Viewing Tickets

In Skylar One you can view, create, and edit tickets, among other features. You can perform these tasks in the Ticket Console page. In the Ticket Console page you can view a list of open tickets and ticket information such as Queue and Severity, create a new ticket, view a ticket's properties, and edit a ticket.

The Ticket Console Page

The Ticket Console page (Tickets page) contains a list of open tickets. From the Ticket Console page you can view a list of open tickets, create new tickets, edit one or more existing tickets, filter, search, and sort the list of tickets, and generate reports for one or more tickets.

By default, the Ticket Console page displays a list of open tickets that you are allowed to view. The bottom of the page displays a legend that lists the number of tickets of each severity. You can click on one of the severities in the Severity Legend at the bottom of the Ticket Console page to filter the currently displayed list to include only tickets of the selected severity.

The Ticket Console page contains a number of fields that display information about each ticket. The fields that are displayed in the Ticket Console page are defined in your user preferences. The Ticket Console page can display the following fields:

To sort the list, click on a column heading. The list will be sorted by the column value, in ascending order. To sort the list in descending order, click the column heading again. You can also filter the items on this inventory page by typing filter text or selecting filter options in one or more of the filters found above the columns on the page. For more information, see Filtering the Items on a Classic Page in the Introduction to Skylar One manual.

Organization. Organization to which the ticket is assigned. This organization might or might not be associated with the ticket's queue.
Description. Description of the problem or request. This field is color coded based on the ticket's severity.
Severity. Severity of the ticket. Possible choices are:

Sev 0/Healthy. Ticket is not urgent.
Sev 1/Notice. Ticket requires attention but is not problem-related.
Sev 2/Minor. Ticket needs to be investigated before the issue becomes more severe.
Sev 3/Major. Ticket requires immediate investigation.
Sev 4/Critical. Ticket requires immediate attention.

Queue. Ticket Queue to which the ticket is assigned.
TID. Unique ID assigned to the ticket. Skylar One automatically generates this.
State. Displays the ticket state (if assigned) associated with the ticket. Ticket state is a custom-defined ticket parameter. The definition of a ticket state includes logic that you can use to control workflow.
Ticket Age. Days, hours, and minutes that have elapsed since the ticket was created.
Element Name. Element to which the ticket is assigned.
Element Name. Name of entity (frequently a device) associated with this ticket. Clicking on an elements icon leads to the properties page for that element.
Element Type. Description of the entity. The choices are:

Organization.
Device.
Device Group.
Asset record.
IP Network.
Interface.
Vendor.
User Account.
Virtual Interface.

Status. Status of the ticket. The choices are:

Open. Ticket has been created.
Working. Someone is working on the ticket.
Pending. The ticket has been acknowledged, and ticket is awaiting the next action.
Resolved. Issue has been resolved.

Parent TID. The ID number of the ticket's parent ticket. If the ticket does not have a parent ticket, the column will show a value of "--".
Category. Descriptive category assigned to the ticket. Administrators can use the Select Objects Editor page (System > Customize > Select Objects) to customize the list of possible categories in this field. Clicking on a category name filters the list of tickets by category.
Assigned To. User the ticket is assigned to.
Source. Original source for the ticket. The list of possible sources can be customized by a system administrator in the Select Objects Editor page (System > Customize > Select Objects). Default choices are:

Automated. Ticket was created automatically when an event occurred. An administrator has configured Skylar One to behave this way.
Email. An email about an issue prompted this ticket.
External. An external source created this ticket.
Internal. Ticket created in Skylar One.
Phone. A phone call about an issue prompted this ticket.

Created By. User who created the ticket.
Create Date. Date and time when the ticket was created.
Modified By. The user who last modified the ticket.
Modified Date. The date the ticket was last modified.
Resolved By. Username of the user who resolved the ticket.
Resolved Date. For tickets with a status of "Resolved", the date the ticket was resolved. To learn how to view resolved tickets, see Resolving Tickets.
Chargeback. The amount of work that has been billed to a ticket, in minutes.
Escalation. Specifies the number of times a ticket has been escalated. This field cannot be edited. Clicking on an escalation value leads to the Logs tab in the Ticket Editor page for the selected ticket. Choices are:

0. Ticket has not been escalated.
1. Ticket has been escalated once.
2. Ticket has been escalated twice.
3. Ticket has been escalated three times.

