So… you set up the Falcon IT Services Trouble Ticket Template for SharePoint 2013 and your helpdesk is working efficiently with this tool. The Trouble ticket system alerts you and your technicians any time that a ticket’s status is changed, but you wish that you could send automatic updates to notify end users that their trouble tickets have been opened, changed or completed.
This is relatively easy to do using a SharePoint 2013 workflow. In the example below, we will add a field to the trouble ticket template so that end users can enter their contact e-mail address and then, we will create two notifications: one that sends the end user an alert confirming that he/she has opened a trouble ticket and another that sends an alert once the trouble ticket has been closed.
Pre-requisites:
- You must have a SharePoint 2013 Server properly configured.
- You must have the Falcon IT Services Trouble Ticket Template installed and working on the SharePoint 2013 Server.
- The SharePoint server must be configured to send out e-mail alerts.
- We must have SharePoint 2013 workflow manager installed and configured on the SharePoint 2013 server.
- You must download and install SharePoint Designer 2013 on a desktop PC.
Adding an End User E-Mail Field to the Trouble Ticket Template
Open the trouble tickets list and navigate to the list settings.
Click on create column to add a new column to the list.
Give the column a friendly name, select single line of text and enter a description as shown below.
When finished, select column ordering and place the new column in position # 4, right below the contact name.
Creating a Workflow for New Trouble Ticket Confirmation
To send an initial confirmation message to anonymous users who have entered a trouble ticket, you have to set up an app store and grant the workflow elevated privileges. This is a bit convoluted and you may want to skip this process entirely. You can go directly to the second workflow creation which will guide you on how to set up a workflow that alerts the end user once the trouble ticket has been closed.
Since the trouble tickets are managed and closed by authenticated users, you do not have to go through configuration h311 to create a simple workflow.
If you have an acumen and time, then to begin creating an anonymous workflow, open SharePoint Designer 2013 and locate your list (if it does not appear in lists and libraries, check the sub sites).
Click on the Trouble Ticket list and then on the list workflow button.
When the create list workflow window appears, give your list a friendly name and description, select SharePoint 2013 platform type and then click OK.
In the step 1 dialog box, double click on the text, then on the magnifying glass. Select send an e-mail from the drop down menu.
Now click on these users to open the e-mail message dialog box. Click on the phonebook icon next to the to: field to open the select users dialog box. Highlight workflow lookup for a user…
Click on the add button to display the lookup dialog box. From there, click on the from source drop down menu and select the alert contact e-mail field that we created earlier.
Click OK twice to come back to the define e-mail message dialog box. If you want to cc: any SharePoint members click on the phonebook icon next to the cc: field and select the users from the list.
Enter the subject in the subject line and begin creating the e-mail body text. When you want to insert dynamic data into the e-mail body, simply position the cursor and click on the add/change lookup button.
This will display a lookup string dialog box where you can choose the field from the field source.
When you click OK, you will notice that the text [%currentItem:FieldName%] has been placed where the cursor was located. The workflow will capture the data from this field and insert in into the e-mail message body.
Finish typing your message body and click OK.
When you have finished, end the workflow and click save on the SharePoint Designer ribbon.
Next, click on workflows from the navigation menu and then click on the newly created workflow.
Since this workflow will only serve as an alert for new trouble tickets, place a checkmark by start workflow automatically when an item is created in the start options.
to finish, click save and then publish from the SharePoint Designer ribbon menu.
Before the workflow can begin to send e-mails we must allow the application to used elevated privileges. This is the fun part I mentioned.
First, we must set up an app catalog, then follow these instructions to grant the app elevated privileges. Once you have given the application elevated privileges, it’s time to test the workflow. Create a new trouble ticket, check your inbox and oh, seriously?
Creating a Workflow to Notify Users That Their Trouble Ticket Has Been Completed
This workflow will be much simpler than the first. It will notify the end user that their trouble ticket has been completed. Since only authenticated users are allowed to modify trouble tickets, we do not have to configure application workflow elevation.
Open SharePoint designer 2013, locate the Trouble Tickets list and double click on it.
Click on the list workflow icon to create a new workflow.
Give your workflow a friendly name and description and make sure that you select SharePoint 2010 as the platform workflow type.
Double click on the step 1 text and then on the magnifying glass. Select if current field equals value.
Click on the field link and select disposition from the drop down menu. The click on the value link and select closed.
Double click on the text below and then on the magnifying glass again. From the drop down menu, select send e-mail. Click on these users and then click on the phonebook icon next to the to: field. From the select users dialog box, choose workflow users and click the add button. In the lookup dialog box, click on field from source and select the alert contact e-mail field that we created earlier.
If you want to cc: anybody, click on the phonebook icon next to cc: and select the users from list. Enter a subject line and begin writing the message body. Whenever you want to insert data from the trouble ticket database fields, simply position the cursor where you want the data and click on the add or change lookup button.
When the lookup string dialog box appears, select the appropriate field.
When finished, click OK.
When finished, click on workflows in the navigation menu and double click on the workflow.
In the start options, place a checkmark on start workflow automatically when an item is changed.
Click the save and publish icons on the SharePoint Designer 2013 ribbon menu.
Log in to the trouble tickets admin site and create a test trouble ticket, then change the disposition to closed to test the workflow.