Spring 2010 - Week 16: Getting IT Done - ITIL

ITIL - Internet Technology Infrastructure Library



The Information Technology Infrastructure Library is a set of recommendations for managing IT. While it's focus is on IT services it also covers IT development and operations.

The Central Computer and Telecommunications Agency, a part of the UK Government, created ITIL back in the 1980s. (As such, ITIL and IT Infrastructure Library are trademarks of the UK's Office of Coporate Governance, formerly the CCTA.) Originally a set of 40 manuals the ITIL has been updated twice: once into a set of 8 manuals for version 2.0 and again in 2007 with a set of five core manuals for version 3.0.

Each manual focuses on a particular aspect of IT which is then broken down into multiple sections. For example:

The Service Desk

With the prevalence of technology at home and in the work place many people have had to ask for help from a help desk or service desk before. ITIL recommends that the service desk handle requests using only one point of contact (at my place of employment we call it "one neck to choke"), one point of entry, and one point of exit.

It's easy to see how doing so accomplishes the next ITIL of making things easier for the customer: They only need to contact one person or department to get help. Instead of being told to contact a different department or to send the request in a different manner the person in contact with the customer is the one who routes it to the correct department. ITIL also recommends keeping the customer updated on progress instead of simply waiting until there is a resolution to communicate again with the customer.

There are also recommendations for data integrity and streamlining communications. Data integrity is necessary for databases. It's easier to maintain information if it is always referenced in the same way. At best time is simply wasted in multiple searches to get all of the relevant data but at worst the database end up completely unusable. Streamlining communications is important internally, to get requests moved and managed as easily as possible, and externally, in further aid of making things easier for the consumer.

As ITIL has become more and more popular as a standard for managing IT, more people have gone into the business of ITIL itself.

Consulting Firms

There are multiple consulting companies offering their expertise on the ITIL. One of these companies is The Drapeau Group, LLC.

The tagline on TDG’s site is, “Achieve ITIL Maturity, Avoid Broken Promises”. They claim that they stand apart from other firms by having consultants who are both IT process experts and technically adept, using a different charging model where they do not bill 8 hours a day, and only selling advice not hardware or software. They also focus on what they consider to be the most important parts of the Service Support and Service Delivery parts of the ITIL rather than trying to apply all of it as is.

TDG offers the following services:

• ITIL Maturity Assesment
• Service Support Implementation
• Service Delivery Implementation
• ITIL Training
• ITIL workshops
• ITSM for SME Business
• ITIL Tools Review
• Metrics Assessment

There are client testimonials on the site as well, the most well known likely being CheckFree(now Fiserv). If you’ve ever received or paid a bill online through your bank chances are good you were using their services. (You can run a search on just the state at the site in the link to see all the financial institutions that use Fiserv.) TDG worked with CheckFree to investigate ITIL and non-ITIL processes and, when CheckFree decided to use ITIL Service Management processes, helped them through the multi-phased deployment.

Software

ITIL Foundations maintains lists of programs related to ITIL in four different categories. In "Help Desk and Support Desk Software Tools" they recommend ServiceDesk Plus. ServiceDesk Plus is used to manage IT service requests from start to finish:

1. An end user who has an IT problem creates a 'ticket' requesting help
   The ticket can be created multiple ways: e-mail, phone, API, web, even a Network Failure can create a ticket
   
   
2. SDP then applies business rules to the ticket
   Rules can be added to have certain events or alerts occur based on the type of incident, SLA, etc.
   
   
3. The SLA is verified
   The Service Level Agreement in this case refers to the amount of time for the incident to be resolved.
   
   
4. The due date is set
   
   
5. The ticket is then sent to the appropriate group
   
   
6. A technician within that group works on the problem specified in the ticket
   
   
7. The end user is notified of the solution of the problem
   SDP can be set up to give the end user notifications in the mean time.
   

Week 10: Insert Joke About Tubes Here

I was looking at my subscriptions in Google Reader and spotted this from Line25: 40 Amazing Female Role Models for Web Designers. I thought it was pretty cool so I'm sharing. Line25 also posts, among other things, 'Sites of the Week' if you just want to look at pretty designs.

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Network Neutrality

I'm sure by now most people have heard that the FCC is drafting rules on network neutrality. (What's up with all the links to Word docs? Not everyone owns a copy of Microsoft Word. PDFs people! Adobe Acrobat Reader is free!)

