Overview

The Whiteboard is a messaging system presented as a ticker--messages that scroll across the bottom of the site header. Messages may be scheduled for a certain date and time with an optional termination date. The message may be displayed for all users including End Users (Public) or just Analysts (Private). It can be further restricted to specific Analyst Groups, Sites and Departments. Analysts who have been given permission to compose Whiteboard messages can do so from Main Menu > Home.

The Whiteboard is a very effective way to communicate important information about the current status of services and outages and also to provide details of upcoming scheduled maintenance and other activities. Effective communication can help to reduce unnecessary Requests being logged in the system.

Settings

Once a Whiteboard message has been saved, the page must be refreshed in the web browser before the message becomes visible.

Start & End

For a Whiteboard message to display properly, you must specify a Start and End date. All other settings are optional and control the visibility of the Whiteboard message.

Message

The text to appear as a scrolling Whiteboard message. Note that standard URLs can be entered, e.g.:

   Go to <a href="www.company.com/resources/forms" style="color:white" target="_blank">Company Form Resources</a> for manual forms for Process XYZ.

If you don't change the banner background from the default dark green, you will have trouble seeing a blue link on it, so it is also suggested that you include an alternate text color using the string style="color:white".

Note that it's important to include the target="_blank" string so that clicking a URL does not try to open it in the Layton ServiceDesk window.

Analyst Author

The Analyst who created the message. This field is automatically populated with the logged-in Analyst. This is the only Analyst who will have access to modify or delete the message once it has been created.

Display To

The type of user, Analyst or End Users and Analysts, who will be able to see the message. This defaults to Analyst, which means that the message is only visible to Analysts. If the message is intended for End Users, Display To should be set to End Users and Analysts.

Analyst Group

An Analyst Group can be selected to restrict visibility to that group.

Site

An Site can be selected to restrict visibility to that Site.

Department

An Department can be selected to restrict visibility to that Department.

Text Color

This setting is in Administration > Form Design > Banner.

Creating a New Whiteboard message

Go to Home > Whiteboard:
Click the Add button .
Fill out the New Whiteboard Message dialog:
Click the Save button .
Press F5 to refresh the whole page, not just the lower frame, to see the message.