Custom fields. The Ticket Console page can also display custom fields defined in the embedded custom form for the ticketing application. Custom fields are defined in the Application Forms (System > Customize > Form Fields) page.

NOTE: To filter the list of tickets in the Ticket Console page, use the "search as you type" function in any column heading in the Ticket Console page. You can further filter tickets by selecting a specific queue in the Show All Queues drop-down list in the upper right of the page, or by using the Advanced Filter tool (). To learn how to use the Advanced Filter tool, see the section Using the Advanced Filter Tool.

Customizing the Display of the Ticket Console

You can customize the display of the Ticket Console by hiding the header bar. To hide the header bar, click on the arrow in the top right of the Ticket Console (above the [Guide] button).

Users can also customize the appearance of the Ticket Console page from two places:

The Account Preferences page (Preferences > Account > Preferences). In this page you can define the appearance and behavior of the Ticket Console page and the Event Console page.
The Ticket Console Preferences page. In this page, you can customize the display and behavior of the Ticket Console page. You can access this page by going to the Ticket Console page, clicking the [Actions] menu and then selecting Console Preferences. In the Ticket Console Preferences page, you can customize the following:

Page Refresh Rate. Specifies how often the Ticket Console page in Skylar One will be refreshed. The possible choices are between 15 seconds and 1 hour.

Console Height. Specifies the vertical height of the Ticket Console page. A larger height allows more tickets to be displayed on a single page, but may require vertical scrolling. The choices are 400 pixels–2400 pixels.

Table Row Height. Affects the row height of all pages that display a table in the main content pane, including the Ticket Console page. You can also change this setting in the Event Console Preferences page (Events > Actions > Console Preferences), the Account Preferences page (Registry > Accounts > User Accounts > wrench a user account > Preferences), and the system Account Preferences page (Preferences > Account > Preferences). Changing the setting for row height in any of those pages affects the row height in all pages that display a table in the main content pane. Choices are:

Small. Sets row height to 17 px and font size to 11 px.

Medium. Sets row height to 27 px and font size to 12 px.
Large. Sets row height to 35 px and font size to 13 px.

Page Result Count. Specifies the number of results to be displayed on each page. The choices in this field are limited based on the Console Height setting, and range from 25–500.
View Assigned Tickets Only. If you select this checkbox, by default, only tickets assigned to you are displayed in the Ticket Console page.

Show Severity Badges. If you select this checkbox:

The value in the Severity column will be displayed as a color-coded badge in the Event Console page and the Ticket Console page.

The value in the Current State column will be displayed as a color-coded badge in the Device Manager page.

If you do not select the Show Severity Badges checkbox:

In the Event Console page, the value in the Event Message column and the value in the Severity column will be painted with the severity color.

In the Ticket Console page, the value in the Description column and the Severity column will be painted with the severity color.
In the Device Manager page, the value in the Device Name column and the value in the Current State column will be painted with the severity color.

Ticket Console Columns. In this list, you can select the default columns to be displayed in the Ticket Console page.

NOTE: When you edit the list of columns in the Ticket Console Columns field, the selected list of columns in the Account Preferences page is automatically updated. When you edit the list of columns in the Account Preferences page, the selected list of columns in this page is updated.

Using the Advanced Filter Tool

In the Ticket Console page, you can specify one or more parameters to filter the display of tickets. Only tickets that meet all the filter criteria will be displayed.

The Advanced Filter Tool allows you to make selections instead of manually typing in a string to filter on.

The Advanced Filter Tool also allows you to pre-filter the list of tickets and then continue filtering again if necessary.

To select multiple entries in the Advanced Filter Tool, hold down the <Ctrl> key and left-click the entries.

