use Serio Remote Desktop. Go to Add/Remove Programs (aka Programs and Features for poor souls using Vista) and see if there is an entry for Serio Inventory Agent. If not, install it.

3. Did the SIA install correctly? On the Target Machine, can you see a Service listed in Services (accessible via the Control Panel) called Serio Inventory Agent? If not, de-install and re-install. If it won’t install, check the Event Log as described in Step 5.

4. Is the SIA Service running? Using the Services control panel applet, check the status of the Serio Inventory Agent Service on the Target. It should say ‘Running’. Then check the Task Manager in windows to see if something called ‘SerioAgent.exe’ is running as a task (they are the same thing). If either of these is not shown, re-start the SIA Service, and then proceed to Step 5.

5. Is there any information in the Event Log on the Target Machine? Normal Windows applications can just display a dialog box when something goes wrong. However, for Services it’s a little more tricky – Windows doesn’t allow Services to do this. Instead, error messages and status information is written to the Event Log. To read these messages open the Control Panel, click on ‘Administrative Tools’ and then double-click the Event Viewer. You’ll find messages from the SIA (Source – Serio Inventory Agent) grouped under ‘Application’ (Vista users: Windows Logs/Application). You should see messages like this from when the SIA was last started:

Serio Inventory Agent startup data: Port=17070, MultiHomedIPAddress=.

This message means that the SIA is listening for requests on Port 17070 (yours may say something different, like 161) and that no multi-homed IP address is set (that’s usually fine, as most computers don’t have multiple network cards). Make a note somewhere of the Port Number you are using.

“Serio Inventory Agent” started successfully.

This means that all startup and initialisation finished without error, and the SIA is ready.

If you don’t see such messages, you will probably see error messages instead. If you see one that says

The requested port is in use – is there another SNMP agent application running on this machine?

…it means that you have what is called a Port Conflict, and nothing is going to work until you resolve it. Almost all the problems we see with installs are Port Conflicts. If you see this message skip to Resolving Port Conflicts below.

6. If everything checks out OK on the Target Machine, let’s run a few checks on the Workstation Machine. Run the Serio Workstation Explorer (SerioWe.exe, you’ll find it in your Serio directory). From the Edit menu, select ‘Edit Advanced Settings’.

Grouped under Network Options you’ll see two numbers:

IP Port used for sending requests
IP Port to send requests to on remote machines

The key value is the second one: IP Port to send requests to on remote machines. This value should match the Port Number noted in step 5. If it doesn’t, then change it and click OK.

Then try to connect to the Target Machine using the Workstation Explorer. If it works then the SIA is functioning just fine and answering requests, else skip to step 7.

7. If you get this far, and you’ve faithfully checked all the things listed, it might be time to place a support call – but be warned, this is exactly the stuff we’ll check all over again.

Resolving Port Conflicts

If you get here, it’s because the SIA is stuck on a Port Conflict. I won’t go into the background of TCP/IP Ports, except to say this: IP Ports are like toothbrushes, and are not designed for sharing. You can do only one of two things to resolve a Port Conflict:

1. Stop the other Application.

Stop the application that is running on the Target Machine that is using the Port you noted in Step 5. If you are not using this application and it was installed by default, stopping or de-installing is usually the easiest thing to do.

Finding out the identity of that application can be tricky, but if the Port in question is 161 there is a good chance it is the Microsoft SNMP Service that is using it.

2. Change the Port number that Serio Inventory Agent uses.

Tip: Only do this if you can do it for all machines – otherwise, having machines using different Ports will cause you an administrative migraine.

To change the Port used on the Target Machine, you can either de-install and re-install, or you can simply edit this registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SERIOIAGENT\
Parameters\SerioAgentStartup\SendPort

and set it to the DWORD value you require (17070 is usually a good value, make sure you set it in decimal). The value is applied when the SIA on the Target Machine is next restarted.

Having changed the Port Number, go back to the Serio Workstation Explorer and edit the ‘IP Port to send requests to on remote machines’ value, and then try re-querying the Target Machine.

• Getting Inventory Data when Machines are Off
• Serio IT Service View WMI Troubleshooting Checklist
• Making use of Agent Status

I’m asked to write about how Group Companies are incorporated into overall IT Service Management. Specifically, what happens if your own company either buys another company or starts another company that will be run as a separate entity (with it’s own capital, directors, and premises)?

Of course, I can’t answer the question for you – but what I can do is consider some of the issues you might have to work through. Some are conceptual, some practical.

Sometimes we at Serio are asked ‘how should we incorporate them into Serio?’ when the real question is ‘How do they fit-in in terms of IT Service Management’.

I’ll refer to the newly acquired company, or the new start-up company, as ‘NewCo’.

What is the ‘Strategic Vision’ for IT in the whole Group?

There may be a Strategic Vision that outlines the approach you take – these usually originate at group Director level. It may be that this will guide you on what you need to do (for instance, many companies centralise IT services, others have a horror of ‘Head Office’ services and want everything as close to the business and customers as possible). If you are lucky there will be such a guidance, but there is every possibility there won’t – at least in my experience.

Will NewCo Management want control over their IT?

The directors of NewCo will be focussed on creating or developing their business, and may see IT as a critical component of their strategy. If so, any suggestion of incorporation of their IT service delivery into existing ITSM services might be unwelcome. Remember that it isn’t necessary for them to be tightly integrated in terms of IT to be able to send and receive emails, and share files, with the rest of the group – you can set-up web portals specifically for this purpose.

