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Knowledge Base allows building your articles library in you to build your article library in the Self-Service Portal (SSP) providing the necessary information for users: instructions, service descriptions, release notes, etc. Here, you can store articles for users with specific roles and public articles for any authorized user.

You can give access to your knowledge base to unauthorized users. See the Opening KB to public section of this article.

Tip

Role required: admin, knowledge_admin.

Knowledge Base allows categorizing the content on different levels and arrange arranging articles in a particular hierarchy to navigate through them easily. Knowledge Base contains five essences:

ElementDescription

Content Database (Content DB)

It helps to create separate knowledge bases which in their turn are arranged into several sets of articles. It is the most general and wide section of the KB and may be called the basic section.

This element is not displayed on the portal page. It serves for inner categorization.

Content Category

It provides an additional level of categorization for content items (articles, known errors). It stands for a more specific and narrow KB section in comparison to Content DB and may be called general section.

This element is not displayed on the portal page. It serves for inner categorization.

Content Item Class

It defines classes of content items and access to them. It may be referred to as a subsection, yet , it does not depend on any of the previous KB sections. That is, a content item class can contain items from any content DB and any content category.

This element defines what articles will be displayed to agents and users without roles. It also helps categorizing categorize KB items.

Content Item (article)

It works as a storage for such KB items as articles and known errors. 

Info

The Self-Service Portal (SSP) displays only articles. Known Errors and other content items are only available only through the agent interface.

This These elements contain data as it is they are in text form.

Knowledge Base Category (KB Category)

It sets hierarchical order of articles and categories, allows nesting articles and sorts them into something that can be called folders. There are no limitations for nesting levels.

This element defines the appearance of the Knowledge Base on the portal page.

 


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Anchor
KB on portal
KB on portal

In the screenshot above you can see a the Knowledge Base portal page. Let us clarify what has been done to To build it.Preparation stage includes , the following resultssteps have been done:

  1. A Content DB was has been created. We named it It is called Company Knowledge Base. Along with this knowledge base we you may need to build a separate KB for other needs.
  2. To categorize articles within our the knowledge base, three Content Categories were added:
    • General information
    • Process description
    • Change protocols and checklists.
  3. To restrict access to specific articles, twoContent Item Classes were used:
    • Processes protocol – internal specifications, custom class.
    • User Self-Study – external specifications, out-of-the-box SimpleOne class.
  4. To make structure the portal knowledge base page structure, the following KB categories were created:
    • Change Implementation
    • Process
    • Change Advisory Board (CAB).

Our The example knowledge base has the following structure:

  • Two articles without a KB category, i.e., they belong to the root folder of the KB:

    ArticleContent CategoryContent Item Class
    About IT services

    General information

    		User Self-Study (external)
    Company structureProcess descriptionUser Self-Study (external)


  • The Change Implementation is a KB category that may be referred to as the a first level folder. It has There are two articles:

    ArticleContent CategoryContent Item Class
    Conditions for changing servicesChange protocols and checklistsProcess protocol (internal)
    Change suggestion

    General information

    		User Self-Study (external)


  • The Process is a KB category that is a second level folder, child category to the Change Implementation KB category. It has There are two articles:

    ArticleContent CategoryContent Item Class
    Change implementation process (stages)Process descriptionProcess protocol (internal)
    Quality checklistChange protocols and checklistsProcess protocol (internal)


  • The Change Advisory Board protocol is a third level folder, child category to the Process KB category. It has There is one article:

    ArticleContent CategoryContent Item Class
    CAB protocolChange protocols and checklistsProcess protocol (internal)



Tip

Please note that Content Category is not equal to KB Category: one KB Category may contain articles with different Content Categories. Yet in some cases they can be closely connected to each other. This depends on the structure you build.

Content Item Class does not depend on is independent of Content Category nor or KB Category either.


User Roles

Knowledge base articles are displayed to all authorized  authorized users in case if the content item class is External.