After selecting a filter, you can reduce the number of options displayed in the other filters by clicking the [Prefilter] button for the filter. When [Prefilter] is clicked, Skylar One calculates how many tickets would be displayed if the chosen filters are applied. The options displayed for the other filters are reduced to those that apply to the potential list of displayed tickets. For example, suppose that five organizations are defined in Skylar One. Suppose that all the tickets with a severity of "Critical" are associated with either the "System" or "East Coast NOC" organizations. Initially, all five organizations will be displayed in the Organizations filter. If you select "Critical" in the Severity filter, then click the [Prefilter] button, the Organizations filter would display only the organizations "System" and "East Coast NOC".
After selecting all filters, click the [Apply] button to apply the filters to the list of tickets.
To reset each field to empty and apply no filters, click the [Reset] button.

NOTE: For user-level users, the Advanced Filter Tool allows you to view and select only organizations of which you are a member and elements which you are allowed to view (based on your organization membership and Access Keys)

To access the Advanced Filter Tool:

Go to the Ticket Console page.
Click on the funnel icon ().
The Advanced Filter Tool will display advanced filters for each column in your default display.

In the Advanced Filter Tool, filter by one or more of the available columns.
Click Prefilter or Apply.

You can perform an advanced filter and then perform a second advanced filter on the results of the first advanced filter. You can perform an advanced filter multiple times, to perform multiple filters.

Saving a Custom View

You can save a filtered list of tickets created with either the filter-while-you-type tool, the Search on Extra Fields tool, and/or the advanced filter tool. When you do so, you are creating a custom view. You can then return to the page at any time and display the custom view, without having to filter the list again.

To save a custom view:

Go to the Ticket Console page.
Using the filter-while-you-type tool, the Search on Extra Fields tool, and/or the advanced filter tool, filter the list of tickets.
In the Custom View drop-down list, select new custom view.
Click the [Save] button.
You will be prompted to enter a name for the new custom view.
The new custom view now appears in the Custom View drop-down list.
To display the custom view, select it from the Custom View drop-down list.
To delete the custom view, select it from the Custom View drop-down list and then click the [Delete] button. The custom view will no longer appear in the Custom View drop-down list.

Select Action Drop-Down Lists

The drop-down list in the lower right of the Ticket Console page allow you to apply actions to all selected tickets (to select a ticket, click on its row in the Ticket Console). The drop-down lists allow you to:

Update the edit date of each selected ticket
Take ownership of each selected ticket
Print a report about the selected tickets
Resolve the selected tickets
Change the state, queue, assigned user, severity, status, source, or category of each selected ticket.

Viewing Tickets for a Single Device

You can view a list of all open, pending, or working tickets associated with a single device from the Ticket History page. You can also access the Ticket Editor page for the ticket directly from this page if you require more detail about the ticket. To view tickets for a single device:

Go to the Device Manager page (Devices > Classic Devices, or Registry > Devices > Device Manager in the classic user interface).
In the Device Manager page, find the device for which you want to view tickets. Click its wrench icon ().
Click the Tickets tab to display the Ticket History page. The Ticket History page displays a list of tickets and information for the device.
In the Ticket History page, find the ticket you are interested in. Click its Information icon ().

The Ticket Summary modal page for that ticket is displayed.

You can also access the Ticket Editor modal page from the Ticket History page. To access the Ticket Editor page:

Go to the Device Manager page (Devices > Classic Devices, or Registry > Devices > Device Manager in the classic user interface).
In the Device Manager page, find the device for which you want to view tickets. Click its wrench icon ().
Click the Tickets tab.
In the Ticket History page, find the ticket you are interested in. Click its life ring icon ().

The Ticket Editor page for that ticket is displayed. From the Ticket Editor page, you can also access the tabs for all the other pages in the Ticket Panel.

To learn more about the Ticket Editor page, see the section on Viewing Ticket Details.

Viewing My Tickets

From the Ticket Console page you can view a list only of tickets that are assigned to you, as opposed to the entire list of tickets in Skylar One. This is helpful if you are required to do work on tickets, and want to see only tickets necessary for you to complete your work.

