Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code

Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code - Setting Up Guided Tours Access Through System Properties

To get Guided Tours working correctly, particularly after the New York release, you need to tinker with system properties. This is essentially flipping a switch to turn them on. The key property, `com.snc.guided.tours.custom.ui.enable`, among others, needs to be set to true. If you're dealing with a fresh ServiceNow instance created after New York, you should be good to go, as Guided Tours will likely be active. However, if you're upgrading from an older version, remember that these properties will need to be configured manually. By doing so, not only do you enable the Guided Tours, but also lay the groundwork for a better user experience. With these tours activated, your end users receive guided walkthroughs and targeted help within applications, making the learning curve less steep and potentially reducing support requests. While this may seem like a simple step, it's the foundation for the Guided Tours feature to become a useful tool for user training and application adoption.

To make Guided Tours accessible throughout the ServiceNow environment, you need to modify specific system properties. This is particularly important for pages built using the Custom UI framework, where the property `com.snc.guided.tours.custom.ui.enable` needs to be set to `True`. Interestingly, New York release instances, when freshly provisioned, come with Guided Tours already activated, which is a helpful starting point. However, if you are upgrading an existing ServiceNow environment to New York, you'll have to manually tweak these system properties to enable the Guided Tours feature.

The location of these Guided Tours-related properties is within the broader System Properties list, and understanding how to locate and modify them is vital for activating the functionality. You can find further guidance on how to create and configure tours within the ServiceNow learning resources, which are valuable for ensuring you can effectively implement and manage tours.

Furthermore, you have the option to customize tours to specific elements, such as catalog items, making the training very focused. This makes them very useful for on-demand training, especially during the rollout of new features or modules, improving user acceptance and minimizing disruption during such transitions.

It's intriguing to note that tours can provide a structured self-service path for users, possibly cutting down on support tickets, as users can learn on-the-job and navigate processes themselves. The visual elements used in the Guided Tours, like step-by-step instructions and visual indicators, aim to aid in the learning process and provide clear instructions. It's a shame, however, that given these potential benefits, organizations tend to overlook the configuration possibilities and don't fully leverage the Guided Tour capabilities.

Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code - Configuring Designer Interface In Next Experience UI

The Next Experience UI, a key part of ServiceNow's San Diego release, introduces a refreshed user interface called Polaris. It's designed with the goal of creating a more user-friendly, personalized experience that enhances engagement and helps users get more done. Essentially, ServiceNow is trying to make the platform more appealing and easier to use. There's nothing extra to buy or install to get it working – as long as you've upgraded to the San Diego release, the Next Experience UI is ready to go. One of the interesting features of the new interface is the ability to customize the color scheme to fit your organization's branding or just to make it visually appealing. This ties in nicely with the "unified navigation" aspect, which attempts to streamline how people interact with different modules and applications within ServiceNow. To help people get started with this new interface, ServiceNow offers a Quick Start Guide and plenty of online documentation. While these features certainly have potential for a better experience, some may argue that it's just cosmetic changes. It remains to be seen whether the changes truly improve usability for the vast majority of users, or if it's simply a surface-level modernization attempt. The overall aim of this Next Experience UI is to modernize the ServiceNow experience and ideally encourage people to use more of its features. Whether it achieves those ambitious goals remains to be seen.

The San Diego release brought about the Next Experience UI, also known as Polaris, introducing a new visual style for ServiceNow. The idea is to offer a more streamlined and personalized experience across the platform, aiming for better productivity and engagement with features and insights. To get access, you'll need to be on the San Diego release, likely on a test environment first if you haven't already upgraded. Interestingly, you don't need any extra plugins or purchases to use the new UI; it's built into San Diego. One aspect you can customize is the theme colors, which helps match the look to your organization or user preferences. Another notable addition is unified navigation, promising a smoother experience across different parts of the ServiceNow environment. ServiceNow has put out a Quick Start Guide to get you going with the Next Experience UI and UI Builder. It appears they want users to quickly adopt the new UI, which is why they have made this resource available. It's good that they have this, as it is a new way of working with ServiceNow, so proper guidance is critical. There is plenty of supporting documentation and resources, which is helpful, through NowLearning and the ServiceNow Community. It's important to note that you can switch to the new UI on existing environments too, following some instructions. It's worth experimenting with this new UI on a test instance, to get a feel for it and consider its potential impact. Overall, ServiceNow is pushing the new UI as a way to improve the experience and drive user adoption. It's hard to say if this redesign will completely revamp users' perspective of ServiceNow, as many have long grown accustomed to the old UI, but it certainly points to a shift in the design and features available. It will be intriguing to see how users respond to the change long term.

Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code - Creating Tour Steps With Action Buttons

When designing guided tours in ServiceNow, you can incorporate action buttons into each step. These buttons let users interact directly with the application while learning, making the experience more engaging and practical. Imagine guiding a user through creating an incident; you could have a button that prompts them to actually fill out the incident form right then and there. This interactive approach can improve understanding and encourage users to experiment with the platform, possibly lowering the need for support.

You can tailor the actions tied to each button to match the step's purpose within the tour, making it contextually relevant. While powerful, it's important to be aware that, from time to time, issues like the 'Play' button not functioning properly can arise. This can obstruct the user's journey and potentially make the tour less helpful, so it's something to monitor when you're creating and testing these tours. The ability to tie actions directly to tour steps is a great addition, but you need to ensure these interactive elements are working as intended to maximize their impact.

ServiceNow's Guided Tours, particularly with the introduction of action buttons, offer a more interactive way to onboard and train users. Action buttons, essentially interactive prompts within the tour steps, can significantly improve the user experience by guiding them through tasks with clear instructions. Research suggests that the inclusion of well-designed action buttons within tours leads to a boost in user engagement during training sessions. It's interesting to note that people tend to be more attentive to interactive elements compared to just text-based steps, leading to a better retention of information.

Fortunately, the Guided Tour Designer allows administrators to customize these buttons to match the style of their organization. This helps with consistency across the ServiceNow environment, improving the user experience, and makes it clear what the user needs to do next. It’s not just about aesthetics, though; where you place the action buttons can also impact user interaction. Placing buttons in strategic locations that draw the user's natural eye can significantly increase engagement. If the button placement is well thought out, you can achieve an improved task completion rate for users who are learning new functionality.

However, you can make these action buttons even more powerful by incorporating conditional logic, which can tailor the user experience based on actions. Imagine, for example, a tour designed for a custom application—an action button might be displayed based on whether the user has previously completed a specific step. This feature can make guided tours more flexible and efficient. While this aspect sounds promising, it can potentially lead to overly complex or confusing tours if not designed carefully.

Furthermore, action buttons can be linked with feedback mechanisms that capture user interactions and identify trouble spots in the tours. This data can be very valuable for refining tours to improve their effectiveness and user experience. The ability to gather data and adapt the tour dynamically could lead to the creation of more tailored and effective training materials. A recent study highlighted a reduction in users abandoning the tours by incorporating interactive elements like buttons. This suggests that action buttons can play a key role in keeping users engaged and motivated to complete a guided tour.

Interestingly, action buttons also offer insights into how users interact with the tours. Coupling this with analytical tools can reveal patterns and identify areas of the training that cause issues. It might be possible, for example, to recognize recurring issues or understand where users are frequently needing to seek support. This feedback loop helps refine and improve tours, ensuring the most efficient and effective training possible. Despite the potential benefits, there are some potential pitfalls, particularly the need to design the tours carefully to avoid overwhelming users with excessive or overly complex actions. Overall, it appears that action buttons, while perhaps a small detail within the guided tour feature, offer an interesting pathway towards more efficient and effective user training and system adoption within ServiceNow.

Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code - Adding Interactive Task Elements To Portal Demos

Adding interactive elements to ServiceNow portal demos can significantly enhance the learning process for users. The ability to integrate action buttons into guided tours lets users directly interact with the platform while learning, creating a more engaging and practical experience. For instance, a guided tour for incident creation could have a button prompting the user to fill out the incident form directly. This type of hands-on learning can improve comprehension and encourage experimentation with ServiceNow, potentially lowering the need for support.

It's crucial to ensure these buttons are designed effectively and positioned strategically to maximize their impact. While the feature holds potential, there's the risk of creating a confusing or overly complex tour if not managed carefully. In addition, it's important to be vigilant about button functionality, as issues can hinder the user experience and make the tour less effective.

Ideally, these interactive additions streamline user training and encourage broader adoption of the ServiceNow platform. By making the learning process more intuitive and engaging, organizations can increase user confidence and skill, optimizing their investment in the ServiceNow environment. While this approach shows promise, ongoing monitoring and refinement of the tour design are crucial to realizing its full benefits.

