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Tag: RSS

Some recent SelfService changes

January 19, 2011 In addition to our recently updated corporate website, we also updated our customer SelfService portal. I wanted to comment on a few changes that were made as part of that. Ditching the Case Type One of things we eliminated was the case type. When customers create a new case, they no longer have to choose a case  type. And the case type isn’t shown on the view case page. We do have (and use) different case types, including Problem, Question, Help Desk, Sales, Support Renewal, and a bunch more. However, when it comes to a technical support issue submitted from our customers – we don’t treat those cases any differently depending on the case type that the customer picked. Whether the customer picks Problem, Question, or Help Desk – it doesn’t matter to us. We don’t do any different work,…

Dovetail information feeds

September 2, 2010 Did you know we provide a few different information feeds that help you stay informed with information about Dovetail? By subscribing to feeds, new information is delivered to you – which means you don’t have to go visiting lots of different web sites to see if there’s new content available. Blogs There’s a RSS feed for all the Dovetail bloggers, or you can subscribe to individual bloggers, if you so wish, by visiting their page and clicking the orange RSS icons in your browser or by clicking the RSS link. Some of us also allow for subscribing by email, in case you’re not an RSS kind of person. Product Releases There’s a feed for product releases – so you’ll know when new products are available – including new revisions of existing products. Knowledgebase There’s also a feed for new knowledgebase…

A feed for new Knowledgebase Articles

February 10, 2009 Kevin has put together an RSS feed for our most recent knowledgebase articles. The feed can be subscribed to using a feed reader (such as Google Reader), and any new articles will be delivered to you. Very cool. We eat our own dogfood here, meaning we use our Dovetail/Clarify system for our customer support team - including the knowledgebase (solutions). Being kept informed about new solutions is good for our support staff, but also for other members of our team - including Sales Engineers, the Product and Development teams, etc - as well as our customers who live in our products every day.  While I really like this specific example, I think the general idea of syndicating data from your Clarify/Dovetail system is totally rockin. Combine the code that Kevin laid out in his post, along with some Dovetail SDK…

Creating RSS Feeds Using ASP.Net

February 6, 2009 Warning: This is one of those late to the party posts where I show off some cool thing that everyone already likely knows about. I just feel special right now because I was able to push out something we’ve wanted to do for quite some time in an afternoon.   We wanted to have an RSS feed so customers could keep up to date with new or recently updated Dovetail Knowledge Base articles. My personal mental gate was that I really didn’t want to try to figure out how to properly create an RSS or Atom feed and I didn’t want to bother with complex heavy handed frameworks like Argotic. Then one day Joshintroduced me to the System.ServiceModel.Syndication namespace (introduced in .Net 3.5) and my life was never the same.   Simple stuff really. Create a SyndicatedFeed filled with feed items and hand that to a…

Commenting on Solutions

September 29, 2008 One of the things I've wanted to do for a long time is have the ability to add comments on objects within the Clarify/Dovetail system. As a specific example, I've wanted to be able to add comments to a solution. For those not versed in Clarify/Dovetail speak, a Solution is essentially a KnowledgeBase (KB) article. By allowing comments, I (and others) can (hopefully) enhance the information that is within the Solution. For example, consider a  KB article that is available on the web, such as a Microsoft KB article, or a Dovetail KB article. Now, lets say that I use the information in that article, but I run into a bit of a snag, discover another tip or workaround, or perhaps I've even found something wrong in that article. What can I do? I'd like to be able to leave…

Subscribe by email

May 28, 2008 Those that know me are well aware that I'm a big fan of RSS feeds. But, I do realize that not everyone has yet jumped onto the RSS bandwagon. So if you'd like to subscribe to my blog by email, you now can. Simply click the Subscribe by Email link, and you'll get updates delivered right to your Inbox.   How about giving RSS a try? Confused about RSS? No worries. The folks over at Common Craft have put together a simple video explaining RSS in plain English. Check it out:   If the embedded video doesn't load, this is the direct link to the video.   Let your Feed Reader bring updates to you I use Google Reader for reading feeds. It's easy to use, web-based, and free! And when I find interesting articles in Google Reader, I share…