To filter the list of tickets in the Ticket Console page and display only those tickets that are assigned to you:

Go to the Ticket Console page (Tickets tab).
Click the Actions menu in the top right of the page and select My Tickets.
The Ticket Console page will now only display tickets that are assigned to you.

Viewing Ticket Details

Along with the information displayed in theTicket Console page, you can view additional information on a ticket. The Ticket Properties, Logs, Automation, and Message tabs, in the Ticketing panel is a group of tabs that allows you to view and edit further information on an individual ticket. The following section will provide details on each tab.

Viewing the Ticket Editor Page

Viewing the Read-Only Information

The Ticket Editor page can display the following read-only information:

Description. Description of the problem or request.
Organization. Organization to which the entity is assigned. This organization might or might not be associated with the ticket's queue. Clicking on the icon displays the Organizational Summary page for the organization.
Element. Element associated with this ticket. Can be an organization, device, asset record, IP network, interface, vendor, or user account. Clicking on the icon displays details about the element. To edit the element, click the magnifying glass icon (). The Element Alignment page appears, where you can search for another element.
Parent Ticket. If applicable, the ticket that has a parent relationship with the current ticket. Clicking on the icon displays read only details about the parent ticket.
Aligned Tickets. If applicable, the ticket(s) that has a child relationship with the current ticket. Clicking on the icon displays a list of child tickets. From this list, you can view the Ticket Editor page for each child ticket.
Aligned Event. If applicable, the event that is associated with the ticket. Clicking on the icon displays read-only details about the event.
Ticket Age. For tickets that are not yet resolved, displays the years, months, days, hours, and minutes that have elapsed since the ticket was created.
Time To Resolve. For resolved tickets, displays the number of years, months, days, and hours until the ticket was resolved.
Resolved On/By. For resolved tickets, displays the date and time the ticket was resolved and the user who resolved the ticket.
Created On/By. Date and time ticket was created and the user who created the ticket.
Modified Age. For tickets that are not yet resolved, displays the number of years, months, days, hours, minutes, and seconds since the ticket was last modified.
Modified On/By. Date and time ticket was last modified and the user who modified the ticket.

Viewing Ticket Properties

The Ticket Properties are listed below the Ticket Editor. The Ticket Properties pane displays the Ticket Description, Sub-Organization, Ticket State, Status, Severity, Category, Source, Queue, and Assigned User. It also displays any embedded fields you include.

Viewing Notes & Attachments

The Notes & Attachments pane displays notes about the ticket. The notes were created in the Ticket Editor page or with the Notepad Editor modal page. By default, the entries are listed from latest to earliest. You can toggle the Ascending and Descending buttons to change the order in which the notes appear.

To expand the Notes & Attachments pane to fill the entire Ticket Editor page, click the Maximize button. To reduce the Notes & Attachments pane back to its original size, click the Restore button.

Each entry includes the username, date and time, and text of the comment.

The user who created the note can also cloak it. Based on the Access Hook that defines cloaking, a cloaked note can be viewed only by: The user who created the note; all users of type "administrator"; or users in the same organization as the user who created the note, who have Access Hooks that allow them to view the ticket where the cloaked note resides and also have the Access Hook "Ticket:Notes:Cloaked."

Depending on the Access Keys associated with your user account, you can perform the following on each note entry:

To view a note's attachment, click the paperclip icon ().
To edit the content of a note, click the wrench icon (). The Notepad Editor modal page appears. You can update the note, format the text, insert content from a saved template, and add an attachment, image, or video to the note. Click the Save button to save your changes.
To delete a note, click its delete icon ().