The list of what the current proposal would require of Internet Service Providers seems reasonable, to me anyway. As long as everything is legal an ISP can't prevent anyone from sending or receiving data, using services or applications, or connecting to other networks. Nor treat it said items in a discriminatory manner. They can't block anyone from the competition and they'd have to make some of the information regarding their network management public.

I know companies like to keep how they do things secret but that's what they get for having invisible bandwidth caps.

The current Wikipedia article on network neutrality is written as a debate instead of an encyclopedic article. Bad for Wikipedia and not exactly neutral either but still interesting reading. I looked at a couple of the web sites cited by the article and was struck by this:

That scenario [a bifurcated world in which the wealthy enjoy first-class Internet access, while everyone else is left with slow connections and degraded content], however, is a false paradigm. Such an all-or-nothing world doesn't exist today, nor will it exist in the future. Without additional regulation, service providers are likely to continue doing what they are doing. They will continue to offer a variety of broadband service plans at a variety of price points to suit every type of consumer.

This is laughable at best and at worst an incredible insult to the intelligence of anyone reading it. I'm supposed to believe that an ISP would never charge users more for accessing sites like Google and Hulu or degrade services like Skype that compete directly with their own offerings just because it hasn't happened yet? ISPs already want companies like Google to pay them to keep access to their site fast. Why should I believe that they won't also charge customers more for other people's content or that only the sites that can pay the most will be easy for me to get to?

I think the problem is that all the major ISPs are either cable or satellite providers or telecommunications companies. Comcast, Charter, AT&T, Verizon, etc. are all used to getting paid at both ends. Both parties have to pay for phone service to make or receive calls. The customer pays for cable or satellite TV and the networks pay money to have their channels carried by the providers.

OK, I've strayed away from 'something I've learned' to 'here's some opinions I already had'. But I did find out from the Wikipedia article that it isn't just ISPs who are against the legislation. While Tim Berners Lee supports network neutrality Robert Kahn does not. That surprised me. People like Bob Kahn believe that they should be able to develop and use technology that does treat different types of data differently and that it will be necessary to improving the Internet. There's a link to an article and a link to a video as sources for that. The article from the Register, unfortunately, doesn't say much about why network neutrality is bad just that it is.

Saying this will prove my professor right in having us do these blog posts, but why doesn't Robert Kahn have a blog?

If anyone knows of any sites with detailed arguments from Robert Kahn or any engineer about why net neutrality is bad feel free to put them in the comments.

5th Week of Class: Step 1: Tweet, Step 2: ..., Step 3: Profit!

I was skeptical of Twitter when I first heard about it. 140 characters is too short to be useful, right?

But then I stared reading stories about different entities using Twitter on Consumerist (over time, not specifically for this assignment). It sounded silly at first, but some of them had good ideas about how to use Twitter. Now I don't even blink when I hear that another group or business is using Twitter. In fact, even a few of my employer's clients use Twitter. Los Angeles Federal Credit Union has a Twitter feed (and a Facebook page and a YouTube account). So does Mobiloil Federal Credit Union.

Stories that changed my mind about Twitter

Boston Police Department: We Will Let You Know When The Zombies Come
OK, the headline is funny but the BPD Twitter feed has information that's not just useful, but the kind of information you'd actually want sent to your phone. Police departments using Twitter means that they can do what I've been saying the Amber Alerts should be doing which is to send people text messages when a child goes missing.

TweetCongress Lets You Succinctly Shout At Your Congresspeople Online
This is actually a collection of Twitter feeds by people in Congress. I imagine it's mostly interns updating it but it's still a way to know what they're doing. (I'd love to know how this turns out. Better have a moderator.)

Comcast's Twitter Reps Save The Day...
OK, so it would be better if their normal customer service representatives had been able to handle it but in general having an alternate way of contacting customer service is a good thing. If you don't want to wait on hold to report that your Internet connection is kaput you can send a tweet instead.

As the above examples show, organizations can use Twitter to alert their followers to recent news and changes as well as resolve issues. It's also a good promotional tool: Many congresspeople send tweets about when and where they'll be speaking to their constituency next. Businesses can tweet coupon codes, contests, and sales information. Non-profits can tweet their progress in fund-raising goals.