21.02 enhancements

BMC Helix Innovation Suite delivered as phased rollout for early adopters

Service Management applications now run on BMC Helix Innovation Suite. With the new BMC Helix Innovation Suite, we bring together the capabilities of Action Request System and BMC Helix Innovation Studio. This change accelerates our ability to deliver innovations to our customers. The new architecture uses fewer resources and improves integration between components.

Initially, distribution of this release will be available only to early adopters as a phased rollout followed by a full distribution.

BMC Helix Innovation Suite provides:

• A single-tenant common platform for Service Management applications.
• A shared database between Action Request System and BMC Helix Innovation Studio.
• Common Foundation data for applications that run on the BMC Helix Innovation Suite. 
• The ability to interoperate between Action Request System and BMC Helix Innovation Studio. For example, in Action Request System, you can call a process that is defined by using BMC Helix Innovation Studio. The process is called by triggering a filter written in Developer Studio.

For more information, see Product overview.

Product name changes in Remedy platform, Remedy ITSM, and BMC Helix Platform applications

Consult the following tables for changes to the product and component names starting with version 21.02.

While the product names have changed in 21.02, some instances in the product UI and product documentation still refer to the previous product name.

Remedy platform and ITSM applications

BMC Helix Platform and applications

Revamped multifunctional user interface for creating and managing broadcasts

BMC Helix Digital Workplace administrators can use an extended list of tools to work with broadcasts by using a completely redesigned user interface:

• Manage as many broadcasts as you want on the enhanced page in the BMC Helix Digital Workplace console
• Create broadcasts of different types depending on the message that you want to share with users (information, success, warning, critical)
• Track the broadcast's status by new labels (Active, Starting soon, Scheduled, Inactive)
• Add more information for end users through the Learn more link that is visible in the feed and in-app notifications
• Send broadcasts immediately or schedule them to become live at a certain time
• Duplicate broadcasts to save time by using existing templates

For more information about broadcasts, see Creating-broadcasts.

Granular configuration for auto-cycle banners in catalog sections

BMC Helix Digital Workplace administrators can now add Banners with layout options to sort and auto-cycle through the banners. In previous versions of BMC Helix Digital Workplace, administrators could add only Items to Catalog Sections.

For more information, see Setting-up-sections-in-the-Catalog.

Additional status filters for events

BMC Helix Digital Workplace end users can now filter both Active and Past events by status and type as well as select several options or combine them. In previous versions of BMC Helix Digital Workplace, end users could sort Active events only by type and Past events only by status.

Users can see the status of each service request in the order without opening the service request details:

For more information about filtering options, see Search-in-BMC-Helix-Digital-Workplace.

Display of the User ID field and configuration of end-user details display settings

BMC Helix Digital Workplace administrator can now select which user information will be displayed in the results of a People search, requests, and approvals. The administrator can also configure the visibility of a new User ID field. In earlier versions of BMC Helix Digital Workplace, work email and work phone (if specified by the user in preferences) as well as mail stop (if specified in Remedy IT Service Management) were always available for other users.

The following image shows the available end-user information display options by using the Global search panel results as an example:

The following table illustrates the ability to display the User ID by using the Global search panel results as an example:

For more information about user details availability, see Configuring-end-user-display-settings.

Remedy ITSM support groups as entitlement groups and collaborators on service requests

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog administrators can now populate collaborator and entitlement groups with Remedy ITSM support groups through a new category called Support Organization. This category is created and managed in Remedy ITSM. You must enable support groups in Remedy ITSM to make them visible in BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog. A Remedy ITSM support group can be added for:

• Virtual marketplace entitlements, which allow members of this support group to view and access services
  
  

• People groups that are used as collaborator groups
  
  

For more information, see Creating-virtual-marketplace-entitlements and User-accounts-groups-and-permissions-for-BMC-Helix-Digital-Workplace-Catalog.

Remedy connector supports all fields for Work Order and Change Request

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog administrator can set any other form fields by using the Other Fields parameter, including custom fields.

For more information, see Remedy-connector. For the workflow example, see Mapping-custom-Remedy-ITSM-form-fields-in-the-Create-Remedy-Work-Order-form.

Exporting only the most recent revision of services

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog administrators can now export a service with the most recent revision instead of all the revisions. In earlier versions of BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog, a service was exported with all the revisions created in the past. A new service revision is created when a service is approved, rejected, or published.

For information about the end-to-end process, see Copying-services-from-another-system. For more information about the existing service revision functionality, see Managing-service-versions-and-revisions.

View release approval details in BMC Helix ITSM: Smart IT

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog approvers can now cross-launch to BMC Helix ITSM: Smart IT

for viewing the release approval details. Approvers must have the Request User permission and belong to the same Support Group as the Release record submitted for approval.

For information on the release approval configuration, see Configuring-how-approval-requests-are-displayed-in-BMC-Helix-Digital-Workplace-end-user-console.

Option to remove all items from the active cart with one click

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog end users can now click Remove all items to remove all services from the active cart. In previous versions, end users had to select individual items in the active cart (Your cart) to delete them.

For more information about carts, see Requesting-more-than-one-enhanced-catalog-item-with-a-cart.

Updated action button icons for requests and approvals

The icons of the following action buttons have been updated in the BMC Helix Digital Workplace end user console:

For more information about requests and approvals, see Business-request-processing.

Cart count shows only the number of items in the active cart

BMC Helix Digital Workplace end users now only see the number of items in the active cart (Your cart) even if there are items in the saved carts. Thus, end users are made aware of the items that require attention. The following screenshot shows three saved carts excluded from the cart count in the BMC Helix Digital Workplace end user console:

Approve and reject buttons for approvers

The Approve and Reject buttons now appear as check and cross icons for each item in the approval order. The kebab menu has been preserved for reassigning approvals and putting them on hold. In earlier versions of BMC Helix Digital Workplace, the approver needed to click the kebab menu to approve, reject, or reassign an item from the approval request list.

This update is available only on the desktop version of BMC Helix Digital Workplace. On tablets and mobile devices, the behavior remains the same as in the previous releases:

For more information about approvals, see Approving-users-business-requests.

Restart available for failed service requests

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog administrators can restart failed processes on behalf of their end users. This action takes the same request to the beginning of its lifecycle and end users do not have to submit a new request. End users will see their request transition from the Fault to In Progress status in the My Activity tab. If your end users have configured their status updates and notifications, they will also be notified when this status change occurs.The option to restart a service is not available in the following conditions:

• Services for which fulfillment is set to External Link are not shown in the reports and cannot be restarted.
• Services that are parents in a dependent service with child services in progress - For example, if an IoT Storage request is the child service and still in progress and the IoT Device request fails, it cannot be restarted. For more information, see Specifying-dependent-services.
• Service requests auto-created when a BMC Helix Business Workflows agent creates a case. For more information, see Enabling automatic creation of service requests in BMC Helix Digital Workplace Advanced from cases.

For more information about accessing the Service Requests report, see Reports-and-analysis-of-the-enhanced-service-catalog.

Additional language support

BMC Helix Digital Workplace Catalog administrators can now use French as their preferred language. If you are upgrading from a previous version, existing names of connectors, services, categories, and so on will not be translated. For information about localizing catalog items, see Localizing-catalog-items.

What else changed in this release

Deprecation of support for Microsoft Internet Explorer 11

As announced, support for Microsoft Internet Explorer version 11 is now deprecated. We encourage you to switch to other fully supported browsers listed for BMC Helix Digital Workplace in the BMC Solution and Product Availability and Compatibility utility.

For a complete list of BMC products that no longer support Internet Explorer 11, see theBMC Customer Support Communities page.