The Ticket Logs Page

The Ticket Logs page displays the history of a selected ticket. Each change made to the ticket, from its creation to the current time, appears in a table in this page. The table lists these changes chronologically, with the oldest first. To view the Ticket Logs page:

Go to the Ticket Console page (Tickets tab)
Find the ticket for which you want its history. Click its wrench icon ().
In the Ticket Editor page, click the Logs tab. The Ticket Logs page appears.
The Ticket Logs page displays the following information for each action performed on the ticket:

Date/Time. Date and time the action was performed.
Type. Type of action performed. Note that when a ticket is updated with a Run Book Automation policy, Skylar One will create a log entry of type "Automation" to specify that the actions were performed by a Run Book Automation policy.
Message. Description of the action performed.
Modified By. User who performed the action.
Age. Ticket age when the action was performed.
Severity. Severity of the ticket at the time the action was performed.
Status. Status of the ticket at the time the action was performed.
Queue. Ticket queue assigned to the ticket at the time the action was performed.
Assigned. User to whom the ticket was assigned at the time the action was performed.

The Event Actions Log Page

The Event Actions Log page displays information about the automated actions that were performed for the event associated with a ticket. To view the Event Actions Log page:

Go to the Ticket Console page (Tickets tab).
Find the ticket for where you want to view its automation policy.
Click its wrench icon ().
From the Ticket Editorpage, click the Automation tab. The Event Actions Log page appears.

Viewing the Automation Logs

The [Automation] tab in the Ticket Editor page displays a history of all automation actions that Skylar One executed in response to the event associated with the ticket.

Each entry in the Event Actions Log page includes:

The date and time when the action was executed.
The automation policy that triggered the action.
The name of the action policy.
The result of the action.

To learn more about automation policies, see the section on Run Book Automation.

The Send Message Tab

The Send Message page allows you to manually create email messages about a selected ticket. You can communicate about events and tickets with the appropriate team members without leaving Skylar One. At any time, you can manually send an email message about a selected ticket from the Message tab.

In addition, Skylar One can automatically generate and send email messages when:

A ticket is created. By default, email is sent to the ticket creator and ticket assignee.
A ticket is assigned to a user. By default, email is sent to the ticket creator and ticket assignee.
A ticket's status changes. By default, email is sent to the ticket creator and ticket assignee.
You can also define one or more users (in addition to the ticket's creator or assignee) who will be considered watchers for a ticket. When the ticket is created, assigned, or changes status, Skylar One will automatically send email notifications to the list of watchers.

NOTE: If in the Behavior Settings page (System > Settings > Behavior, the field Automatic Ticketing Emails is set to Disabled, all assignees and watchers will not receive automatic email notifications about any tickets. By default, the tield is set to Enabled.

NOTE: To learn more about ticket watchers, including assigning a watcher to a ticket and alerting a watcher of a ticket, see Ticket Emails and Watchers.

To send an email about a selected ticket:

Go to the Ticket Console page (Tickets tab).
Find the ticket for which you want to send an email. Click its wrench icon ().
In the Ticket Editor page, click the Message tab. The Send Message page appears.

Creating a Message

From the Message tab you can manually create and send an email message about a ticket. To create an email, supply values in each of the following fields:

TO. Enter the email addresses of the people you want to notify about the ticket. By default, this field automatically includes the email address of each watcher for this ticket. You can delete one or more of these email addresses. You can also manually enter other email addresses, separated by commas, in this field.
CC. Enter the email addresses of the people you want to receive a copy of the email message. If you enter a list of email addresses, separate them with commas.
BCC. Enter the email addresses of the people you want to receive a blind copy of the email message. If you enter a list of email addresses, separate them with commas.
Subject. This field will be populated automatically with the severity and a description of the selected ticket or event. You can delete this text and manually enter a subject.
Sender's Address. Allows you to specify the "From" address that will appear in the email. You can use the Ticket Queue Properties modal page (Registry > Ticketing > Queues > Edit/Create) to define the default value that appears in this field. You can specify that the field will contain either the queue email address or the email address of the last user to edit the ticket. You can also manually enter an email address in this field.

NOTE: By default, the Sender's Address field includes the email. If no such email address is defined for the ticket's queue, by default the Sender's Address field will contain the email address of the current user.

Message Format. Skylar One formats the email for specific displays. Choices include:

HTML Formatted. Skylar One includes relevant information about the ticket, as a formatted table. Skylar One also includes more details, including ticket history, with this method. This is the default method.
Text Formatted. Skylar One includes relevant information about the ticket, as unformatted text.
Pager Formatted. Skylar One includes a condensed set of ticket information, formatted for a pager.

