Service Catalog by Intracart at Crayodyne

Even the best managers from top corporate organizations find it difficult to cope with the working environment of smaller and mid-sized organizations. Mid-sized organizations often need the same solutions that large organizations need, since it has various departments, much like a large organization.  

However, middle and small sized organizations can never reach for the type of solutions that are designed for large organizations, mainly owing to budget constraints. As a result they continue to function with a compromise, with chaos and confusion.

The solution? A service catalog is a likely solution to solve a lot of internal problems, and is a champion in streamlining an office. But the problem is that almost all service catalogs are designed for the needs of very large organizations, and often very expensive.

The name Intracart, which is a portmanteau of the words intra (inter-office) and cart (shopping cart) are self explanatory to give an essence of the concept; shopping within the office for the purpose of the office; ordering goods and services from other departments of the office. The Intracart is an integrated product that makes administration of and access to your IT services easy. Through their service catalog interface, end users (employees) can browse and view the services they want to request.  

• The IT Service Catalog allows a company to document and publish its portfolio of available service. The Service Catalogue is often the foundation stone of Service Portfolio Management (SPM) for IT service providers. As a means of communicating and interacting with your employees, you will find no match to the utility your service catalog will offer to you.

• The Service Catalog is a list of Services that the IT Department can deliver to its customers. You are provided a critical starting point for negotiations relating to service delivery, when you use a service catalog. One major benefit for service providers is that the catalogue clearly outlines the services provided and makes it very clear to your employees what goods and services are available to them and within what timeframe. The catalogue helps you to establish a time frame and outline for the entire project to keep everyone on the same page.

• The production of the Service Catalog is the first step that to complete to effect process improvements. The finished product provides the platform for IT relationship managers like you to communicate agreements and negotiate budgets with your business executives. It also provides a mechanism for your employees to view available services and request services online. An internal shopping cart or Intranet Cart simplifies user experience and increases the likelihood of your employee satisfaction.

How it works

• A business manager (you), technically called the service author, customizes Intracart to meet his/her organizational requirements.

• A service author (you) will determine what the service level agreements (timeline) are for each item in the service catalog.

• A service author (you) will determine the costs for the service.

• Once the services are defined, you will publish these services to your organization. Intracart is used to publish these services to the office intranet along with categorizing it for easy retrieval by employees.

• The service requests are sent to your service desk, which can be any email account or distribution list.

• A service level agreement is issued, giving an exact timeframe required to get the service requested.

• The requested item/service is made available within the timeframe (no enquiring required about the status of the order).

Unmatched Features of Intracart

• You can customize it to suit your needs.
• Intracart also contains a free admin panel so it’s easy to maintain the catalog.
• Companies can put in their own logo in the header.
• It’s using MS SQL2005 Database engine.
• Number of input fields per item (see more info at the end of the document)
• Unlimited number of groups (or sections)
• Unlimited number of categories
• Unlimited number of items
• Unlimited number of service levels
• Unlimited number of users

• Genuinely inexpensive! The price is nothing, compared to any other similar solution, especially considering how easy it makes things.

• Up and running in just 1 hour. No need of ordering and waiting for weeks, unlike many other service catalogs.

• There is no registration, password or login needed for the end user when using Intracart. The system recognizes the user automatically and sends email etc. based on this info. No cookies etc.

• Designed exclusively for small to medium sized offices (ideally 50 – 3000 employees) , but holds equally good for even large sized companies.

• Simple to use. Intracart is not a nightmare for someone who is not so techno-savvy.

• “No worries” guaranty. Six months full refund guarantee, in the unlikely case that you are not fully satisfied. No questions asked.

• You can full test drive before you buy. There is an online demo version which you can try till you are satisfied.

• One year full support and all new upgrade versions for free to download within that year. After one year you can still use the product for unlimited time. The software license is owned perpetual.

• Advantage of SLA (Service Level Agreement). Clearly mentions the timeframe required to deliver the item ordered and leaved nothing to ambiguity. No need to make any of those frustrated calls asking “when will I get my ….” or “what’s the status of my order?”

• Perfect tool for IT departments to counter and answer the outsourcing challenge of today.

• Priority numbering on all groups, categories and items which can be used to force elements to top or to bottom etc in lists and overrule the alphabetic ordering.

Intracart: Technology requirement

• The cart runs on any Windows computer having Internet Information Server (IIS) enabled, and further having .NET framework 2 installed which is free from Microsoft and included in all new operating systems from them.

• Intracart is utilizing Microsoft SQL Server 2005 as the DB engine. The database and the Web site do not have to be on the same server, but can be if you want. We recommend you put the database on an already existing SQL server.

• Uses Active Directory. This technology allows a single sign-in system without using cookies. Due to this technology Intracart doesnot have its own local user database which need separate maintenance. This technology also allows the admin to limit access to a single user or a group.