Adding interactive elements, like action buttons, to ServiceNow portal demos has become increasingly popular. It seems these elements can make a noticeable difference in how users interact with the guided tours and learn the system. Research suggests that interactive prompts can lead to a much higher engagement rate, potentially boosting user interaction by 30-40% compared to plain instructions. It's interesting how these buttons can reduce the mental strain on the user, as they don't have to remember as much information when they are guided through tasks. This idea aligns with the concept of cognitive load theory, which suggests that people learn more effectively when they aren't overwhelmed with unnecessary details.

One of the surprising aspects is how interactive buttons allow users to essentially practice while they learn. Being able to interact with the application directly during the guided tour can significantly improve understanding. This approach could potentially cut onboarding time nearly in half, as users get a more immediate grasp of how things work. It's also possible to link these action buttons to analytical tools, which can provide insights into how users navigate the tours. This can be a goldmine of information, as you can see which features are most engaging and where users struggle. This feedback loop allows you to adapt the tours to be more effective, which is valuable for refining training.

Conditional logic can also be applied to these buttons, creating a more dynamic and personalized experience. For example, a button might only appear if a user has successfully completed a previous step, which improves how relevant the guided tour is to the user's progress. This dynamic aspect, while powerful, can also create very complex tours if not designed carefully. The action buttons can also incorporate feedback mechanisms, which allows the tour designers to continually refine and improve the learning experience. It's like a perpetual feedback loop that ensures the training content remains relevant and useful.

Where you place the action buttons matters a lot. Studies indicate that strategically positioning them can increase clicks by 50%, so clearly, the location of the buttons is not just an aesthetic choice. Using interactive elements can also help when dealing with complicated tasks. By breaking things down into smaller, manageable steps, the process feels less daunting. Overall, this approach seems to lead to higher task completion rates. Another intriguing aspect is how these buttons can improve how long people retain the information. It looks like interactive learning can increase information retention by up to 60% compared to a more passive form of instruction.

Despite the advantages, there are some potential pitfalls. One thing to be careful of is not to make the guided tours too complex. If you overload users with too many actions and confusing logic, you can end up making the tour harder to follow, rather than easier. So while interactive buttons can be immensely helpful, it's important to carefully consider how they are implemented and whether they detract from the primary goal of improving the user experience and training.

Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code - Testing Tour Navigation Across Multiple Pages

When creating guided tours that involve multiple pages in ServiceNow, it's crucial to thoroughly test how users navigate between them. The ability to design tours that span different pages, a feature introduced or significantly improved in the New York release, is a powerful tool for onboarding and guiding users through complex processes. Ideally, these multi-page tours should provide a smooth transition between steps, helping users progress through information in a logical and intuitive order. This can be a really helpful feature, especially when you're trying to teach users about a complex process within ServiceNow. However, there are potential challenges that can arise during the testing phase. Issues like broken links between pages within the tour, or steps that don't appear at the right time can lead to a disjointed and ultimately, unhelpful user experience. If you don't carefully test these transitions, you run the risk of the tour actually hindering user comprehension rather than improving it. This means spending time testing these cross-page transitions and refining the tour design to avoid such pitfalls. The goal is to create a seamless and engaging experience for users, and thorough testing is essential to achieve that. Without it, the guided tour functionality, which is supposed to be a positive, helpful aspect of ServiceNow, might actually become frustrating for your end-users, ultimately failing to achieve its potential.

When it comes to exploring the ServiceNow guided tour feature, particularly how users navigate across multiple pages, we can see some interesting trends. One study showed a 30-40% boost in user engagement when guided tours include things like interactive buttons. This is intriguing because it suggests that tours aren't just passively viewed, but they can actively involve users. This dovetails with the idea of cognitive load theory—people tend to pick up new concepts quicker if they aren't bombarded with a ton of info at once.

And the benefits don't stop at engagement. It seems that these interactive tours can enhance how long people remember what they've learned. Research suggests a 60% improvement in information retention compared to more traditional methods. If you're aiming to get new hires up to speed quickly, this might be a big win. Guided tours that let users actually try things out during the tutorial could potentially shave onboarding time in half, which is a significant improvement.

However, small details can have a big impact. Where you put the buttons within the guided tour can significantly influence whether users click them, with some studies showing a 50% increase in clicks with strategic placement. So, it's not just about making the tours look nice; it's about making them easy to follow. It's an interesting concept to add conditional logic—basically, showing buttons only if the user has done something else. This adds personalization, but if overdone, it can be confusing for users.

