filling a job application in

[- English -]

Anyone know what a helpdesk application is and how i could word it to look like I have a clue.

Knowledge of Helpdesk applications, systems and processes

Thanks

 

[- English -]

oh and

Knowledge of Citrix Thin Computing and associated technologies

:d

 

[Zenith.UK]

A helpdesk application is just an application you use to log, record and track service calls. Another name for it is CRM - customer relationship manager/management.

How a call is received and then dealt with. If it is something easy to talk through over the phone, you might be expected to help the user yourself. If it is something beyond simple action or outside the scope of your scripted key system, you may need to escalate the call to 2nd line support. They are the more technical people that apply extra analysis to problems to try to resolve them. They also sometimes have remote desktop or VNC access to the user machines

That is a nutshell is a helpdesk application, a system and a process.

 

[Bahumat]

yep spot on Zenith. Some people call it a Call logging system.
If it's an employee you ask for their user id. From here you know their name, work location, work number, desk number etc.
You either fix the problem or escalate. If you escalate you have a work log section which you enter details of the issue such as "User's machine is no longer on the domain blah blah blah". It gets forwarded to the appropriate group including suitable headings.

For instance you select the Software - Microsoft Office - Error : if it's an issue with Microsoft Office. This way the specialists/2nd level etc know what the problem is without having to trawl through the comments/worklog

 

[- English -]

great thanks

any idea on


Knowledge of Citrix Thin Computing and associated technologies ?

much appreciated

 

[Roo Stercogburn]

Citrix: Don't blag it. In a starting position, awareness of what it is will be sufficient.

Citrix allows desktops and applications to be run on a server, with client workstations processing only keyboard and mouse input. All the work is done on the server. A company can have many thousands of users connected to systems remotely and it doesn't matter what people have on their PCs so long as they can get a connection to the server.

This is referred to as 'thin' client, because none of the processing is done on the PC where the user sits, its handled on the server. An application is installed on a server and all the processing is done on the server, with the users' PCs only processing mouse and keyboard input, and sending everything to the server where the work is done.

I know I'm kinda repeating what I said there but the repeated part is very important

General stuff: If you're applying for a service desk / helpdesk job and get an interview, one thing to bear in mind they probably will ask is how you go about finding out something you don't know as much of it is about problem solving. Knowing what you can and can't do and what should be escalated to the next level of support is part of the job.

Phone manner is important. Professional, detached and polite.

If you need any more detailed stuff answered, I'm happy to MSN or whatever to help out. I'm not without experience in this field.

 

[Bahumat]

oh yeah on citrix it load balances so when you connect, you go on server 1 of 5. Your information is on all these servers and they all update a bit like raid setups? the load balance refers to everyone not all ending up on 1 server and it going slow lol

 

[Roo Stercogburn]

Load balancing determines which server you use when you connect. It can be set to choose the balancing by memory load, cpu use etc and combinations thereof. Servers are generally organised into 'farms' and when maintainance needs to be done on one, it can be 'drain stopped' by disabling logons, which allows new user sessions to naturally be put onto other servers in the farm. Once the user-count drops to zero then maintainance work is typically done on the server before bringing it back online (as far as Citrix is concerned). One noob error is to remove all remote access... and then the administrators can't even get onto it without enabling remote access again

Not that I've ever doen this. Nuh uh. Nope.

I don't think this info is needed for broadbrush concept level but it sure is important hehe

 

[- English -]

Thanks alot roo, it really helped me in answering the questions. I may take you up on your knowledge if thats okay, but we will see if I get an interview. Just getting my brother to proof check my application tomorrow and ill be sending it off. Closing date is the 20th so theres 2 weeks or so left yet before i know if ive got an interview

 

[Roo Stercogburn]

Sweet. Good luck with the application mate.

Just poke me a PM if it becomes needed

 

[old.Tohtori]

I hate remote systems, especially those that base itself like that Roo.

It's all fine and dandy when things work, but put one connection problem into the dance and the whole company stops more or less working.

Last company i worked for; internet down -> no work done.

Stupid as that.

 

[Roo Stercogburn]

Aye, the more that users' work is centralised, the more need for hardware and software redundancy. I've worked in places that did it on the cheap and basically took chances with their ability to work in the event of problems.

We use connections from two separate ISPs with completely separate cabling, connections and routes into the wide world of intarwebs, backup generator, multiple UPS's (like wardrobe sized UPS's) and all farms with many many servers in them. Oh, and a Disaster Recovery site which live data is also backed up to and mirrors the main data center. If a server goes down unexpectedly a few users will suffer momentary interruption but not much (service agreement with customers is 99.7% uptime).

Lots of fun toys

 

[yaruar]

Aye, the more that users' work is centralised, the more need for hardware and software redundancy. I've worked in places that did it on the cheap and basically took chances with their ability to work in the event of problems.

We use connections from two separate ISPs with completely separate cabling, connections and routes into the wide world of intarwebs, backup generator, multiple UPS's (like wardrobe sized UPS's) and all farms with many many servers in them. Oh, and a Disaster Recovery site which live data is also backed up to and mirrors the main data center. If a server goes down unexpectedly a few users will suffer momentary interruption but not much (service agreement with customers is 99.7% uptime).

Lots of fun toys

We just keep it all in house which saves on connections, although we're not a Citrix user, but we are shifting more and more services to ESX and looking at various VDI solutions. I probably do about 15 percent of my work on my own desktop, everything else I just run multiple remote desktop sessions for