Revamping a Helpdesk application based on ITIL best practices

Company Bio

Based in Atlanta, Georgia, Frontline Managed Services– formerly Intelliteach – is a leading global provider of outsourced solutions to over 300 firms in the legal and accounting markets.

With more than 21 years of industry experience, Frontline Managed Services provides IT managed services such as help desk support, financial management services, and eLearning software with a focus on the specific needs of law firms.

The company is recognized as a leader in outsourced accounts receivable management.

Business Challenge

InApp’s goal was to maintain and add new features to the client’s helpdesk application based on ITIL best practices. The previous infrastructure was dependent on a single server. The variation in incoming loads posed a significant risk of suffering downtime and potential issues.

The challenges were to:

  • Upgrade the software to make it more effective
  • Integrate the application with a Professional Services Automation (PSA) software, which streamlined ticketing and certain helpdesk operations
  • Enhance particular modules within the application such as service catalog, incident and change
    management, and several UI changes.

Industries/Solutions

  • IT Managed Services
  • Financial Management
  • eLearning
  • Help Desk Support

Technologies Employed

  • .Net 4.5
  • C#
  • SQL Server 2008
  • JS

InApp’s Solution

The existing helpdesk tool was widely used by more than 300 law firms to manage their IT requirements. Using its expertise in IT service management, InApp developed the product by considering ITIL best practices to improve process workflows and to enable better collaboration between technicians and customers.

  • InApp rewrote the front-facing part of the architecture into a single-page application to avoid interruption between successive pages and to make it available as a web-based application. InApp used C# to develop the front end via an ASP.Net framework and utilized SQL server 2008 R2.
  • InApp hosted an email server with a dedicated script that resolved the email requirements of the helpdesk. For example, users’ replies to a ticket were recorded in the tool with attachments (screenshots and documents) if any.
  • InApp integrated the client’s helpdesk tool with a third party Professional Services Automation (PSA) software. The product integration allowed the client’s tool to exchange data with PSA software.
  • InApp resigned the application in the following three tiers:
  • A JavaScript client built using the Ext JS framework.
  • An ASP.NET API layer written in C#.
  • A set of T-SQL stored procedures that backs the API layer and handles data exchange.

In addition to rewriting the core application and enabling cross platform integration, InApp re-engineered the following modules:

  • Problem Management: InApp redesigned the Problem Management module with a provision to perform Root Cause Analysis (RCA) on high-priority issues. RCA aids in tracking and resolving recurring issues. This led to improved data analytics and file attachment features that tracked all issues and solutions provided.
  • Service Catalog: InApp enhanced the service catalog module of the application that contained release notes, training documents, and diagnostic reports. In addition to product owners and technicians, customers now could directly access the service catalog and use documents for self-servicing.
  • Change Management: InApp improved the entire workflow of change management necessary to track important changes in the organization. 
  • Maintenance and Support: InApp provided technical support and maintenance to the client’s helpdesk
    software. Each product enhancement and release were followed by a maintenance period where the
    application was monitored for any potential issues.

Business Benefit

Enriched application modules corresponding to the ITIL lifecycle helps to align IT services with business requirements.

Stable integration with a third party PSA software enables data collaboration and automation to manage the tickets logged

The load balancer deployed by InApp aids in sharing incoming user traffic to the different application servers and enables 24×7 application availability to the end customer.

An improved problem management module performs root cause analysis with options to attach evidence as a file/document.

"InApp is a true partner who has invested in our success, most notably with our strong collaboration from both a business and technical perspective."

– Frank Ziller, CIO

Frontline Managed Services, formerly Intelliteach