Application Notes for configuring NICE IEX Workforce Management R4.6 with Avaya Proactive Contact R5.0.1 Issue 1.0

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Avaya Solution & Interoperability Test Lab

Application Notes for configuring NICE IEX Workforce

Management R4.6 with Avaya Proactive Contact R5.0.1 –

Issue 1.0

Abstract

These Application Notes describe the configuration steps required for NICE IEX Workforce Management to interoperate with Avaya Proactive Contact R5.0.1. NICE IEX Workforce Management is a work force management solution that provides forecasting and monitoring of work for contact center agents. NICE IEX Workforce Management uses the historical data from Avaya Proactive Contact to produce forecasts for contact center agents, and then uses the real-time data from Avaya Proactive Contact to check the agent adherence to the forecasts. Information in these Application Notes has been obtained through DevConnect compliance testing and additional technical discussions. Testing was conducted via the DevConnect Program at the Avaya Solution and Interoperability Test Lab.

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1. Introduction

NICE IEX Workforce Management is a work force management solution that provides forecasting and monitoring of work for contact center agents. NICE IEX Workforce

Management uses the historical data from Avaya Proactive Contact to produce forecasts for contact center agents, and then uses the real-time data from Avaya Proactive Contact to check the agent adherence to the forecasts.

For historical data, NICE IEX Workforce Management queries the Avaya Proactive Contact Oracle database to obtain information on jobs and agents. For real-time data, NICE IEX Workforce Management uses the Avaya Proactive Contact Event Service interface to obtain events on agent states.

2. General Test Approach and Test Results

The interoperability compliance test included feature and serviceability testing.

DevConnect Compliance Testing is conducted jointly by Avaya and DevConnect members. The jointly-defined test plan focuses on exercising APIs and/or standards-based interfaces pertinent to the interoperability of the tested products and their functionalities. DevConnect Compliance Testing is not intended to substitute full product performance or feature testing performed by DevConnect members, nor is it to be construed as an endorsement by Avaya of the suitability or completeness of a DevConnect member’s solution.

2.1. Interoperability Compliance Testing

The feature testing focused on verifying the ability of IEX Workforce Management to receive, parse, and display historical and real-time data from Proactive Contact.

Proactive Contact was run in test mode to generate historical data; the reports provided by IEX Workforce Management were verified for accuracy against reports provided by the Proactive Contact Analyst application.

For the purposes of real time statistics, Proactive Contact was configured to operate as normal with live agents handling outbound calls. The agent status was verified against the information presented by IEX Workforce Manager.

The serviceability testing focused on verifying the ability of the IEX Workforce Management server to recover from adverse conditions, such as disconnecting the Ethernet cable to the server.

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2.3. Support

Web: http://www.nice.com Phone: 972-301-1768

Email: [email protected]

3. Reference Configuration

These Application Notes assume the configuration and connectivity between Avaya Aura ® Communication Manager and Avaya Proactive Contact is already in place and will not be described.

During the testing, the Avaya Proactive Contact Supervisor and the NICE IEX Supervisor shown in Figure 1 were used for report verification purposes.

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4. Equipment and Software Validated

The following equipment and software were used for the sample configuration provided: Equipment/Software Release/Version

Avaya Aura® Communication Manager running on Avaya S8800 Server

R6.2 SP3 build R016x.02.0.823.0-20001 Avaya Proactive Contact running on

Avaya S8730 Server

R5.0.1 with patch 301, 302, 307, 309, 323, 328

Avaya Proactive Contact Supervisor running on Windows Administrator PC

R5.0.1 NICE IEX Workforce Management

running on NICE provided hardware

R4.6 CP4

5. Configure Avaya Proactive Contact

The detailed administration of contact center resources and connectivity between

Communication Manager and Proactive Contact are not the focus of these Application Notes and will not be described. For administration of contact center resources and connectivity to Avaya Proactive Contact, refer to the appropriate documentation listed in Section 9.

This section provides the procedures for how to configure a hierarchy for jobs that are monitored by IEX Workforce Management, and on how to obtain the necessary Interoperable Object Reference (IOR) file, host name, database information and configure the hosts file, that is required by IEX Workforce Management.

5.1. Obtain IOR File

IEX Workforce Management uses the Event Service interface from Proactive Contact to obtain real-time agent events. The Event Service is a service based on the Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA), and supports client application connection via several methods. The IOR method is used by IEX Workforce Management to locate and connect to the CORBA objects on Avaya Proactive Contact.

As part of the installation of IEX Workforce Management, a copy of the IOR file from the Avaya Proactive Contact server needs to be provided to the IEX Workforce Management

implementation team, and the path to the file is shown below: /opt/avaya/services/data/ns_ior

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5.2. Obtain Host Name

As part of installation IEX Workforce Management, the host name and the IP address of the Avaya Proactive Contact server needs to be provided to the IEX Workforce Management implementation team. Log in to the Linux shell of the Proactive Contact server. Use the hostname command to obtain the host name. In the compliance testing, the host name of the Proactive Contact server is devconhd501 as shown below.

$ hostname devconhd501

5.3. Configure Hosts File

Proactive Contact must be configured with the hostname and IP address of the IEX Workforce Management Server. Using the command shown below, configure the /etc/hosts file with these details provided by the IEX Workforce Management Implementation Engineer.