Users with the following roles can access Internal articles:

  • admin
  • ITSM_agent (and its related roles such as problem_manager, incident_manager,etc.)
  • service_owner
  • service_catalog_manager
  • knowledge_admin
  • knowledge_agent

See the Role Structure article to learn more.

Content DB configuration
Anchor
create a content DB
create a content DB

Content databases are designed for storing to store knowledge base content items. It is the most general and wide section of the KB.

For example, you can establish the following storages:

To create a content DB, follow the steps below:

  1. Navigate to KB Dictionary → Content DB.
  2. Click New and fill in the fields.

  3. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply changes. 


Content Category configuration
Anchor
create a content category
create a content category

Content categories helps arranging help arrange items in the content DBs. They provide adding the addition of new groups of articles within one content DB.

Create a content category by following the steps below:

  1. Navigate to KB Dictionary → Content Categories.
  2. Click New and fill in the fields.

  3. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply the changes.


Content Item Class configuration
Anchor
create a content item class
create a content item class

Content item class defines the content item purpose (SLA, OLA, UC, Service Description, Known Error, etc.) and application area:

  • External – service external specifications are essential for a person with the end-user role.
  • Internal – service internal specifications are available to the agent (also may be called the service owner) responsible for the task handling.
Tip

A good Good practice is to configure content item class records in a developer instance. After the necessary configurations are applied, create a configuration pack to transfer the content item class to the main instance.

Create an item class by following the steps below:

  1. Navigate to KB Dictionary → Content Item Class.
  2. Click New and fill in the fields.

  3. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply the changes.


Tip
titleBefore starting your work with SimpleOne ITSM

Create the following Content Item Classes used for specifying to specify the External specifications:

  • SLA
  • Service Description
  • Request Description
  • User Self-Study.

Create the following Content Item Classes used for specifying to specify the Internal specifications:

  • Incident Model
  • Request Model
  • Contacts
  • Escalation Rules.


Info

Content Item Class versions are stored in the VCS Records (sys_vcs_record) table for keeping the access settings. You can implement changes to unrelated instances using the configuration packs.


Knowledge Base Category configuration
Anchor
create a KB category
create a KB category

Knowledge Base Categories define the a tree of articles on the portal. It is the The KB Category that divide divides sets of article articles from each other. Use categories to group articles.

To create a new KB Category, perform the following steps:

  1. Navigate to KB Dictionary → KB Categories.
  2. Click New and fill in the fields.
  3. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply changes.

Content Item configuration
Anchor
create a content item
create a content item

In SimpleOne, each service documentation has a set of a specifications which, in turn, are divided into external and internal ones. The Knowledge Base contains these service specifications as Content Items.

Info

Before creating the KB content items, make sure you have configured content DBs and content item classes.

Create an article

To create an article to be displayed on the SSP, perform the following steps:

  1. Navigate to Knowledge Base → All Articles.
  2. Click New and fill in the fields.
  3. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply changes.
Tip

Articles in the Draft and Retired states are not displayed on the knowledge base portal page. To display them, change the state to Published.


Create a Service Description

This is a service description, informative, and related to the company infrastructure.

To create a Service Description, follow the steps below:

  1. Navigate to Knowledge Base → All Articles.
  2. Click New to open the form.
  3. Fill in the form and specify the following fields:
    1. Content DB – select the Service Catalog option.
    2. Content Item Class – select the Service Description option.
  4. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply changes.

Create a Service SLA

This specification is for SLM-relevant parts related to this service (for example, indicators). It describes various aspects of service quality, like maximum requests handling time, and others.

  1. Navigate to Knowledge Base → All Articles.
  2. Click New to open the form.
  3. Fill in the form and specify the following fields:
    1. Content DB – select the Service Catalog option.
    2. Content Item Class – select the SLA, OLA, or UC option.
  4. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply changes.

You/

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