1 Introduction to the Connector

The Siebel Connector integrates Siebel Help Desk 8.x with Enterprise Manager. Using this connector, you can create a Siebel HelpDesk request, update an existing service request, or close a service request based on metric alerts in Enterprise Manager. The Siebel Connector integrates Enterprise Manager with Siebel Help Desk through either an HTTP or HTTPS connection.

You can create, update, or close tickets based on only the following types of alerts in Enterprise Manager:

The following sections explain various Siebel Connector concepts that you must understand before you start using the Siebel Connector.

Auto Ticketing

Whenever an alert is triggered or its state changes in Enterprise Manager, the Siebel Connector can automatically open or update a service request. You can specify the set of alerts for which tickets must be opened and the alert severity for which this should happen.

You can do this by using Notification Rules, the user-defined rules that define the criteria by which notifications should be sent for alerts.

See Also:

"Configuring Notifications" in the Oracle Enterprise Manager Advanced Configuration Guide

After the ticket is opened, any subsequent update of the alert, such as a change in alert severity, produces an annotation for the ticket. After the alert is cleared (severity is set to Clear), you can optionally close the ticket.

See Also:

Section 4.1, "Automatically Creating Service Requests"

Manual Ticketing

From the Enterprise Manager console, you can manually open a Siebel HelpDesk service request based on an open alert in Enterprise Manager. The Siebel Connector populates the ticket with details based on the alert and the ticket template selected.

See Also:

Section 4.2, "Manually Creating Service Requests"

Ticket Templates

Ticket templates are XML transformation style sheets that transform Enterprise Manager alerts to a ticket format before the requests are sent to Siebel HelpDesk. These templates specify how Enterprise Manager alert attributes can populate the fields of a Siebel service request.

In Auto Ticketing, a notification method is created for each registered ticket template. The selected notification method determines which ticket template is used when a notification is sent out to the connector. For manual ticketing, you have to select a ticket template before submitting a request to create the ticket.

See Also:

Chapter 5, "Reading Ticket Templates"

Grace Period

The grace period provides you with a configuration to prevent the creation of a large number of tickets for frequently reoccurring alerts. For alerts that occur frequently within a relatively short time interval, it is often desirable to open and maintain a ticket that tracks each occurrence of the alert instead of separate tickets each time.

For recurring alerts, the grace period is a time period when reoccurrences of the same alert update (or re-open) an existing ticket for the alert, rather than open a new ticket.

For example, an alert triggers and a ticket is opened for it. If the grace period is one hour and the alert is cleared at 10:00 a.m., and if the same alert retriggers before 11:00 a.m. (one-hour grace period), the ticket originally created for the alert will be updated/reopened, rather than creating a new ticket.