Will NewCo have its own IT Service Management function?

First of all, is there any NewCo IT Helpdesk or Service Desk? What you are trying to assess is if there is any local function to integrate in the first place. The important thing is how such a service is perceived by the directors of NewCo.

How much interaction between your existing IT service management function and NewCo will there be?

…or phrased another way, ‘how much will NewCo use group services’. Try and imagine how many support tickets might need to be passed between the two groups – but be realistic. How much will NewCo and your own ITSM group need to work together (be realistic, and resist the urge to over-estimate).

What are the politics of the situation?

This is most poisonous aspect, particularly in cases where NewCo is an acquired company rather than a start-up. As soon as anyone mentions ‘incorporation’ or ‘merger’ of IT services people see their jobs and (most importantly) their prestige to be under threat, any hope of co-operation can go out of the window. People start firing-off their CV’s, attitudes become negative, it gets harder to achieve any kind of consensus. Alternatively, you might find two groups of people whose skills complement each other.

Technorati Tags: IT Service Management, ITSM

• Start-ups, Acquisitions, and your ITSM System
• Making a Start with ITSM Reporting
• First SLA? Some Statistics to start with

As some of you are aware, we’ve recently (as of Friday) relocated to new offices here in Livingston. BT’s technology doesn’t seem capable of allowing us to keep our old telephone numbers even though we’ve moved no more than 2 miles to Uphall Station, so we now have new telephone numbers which are:

Tel: 01506 438855
Fax: 01506 438868

This is a follow from the post last week, continuing the topic of Team and Agent metrics.

Quality of Completion – An interesting an often overlooked figure connected with Incident Management. How many tickets are re-opened after closure? Whilst it might be that there are legitimate reasons for re-opening a closed ticket, a high number might suggest issues with quality control (closure before it’s really closed).

First Time Fix Rate (FTFR) – For call-handling teams, you can look at this figure both by Team and by Agent – either with examining actual results achieved, or by looking at a 3 month trend.

Speed of Resolution – For Helpdesks and Service Desks you might have underpinning contracts and might want to examine performance from a time perspective – either resolution against target or response against target. These can often reveal more insight into why your overall service targets are hit or missed.

Backlog or Assignment Status – Something you should probably be looking at at least weekly (and ideally daily) is a status report that shows you where tickets are currently assigned – both by Team and by Agent (you’ll find such a graph under performance in SerioClient). If you see relatively large numbers against a single Agent or Team, you can take action by re-distributing or allocating other staff to the Team.

Technorati Tags: ITSM, Metrics, Reporting, Service Desk

• Measuring the Performance of Helpdesk/Service Desk Teams and Agents
• More Simple Helpdesk/Service Desk Metrics and Reports
• Service Desk/Helpdesk Metrics Health Check

I’m asked to address the subject of how you measure the performance of Helpdesk/Service Desk Teams and Agents – something that can be both useful, vexatious, misleading and controversial (and possibly all of these at the same time).

If you are asked to look at this subject, you need to be clear about what aspect of performance you want to look at – saying ‘I just want to look at standard reports’ usually means you haven’t thought clearly enough about what you wish to examine, or what problem you are trying to solve. For example, are you concerned about a Team that seems to take a long time to resolve Incidents? Or a Team that seems to re-assign a lot of tickets that are assigned to it? Do you just want to get an overview?

Let’s take a look at some different aspects of Team and Agent performance. You’ll see that these are mostly subsets of overall ITSM service delivery performance.

Type of Ticket – Are you looking at Incidents, Problems, Service Requests or Changes? Or all four? You might find it helpful to consider each individually.

Rate of Resolution – Now by this I don’t mean speed, I simply means out of how many tickets logged or assigned to a Team did that Team actually resolve? This may not be appropriate for all ticket types and for all teams – but for some it will be. The most obvious is a first line support team, and instances where you are trying to improve the number of tickets resolved without being passed to other teams. It might be hard to determine what the ‘right’ or ‘acceptable’ number is, so try looking at the figures over something like a 3 month period.

Number Resolved - This is probably the ultimate blunt instrument, so use with caution (yet bizarrely it’s often the first measure managers look at, especially for Agents). The reason it’s a problematic measure is that those Teams and Agents having more complex workloads and tasks will usually have a much lower rate of resolution than those with simpler tasks. One useful thing you can deduce from this is if a particular Team or Agent is being put under increasing stress by increasing volumes. You can also investigate issues where ticket closure figures are low for one or two Team members – but remember it might simply be they are doing other things, or handling more complex cases.

Churn – Here I’m referring to an overview of incoming tickets, the number resolved, the number outstanding and the number on-passed to other teams. You’ll find a report in SerioReports that shows this, and can be used to get a view of how Incidents move between teams.

I’ll post the rest of this article next week. In the meantime, I’ve made a companion spreadsheet to our Service Desk Metrics White Paper which contains some actual examples. Search this site for downloads and you’ll find it.

Technorati Tags: Helpdesk, ITSM, Metrics, Reports

• Measuring the Performance of Helpdesk/Service Desk Team and Agents – Part 2
• More Simple Helpdesk/Service Desk Metrics and Reports
• Service Desk/Helpdesk Metrics Health Check