System settings

Navigating to "Collaboration > Virtual Agent > General Settings" brings you to the new "System settings" UI Page. The UI Page shows several Setup Topics which could be selected. Setup topics like a "Greetings topic", "Survey topic", etc.. One of them is the "Anything else topic". You might already notice… by default it's left blanc, while out-of-the-box there is a topic provided called (how appropriate) "Anything Else Topic".

Out-of-the-box look and feel

If a user ends a topic, for example the out-of-the-box "Open IT Topic", the topic configured as "Anything else topic" will be started. The out-of-the-box topic will basically provide the below question:

"Yes" will result in displaying the Topic Picker, so the user could start a new topic.

"No" will result in - if configured - starting the topic configured as "Survey topic".

Basically the flow is:Topic picker > Selected topic > Anything else topicNo: Survey topic- or -

Yes: Topic picker

Note: After the configured "Survey topic" (or if not configured), the chat will just end. This is different as Pre-New York where a new conversation would start immediately. You can still start a new conversation, though you have to do this manually thru the "+" sign on the top right, or the "Click here to start a new conversation" bar on the bottom.

How does the topic design look like

The canvas for the out-of-the-box "Anything Else Topic" looks pretty straight forward. Personally I don't see a reason to change this out-of-the-box topic. Where I usually say that out-of-the-box Virtual Agent topics should be seen as templates, this topic could be applied right away!

If you would like to change the messages within the out-of-the-box "Anything Else Topic", consider using UI Messages for this [sys_ui_message table]. Also for overwriting English phrases like "Is there anything else I can assist you with?". There's no need to change the topic for this. Just look if there is already an existing UI Message which could be updated or add a new one.

Need to know when building a custom topic

If you are planning to build custom topics, and wish to use the Anything else topic, is there anything to keep in mind? Anything need to know when building a custom topic?

Not in particular. Two things to note:1) Don't mimic a "Send Topic Picker" step before the end step in your topic. The topic picker is already set up within the out-of-the-box "Anything Else Topic".

2) Within the Virtual Agent Designer, on the Topic Properties, don't forget to define the Category ("Setup Topics"). If you would leave this out, your topic won't be selectable on the System Settings Setup Topics section.

---

Kind regards,

Mark Roethof

ServiceNow Technical Consultant @ Paphos Group---

LinkedIn

Labels: