Manage Service Manager knowledge articles

Knowledge articles in Service Manager can help service desk analysts and end-users understand and solve problems. Any employee can search for, view, and create knowledge articles so that end-users can help themselves and resolve IT problems before new work items are opened. Service desk analysts also have to link work items to knowledge articles.

Use the procedures in this article to create and search for knowledge articles.

Create a knowledge article

You can use the following procedure to create a knowledge article in Service Manager. This procedure describes how to create a new example knowledge article to help users obtain the latest service pack for Windows 10. However, you can complete these steps to create any type of knowledge article.

To create a knowledge article

1. In the Service Manager console, select Library.

2. In the Library pane, expand Knowledge, and select All Knowledge Articles.

3. In the Tasks pane, under Knowledge, select Create Knowledge Article.

4. In the form that appears, on the General tab, in the Knowledge article information area, follow these steps:

   1. In the Title box, enter a title for the knowledge article. For example, enter How to obtain Windows 10 service packs.

   2. In the description box, enter a description for the article. For example, enter You can use this article to help understand this problem and to correct the problem yourself.

5. In the Knowledge form, expand the Classification area, and then complete these steps:

   1. In the Keywords box, enter classification keywords that you can later search, separated by semicolons. For example, enter Windows; Service; Pack.

   2. In the Knowledge Article Owner box, browse for and select an owner for the knowledge article. For example, select Phil Gibbons.

   3. In the Category list, select an applicable category. For example, select Software.

6. Expand the External Content area. In the URL box, enter the web address if the information source of the article is known. For example, enter https://support.microsoft.com/kb/935791.

7. Expand Internal Content. In the box, enter or paste information about how the user can apply information from the External Content box to fix a problem that is specific to your organization. For example, enter Visit the URL to read about how to download the latest service pack for Windows 10.

8. Select OK to save the new knowledge article.

To validate that the knowledge article was created

• Verify that the new knowledge article appears in the All Knowledge Articles pane.

Search for a knowledge article

You can use the following procedures to search for a knowledge article by using the Service Manager console in Service Manager. If you want to link a knowledge article to an incident or to a change request, save the incident or change request first. You can perform full-text searches when you search for knowledge articles. When you search, Service Manager queries the following fields in the knowledge search form:

• Title

• Description

• Comments

• Keywords

• External URL

• Internal Content

• Analyst Content

When the search is complete, Service Manager displays matches for content in the Title, End-User content, and Analyst Content fields. If you want to view the whole article, select Open article to see external content. If you enter Windows 10 in the search box, that exact string must exist in one of the knowledge article fields.

To search for a knowledge article using the Service Manager console

1. In the Service Manager console, in the search box, enter a keyword or term. For example, enter Windows 10.

2. Select the arrow to the right of the search box to view a list of the objects for which you want to search, and select Knowledge.

The Knowledge Search form displays the knowledge articles that match the search term.

To search for a knowledge article when an incident or change request form is open

1. With an incident or change request form open, in the Tasks pane, select Search for Knowledge Articles.

2. In the Knowledge Search form, enter a search term in the Search for box, and select Go. For example, enter Windows 10.

To link a knowledge article to an incident or change request

1. In the Service Manager console, in the search box, enter the keyword or term for which you want to search. For example, enter Windows 10.

2. Select the arrow to the right of the search box to view a list of the objects for which you want to search, and select Knowledge.

3. The Knowledge Search form displays the knowledge articles that match the search term.

4. Select the article that you want to link, and select Link To.

5. In the Select objects dialog, under Filter by class, select either Incident or Change Request.

6. Select an incident or change request, and select OK.

7. Select OK to close the informational message.

8. In the Knowledge Search form, select Close.

Next steps

• Configure and use Service Manager cmdlets.