Servigistics InService Administration > Service Groups
  
Service Groups
The Service Groups utility allows Servigistics InService administrators to create and manage service groups, including defining the license configuration, and revoking licenses. A service group is a defined business entity within Servigistics InService used for pricing and availability information, shopping carts and orders, and also for managing offline systems.
When a user logs in to Servigistics InService, if they are affiliated with multiple service groups, they must select one service group to bind to for that session.
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Administrators of individual service groups can access the Licensing Configuration tab of the Service Groups utility for their service group. This allows them to view the currently defined license configuration for the service group, enter installation keys provided during activation of offline systems, and generate administrative packages for manually activating offline systems.
Launch the Service Groups utility by clicking Service Groups on the administration home page. The name, description (if any), and creation date for existing service groups are displayed.
From the Service Groups utility, you can take the following actions:
• Create a new service group by clicking Create Service Group. On the empty service group page, enter the name and optional description for the service group. Click through the tabs to define the service group information. Click Save to create the service group.
• View and edit a service group by clicking the name of the service group. On the service group page, click through the tabs to view and edit the current service group information. Click Save to commit the changes.
• Deactivate, reactivate, or delete the service group.
When viewing an individual service group page, return to the main Service Groups utility by clicking the Service Groups link in the breadcrumb navigation.
Viewing and Editing Service Group Information
The tabs on the service group page are used to view and define service group information. When you have finished entering or editing the service group information, click Save. From the service group page, you can also take the following actions:
• Generate service group administrative packets for use with manual activation of an offline system.
• Revoke all licenses for the service group.
Tab
Description
Service group identity information
• Name—Name of the service group. Once the service group is created, the name cannot be edited.
• Description—Description of the service group.
• Logo—The logo displays in the Servigistics InService product when a user session is bound to the service group. Click Add to browse for and select a graphic file to use as a logo. Click Change Logo to change the graphic file as needed.
Note that when adding or changing a logo for a service group, the recommended size for the logo is 32x126 pixels.
Users
Servigistics InService users who are affiliated with this service group. Use the Find Users field to search for users and add them to the service group.
Once licenses have been defined on the Licensing Configuration tab, the Activations field displays for users who have activation privileges. Enter the number of activations each activating user is allowed. The maximum number is limited to the total number of activations specified on the Licensing Configuration tab.
Delete users from the service group by clicking the delete icon next to the user.
Administrators
Users with administrative privileges within the service group. Use the Find Users field to search for users present in Servigistics InService, and add them as administrators. The user creating the service group is automatically made an administrator when the service group is initially saved.
Delete administrators from the service group by clicking the delete icon next to the administrator. If only one administrator is specified for the service group, that administrator cannot be deleted. Another administrator must be added before the other can be deleted. Administrators identified as being added by a service group administrator (from within the service group itself) can only be deleted from within the service group. If nothing is specified, by default the system will add the OEM admin as the default admin of the service-group created.
Attributes
Specify the enterprise attributes which apply to this service group. All currently mapped enterprise attributes are listed.
For more information on enterprise attributes and how they are used by service groups, see Understanding Enterprise Attributes.
Add an attribute value to the service group by clicking the add icon next to the attribute, and entering the desired value in the Value field. Multiple entries with different values for a single attribute can be added. Multiple values can be specified for an attribute as a semi-colon-delimited list in a single entry if that is also supported in the enterprise identity management system. When multiple values are specified for a single attribute, new users only must match one of the multiple values.
If values are already specified for an attribute, clicking the blue arrow next to the attribute name displays the currently specified attribute values for viewing and editing.
Click the delete icon next to an attribute value to remove it from the service group.
Profiles
The profiles associated with the service group. The selected profiles determine the information elements and privileges to which the service group admin has access. The service group administrator can further manage what service group members can see, by creating more restrictive profiles within the service group. If a service group is associated with multiple profiles, the service group has access to all information elements and privileges granted by the complete set of associated profiles.
