We actually adopted this "human centric" model long before the Email
Engine existed and it has worked well for us so far. (for the last
8-10 years)
We pump email into an AR System form, but not directly into the
incident form. This allows for the following to happen:
1) Spam does not clutter the incident form (and later incident statistics)
2) Users can filter down the content before it is re-added to existing
incidents.
Like users signatures (that really should be a separate attachment
due to their size)
Like content that was sent to the requester from the Service Desk
that is already in the incident
etc...
3) Support staff can decided when an "update to an existing incident"
really indicates a new incident.
Often one question/problem leads to another. However, for the
later metrics to have a shot at being correct someone (a person) needs
to spin off the "new requests" from the "old request".
4) We also do things to try to help identify the sender of the email,
and also do some "auto processing" on some of the inbound emails too.
(Things like triggering outbound notifications when the sky is
falling, etc..)
Those features really do not have a place in the incident form as they
are not generic incident management tools. Rather they are "email
centric" and are kept separate so that they can be focused and
compliment and contribute to the incident management process.
FWIW: We also use procmail on the email's way into the Email Engine.
:) I find it refreshing to see independent confirmation that our model
makes sense to at least someone in the greater universe. :)
We actually are not currently using spamassassin in our model, but
maybe we could see some benefit from that too. We actually have a
fairly good spam filter already in front of all incoming emails to our
company. But maybe having a local spam hook could simplify some of our
procmail rules and maybe even "sort" the spam to the side too....
hum.... That is something to think about. Thanks for the idea. :)
--
Carey Matthew Black
BMC Remedy AR System Skilled Professional (BRSP)
ARS = Action Request System(Remedy)
Love, then teach
Solution = People + Process + Tools
Fast, Accurate, Cheap.... Pick two.
On Fri, Feb 13, 2009 at 9:31 AM, Ramey, Anne <[email protected]> wrote:
> That will definitely help, but we have SpamAssassin amoung our list of
> spamfighting tools and still get a fair amount of spam into Remedy. Part of
> the problem is that these helpdesk addresses for email are on web pages and
> in people's addressbooks and are free for the harvesting by the spambots.
> They are just too public, though that is necessary. I don't think there is
> any winning that particular battle without human intervention. One taxing
> method could be have the publicized address not create tickets. Have a human
> check that box and forward only the valid messages to the Remedy system.
>
> Anne Ramey
<snip>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Action Request System discussion list(ARSList)
>> [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Remedy Maniac
>> Sent: Friday, February 13, 2009 2:22 AM
>> To: [email protected]
>> Subject: finding a good spam killer for remedy
>>
>> dear all,
>>
>> I have been asked to find some way of reducing the number of spams
>> ending in one of our schemas.
>> Obviously and unfortunately, the existing tools are not capable of
>> blocking all the spams.
>> The email lifecycle is quiet a bit cumbersome but I have to live with
>> it.
>> Emails are sent to IMAP server. On my remeyd box, fetchmail pools them
>> and give them to procmailrc.
>> This later does first checks, formats then the emails to fit a certain
>> criterias and give them to the email engine.
>> Upon arrival in the Email Box, my Remedy workflow fires and creates the
>> necessary tickets for Helpdesk or other in-house schema that I wrote.
>> So my idea is to plug something like spamassassin to the procmail.
>> Does anybody have any experience of infos regarding this spam killer?
>> Or any other further hints/tips would be very welcomed.
>> Serouche
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