Message Priority. Specifies flags to add to message. Some, but not all, mail clients will display a flag for high-priority messages. You can select from the following:

Normal Priority. Message is marked with normal priority.
Urgent Priority. Message is marked with urgent priority.
Low Priority. Message is marked with low priority.

Show Ticket Logs. If you select this checkbox, the complete Ticket Log is included with the email.
Show Cloaked Notes. If you select this checkbox, the email will include cloaked comments from the Notes & Attachments section of the ticket. By default, cloaked comments are not included in email messages about the ticket.

NOTE: The Show Cloaked Notes checkbox appears only for users who have been granted the Access Hook "Ticket:Notes:Cloaked".

Add to Ticket Notes. If you select this checkbox, the entire text of the email is added to the Notes & Attachments section of the ticket.
Message. By default, Skylar One includes all of the information about the ticket from the Ticket Editor page, plus all information from the Ticket Logs page. Skylar One also includes a link to the ticket. However, you can delete this text and enter your own. You can also include a document template, image, or video in this field.

To send the email, click the Send button.

Organizational Tickets

The Organizational Tickets page displays all open, pending, working, or resolved tickets associated with the organization. The Organizational Tickets page displays only critical information about each ticket. If you require more detail, you can access the Ticket Editor page for the ticket, directly from this page.

To get to the Organizational Tickets page:

Go to Registry > Accounts > Organizations.
Click the wrench icon () next to the organization for which you wish to view tickets.
Click the [Tickets] tab.

Viewing the List of Tickets

The Organizational Tickets page displays a list of all tickets of all statuses that are associated with the organization.

Tickets with a Status of Open, Pending, or Working appear in a pane at the top of the page. Tickets with a Status of Resolved appear in a separate pane at the bottom of the page.

For each of these tickets, the Organizational Tickets page displays the following:

Description. Description of the problem or request.
Severity. Severity of the ticket. This is represented by the background color of the description field. Choices are:

Critical. Critical tickets are those that require immediate attention.
Major. Major tickets are those that require immediate investigation.
Minor. Minor tickets are those that need to be investigated before problems become severe.
Notice. Notice tickets are those that require attention but are not problem-related.
Healthy. Healthy tickets are those that are not urgent.

TID. Unique ID assigned to the ticket. This ID is generated by Skylar One.
Queue. Ticket Queue to which the ticket is assigned.

Status. Status of the ticket. The choices are:

Open. Ticket has been created.
Pending. Ticket has been acknowledged.
Working. Someone is working on the ticket.
Resolved. The ticket has been resolved and closed.

Ticket Category. Descriptive category assigned to the ticket. The list of possible categories is customized by the system administrator in the Select Objects Editor page (System > Customize > Select Objects).
Ticket Source. Original source for the ticket. Choices are:

Automated. Ticket was created automatically when an event occurred. An administrator has configured Skylar One to behave this way.
Email. An email about an issue prompted this ticket.
External. An external source created this ticket.
Internal. Ticket created in Skylar One.
Phone. A phone call about an issue prompted this ticket.

Viewing the Ticket Summary Page

From the Organizational Tickets page, you can access the Ticket Summary modal page for each ticket. To access the Ticket Summary page for a ticket:

In the Organizational Tickets page, find the ticket you are interested in. Click its information icon ().
The Ticket Summary modal page for that ticket appears.

Accessing the Ticket Editor page for a Ticket

From the Organizational Tickets page, you can access the Ticket Editor page and all the tools in the ticket panel. To access the Ticket Editor page and all the tools in the ticket panel for a single ticket:

In the Organizational Tickets page, find the ticket you are interested in. Click its life-ring icon ().
The Ticket Editor page for that ticket appears. From the Ticket Editor page, you can also access the tabs for all the other pages in the Ticket Panel.

NOTE: For more information on viewing an organization's Critical Contact List, Product Usage List, or Organizational Sub-Locations, see the section on Organizations and Users.