There's always a flip side though. We've found instances where the interactive buttons in the guided tours don't work as intended, which can be really disruptive for the user. You want the tours to be helpful, so making sure everything is functioning properly is a must. Having a system to track how people use the tours and then refine the tours based on that data is very useful. We can get insights into where users might get stuck and modify the tours to make things smoother.

These interactive elements also make complex tasks more approachable by breaking them into simpler steps, increasing user confidence as they go. And if you think about it, there's potential here to reduce the number of support tickets your team receives as users become more self-sufficient through the guided experience. However, the key takeaway here is the need to carefully consider the complexity of the tours. If you add too many interactive elements or overly intricate logic, you risk creating something that's harder to understand, rather than easier. Despite this, action buttons within tours offer a potentially valuable pathway toward creating engaging, effective training that could lead to improved user adoption.

Step-by-Step Guide Enabling ServiceNow Portal Guided Tours Post-New York Release Without Custom Code - Assigning User Access Through Custom Roles

Within ServiceNow, custom roles play a crucial part in controlling who can access specific features and functions. To create a custom role, you essentially define its unique name and purpose. You can then manage these roles within ServiceNow's access control area.

The idea is to determine the exact permissions that a role needs. This is often done by starting with an existing role and then modifying it to meet specific needs. One benefit is that you can build more complex role hierarchies by nesting roles. Essentially, roles can inherit permissions from parent roles, making access management potentially much easier.

This ability to assign user access using custom roles helps keep your ServiceNow environment organized. You're basically tailoring access rights to different users or groups, which helps create a smoother user experience and potentially reduces confusion. As environments evolve, creating well-structured custom roles becomes increasingly important for effective access management and aligning with best practices within ServiceNow.

To tailor user access in ServiceNow, you can create custom roles. This involves using the "Create Application File" tool in Studio, specifying the file type as "Role," and defining its name and a unique identifier. This way, you can control who gets to see what features and functionalities within the system, adding a layer of security by limiting access to only necessary components.

You can manage these custom roles within the Access Control IAM area of the ServiceNow platform itself, where you'll find a list of the roles currently defined and assigned. This provides a central hub for keeping track of the roles and their connections to users. ServiceNow roles are the core of how access is handled, and built-in roles, like the administrator role, are pre-configured with the most comprehensive access.

When defining custom roles, you're essentially figuring out the specific things that a role needs to be able to do. You might start by adapting an existing role to fit the needs of your unique use case. You could perhaps begin with a standard role and modify it, adding or removing permissions to suit your exact requirements.

One interesting thing you can do is nest roles within each other. Imagine a tree-like structure where roles can contain other roles. This means any permissions given to a parent role get passed down to its children. This hierarchical arrangement makes it easier to manage roles for large, complex teams, as permissions can flow down the structure, reducing the need to set them individually for each role.

A significant part of this is understanding the necessary actions and permissions for each custom role. This careful consideration ensures that the role is configured to accomplish its purpose in the system, avoiding both over-permission and under-permission. It's worth pointing out that while ServiceNow guided tours are great for new users, these aspects of access and permissions are separate, and you might need to think carefully about how users, particularly in training, will use the access they are granted.

If you're keen to view your own custom roles, head to the IAM section and filter by role type. This makes finding them amongst the pre-defined system roles much easier. You can then decide which users or groups to associate with the role from within ServiceNow.

Once a role is assigned to a user, they'll get access to the related parts of the ServiceNow system. This means that they can seamlessly perform their tasks within the modules and applications that are associated with their roles.

It is worth noting that in a large organization, the management of user access can be complicated. You need to strike a balance between providing appropriate access for task completion and the potential downsides of over-permission. This is a critical design aspect for using roles. For a complex deployment, this can potentially take weeks to refine. It's easy to lose sight of the details and potentially create too loose a structure, increasing the risks to the organization. It's worth checking the audit logs frequently and reviewing how the roles are assigned, to make sure they are working as intended and ensuring that you have a reasonable audit trail for all access.

However, ensuring that training is linked to the actual use of roles is often overlooked. You've created all of these roles and hopefully provided a sensible access structure, but if your team isn't clear on what they can access or why that's been implemented, then your hard work can easily be undermined. Furthermore, the roles themselves aren't set in stone. As your organization changes and evolves, so will your access needs. Be ready to revisit and adjust role configurations to keep up with changes to teams, projects and responsibilities, and the overall evolution of your ServiceNow environment.





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