Get “Hooked” On A Wiki Becky Klein Matt Smith Dave Sierkowski

Valparaiso University o Co-ed, four year, private university o Independent Lutheran affiliation o Nearly 4,000 students from most states and 40 countries (includes graduate programs and Law School) o More than 70 programs in five colleges: Arts & Sciences, Business Administration, Engineering, Nursing, Christ College (the honors college)

Top 5 Reasons You Are Here 5) Curious what a wiki is 4) Knowledge base solutions are integral for IT support staff 3) Interested in best practices for addressing knowledge base needs 2) Interested in how a wiki has addressed knowledge base needs 1) Already know that wikis are cool!

Knowledge Bases o IT Help Desk staff on the front lines of support are expected to be an expert on everything. o Help Desks need to be able to quickly access information and relay this knowledge to the customer.

Possible Solutions Pre packaged Knowledge Bases Pro: Low time investment / Support through vendor Con: Cost issues / Limited customizability Add on Modules Pro: Designed for software packages already in use Con: Cost issues / Limited customizability Home Grown Solutions Pro: Highly customizable Con: No external support and higher level of staff labor to setup and support Open Source Solutions Pro: Free or low cost / Customizable Con: Possible scalability issues / Support issues

Why Were We Shopping? o Overhauled tracking system o Received requests for user-friendly and remotely accessible knowledge base solution o Moving toward ITIL ® implementation

HEAT ® First Level Support

Locating Information o Tree-based structure allowed for grouping; we chose call classification. o Customizable entry allowed for synchronization with knowledge base. o Nodes were identified as new, updated, or approved for use. Information could be somewhat guaranteed through this process.

Search Feature

What Is A Wiki? A wiki is a medium which can be edited by anyone with access to it, and provides an easy method for linking from one page to another. Wikis are typically collaborative websites, though there are now also single-user offline implementations.

Why We Salute The Wiki o System Management o Ease of Use o Information Management

Why MediaWiki™? o Familiarity o Based on currently utilized technologies – Apache Web Server – PHP language – MySQL Database o Scalability o Cost (It’s FREE!!!!!)

How We Transitioned o FLS information review and transfer – Over 50% of the information found was out of date. o Integration of LDAP authentication o Granted access to all IT staff o Ongoing information entry / modification

Typical Page Users can choose from various skins to personalize their wiki viewing experience. The general layout of each is the same and contains a sidebar, main page information, and tabbed page options.

Help Desk Wiki Side Bar is on all pagesContains o Updates or Service Outages o Primary Content Areas o Main Navigation o Search Field

Help Desk Wiki Search organizes results to help you determine the best match

Help Desk Wiki notification of page updates Individual viewing and editing options

Help Desk Wiki Watchlist refines recent changes by user choice

Help Desk Wiki All content changes are recorded

Lessons Learned o Call Type vs. Assignment Group Navigation o Listen to Younger Generation Staff o Simpler Is Better o If Given the Opportunity, People Will Provide Content

Questions?