If a profile with which a service group is associated is changed in any way, that change is automatically propagated to the service group.
Filter the list of profiles displayed by choosing Selected Only, Unselected Only, or All.
For more information, see Profiles.
Licensing Configuration
Defines the licenses applicable and pertaining to the service group. A license is used to activate a single Servigistics InService installation on a single machine for a limited period of time. Each separate Servigistics InService installation requires a separate license. Each license is associated to the specifying service group, and cannot be moved to another service group.
For more information on activating offline systems, see Activating the Offline System.
Two types of licenses are available:
• Dealer—Used to generate licenses for service group network systems. A service group network system is a server-client deployment of a Servigistics InService offline system serving multiple users who are working simultaneously using the service group intranet network.
• Customer—Used to generate licenses for a single offline system, such as an individual laptop, typically used by a single user at a time.
For each license, the following information is defined:
• Max # Users—The maximum number of concurrent users allowed for each license. For non-service group user licenses, the maximum number of concurrent users is typically 1.
• Activation Type—Specifies the license activation method. Currently only machine-based activation is supported, meaning that the license is generated for a Servigistics InService installation residing on a specific machine.
• Max # Activations—Specifies the maximum number of licenses allowed from the license type within the service group. Each license is tightly coupled to one unique installation key, which is automatically generated during Servigistics InService installation and is associated to the service group when the client–side activation is performed. Specify as many or as few licenses for each type of licenses as needed for the service group.
• Installation Keys—The installation key string is used to uniquely identify the installation instance and the machine for which a license is required. This string is generated when an offline system is installed, and is displayed on the Activate System screen for the offline system. If the offline system is activated through web activation, the Installation Keys value is automatically provided by the system, along with the name of the activating user and activation date. If the offline system is activated manually, the installation key must be entered manually in the Installation Keys field; the name of the activating user, and activation date can be left blank or entered manually.
• Expiration—Specifies whether the license expires on a particular date, or in a specified number of days after activation. If the license expiration is extended, it is automatically downloaded and applied the next time user of the offline system logs into the corresponding web system or update their license.
If the expiration date or number of days entered exceeds the limit set for the system, the system generates the following warning message: Days exceeded maximim limit of <number of days> days.
Deactivating, Reactivating, and Deleting Service Groups
A service group can be deactivated by clicking the deactivate icon on the main Service Groups utility. Deactivating a service group has the following impacts:
• The deactivated service group is displays in the Service Groups utility with strike-through text.
• No new data can be associated with the deactivated service group.
• Affiliated users cannot bind to a deactivated service group for new sessions. Users currently bound to a service group when it is deactivated can experience errors on any current transactions, and must bind to another service group.
• The deactivated service group does not display on the Service Groups tab for profiles, even if it was previously selected for that profile.
Deactivated service groups can later be restored by clicking the reactivate icon . A reactivated service group behaves as though it was never deactivated.
Deactivated service groups can be permanently deleted from Servigistics InService by clicking the delete icon . The deletion is permanent. A deleted service group cannot be restored.
Generating an Administrative Package
For offline systems that do not use the web activation, an administrative package must be generated and provided to the administrator of the offline system. (For web activations, this information is downloaded automatically.) The administrative package includes the licenses, users, profiles and service group information for which the package is generated.
For more information, see Activating the Offline System.
Revoking Licenses
All licenses with the service group can be revoked by clicking Revoke. This causes all licenses in the service group to become invalid. Users and service group administrators are unable to log in to the service group. A Revoked flag displays next to the Expiration field for the licenses on the Licensing Configuration tab for the service group.
You can specify new licenses for the service group by entering a new value for the Expiration field.
To revoke a single activated license, manually delete the installation key and save the service group. Once an individual installation key has been deleted from a service group, it can be reactivated within that same service group, or added as a new installation key on a different service group. An installation key can be activated with only one service group at a time and it should be unique across all service group or user license.