$ vi /etc/hosts 127.0.0.1 localhost 10.10.16.95 devconhd501 10.1.10.28 devconhd501 10.1.10.29 switch1 10.10.16.58 niceitester

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5.4. Obtain Oracle Database Connection Information

IEX Workforce Management connects to the Proactive Contact Oracle database using a JDBC Oracle thin client embedded in its application which requires the database instance name, user name, password, listener port number and hostname from Proactive Contact

Log in to the Linux shell of the Proactive Contact server. Switch to the oracle user and enter the command lsnrctl status to view the PORT and database Instance as shown below.

$ su - oracle Password:

-sh-3.2$ lsnrctl status

Connecting to (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=IPC)(KEY=EXTPROC))) STATUS of the LISTENER

---

Alias LISTENER

Version TNSLSNR for Linux: Version 10.2.0.5.0 - Production Start Date 19-NOV-2012 10:03:54

Uptime 2 days 2 hr. 52 min. 23 sec Trace Level off

Security ON: Local OS Authentication SNMP OFF

Listener Parameter File /opt/dbase/OraHome1/network/admin/listener.ora Listener Log File /opt/dbase/OraHome1/network/log/listener.log Listening Endpoints Summary...

(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=ipc)(KEY=EXTPROC)))

(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=tcps)(HOST=devconhd501)(PORT=2484))) Services Summary...

Service "PLSExtProc" has 1 instance(s).

Instance "PLSExtProc", status UNKNOWN, has 1 handler(s) for this service... Service "orastd" has 1 instance(s).

Instance "orastd", status UNKNOWN, has 1 handler(s) for this service... The command completed successfully

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Proactive Contact is preconfigured with a database user name and password of reporter. To view the usernames configured in the Oracle Database, following on from the previous command prompt, enter the commands shown below. Type quit when done.

-sh-3.2$ sqlplus / as sysdba

Connected to:

Oracle Database 10g Enterprise Edition Release 10.2.0.5.0 - Production With the Partitioning, Data Mining and Real Application Testing options SQL> select username from dba_users;

USERNAME --- SYS SYSTEM DSC STATSPUMP REPORTER DATAPUMP AVAYADBA OUTLN MDSYS ORDSYS CTXSYS USERNAME --- ANONYMOUS EXFSYS DMSYS DBSNMP WMSYS XDB ORDPLUGINS SI_INFORMTN_SCHEMA MDDATA DIP ORACLE_OCM USERNAME --- TSMSYS 23 rows selected. SQL>

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5.5. Administer Hierarchy

Hierarchies are used in Proactive Contact to group and organize data, and to adjust the scope of data to monitor and view. IEX Workforce Management requires the jobs to be monitored to be configured in the hierarchy.

From the Avaya Proactive Contact Supervisor PC, launch the Analyst Application by selecting Start  Programs  Avaya Proactive Contact  Supervisor  Analyst, followed by selecting Tools  Hierarchy Manager from the top menu. The Hierarchy Manager screen is displayed.

From the Hierarchy Manager screen, create a new job hierarchy by selecting Job Hierarchies in the left pane, followed by File  New from the top menu. The screen is updated with default hierarchy levels, and a list of available jobs to assign to the hierarchy, as shown below.

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Rename and add levels by right clicking the items in the hierarchy as desired, drag and drop the available jobs to define the jobs monitored by IEX Workforce Management to the new hierarchy. In the compliance testing, IEX Workforce Management monitored the outbnd3, outbnd5,

outbnd6 (managed job) and inbnd1 jobs.

Select File  Save As from the top menu to save the hierarchy configuration, and provide a copy of this screenshot to the IEX Workforce Management implementation team.

6. Configure IEX Workforce Management

IEX Workforce Management is installed and configured by the IEX Workforce Management implementation team. Customers are provided with training on how to configure resources to map to the resources on Proactive Contact, and on how to use the IEX Workforce Management Supervisor.

The procedure for installing and configuring IEX Workforce Management is outside the scope of these Application Notes and will not be covered. For detailed information on installation and configuration, refer to the appropriate documentation listed in Section 9.

These Application Notes assume that the IEX Workforce Management server has already been installed and configured with the connection, hostname, IOR, job and agent information from Proactive Contact. This section describes the steps to display the configuration on the IEX Workforce Management Supervisor.

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6.1. View Database Connection Information

The database connection information can be viewed in the r_swxifacejobparms table on the IEX Workforce Management server database, as shown below, and must match the information obtained from Proactive Contact.

6.2. View Event Services Connection Information

The credentials used to connect to Proactive Contact Event Services are contained within the c:\acdconnectors\totalviewasc\proactive5asc\conf\wrapper.conf file. Using an appropriate text viewer, confirm that the Event Services connection information is correct. In this instance, the dialer hostname of devconhd501 is set, the default username and password of client1 and server1 provided by Proactive Contact are used, and the path to the ns_ior file described above is configured.

# Application parameters. Add parameters as needed starting from 1

wrapper.app.parameter.1=com.iex.tv.integrations.connectors.avaya.proactive.rt a.proactivebridge wrapper.app.parameter.2=-listenerport wrapper.app.parameter.3=6999 wrapper.app.parameter.4=-dialername wrapper.app.parameter.5=devconhd501 wrapper.app.parameter.6=-username wrapper.app.parameter.7=client1 wrapper.app.parameter.8=-password wrapper.app.parameter.9=server1 wrapper.app.parameter.10=-IOR wrapper.app.parameter.11=../conf/ns_ior wrapper.app.parameter.12=-tvaddress wrapper.app.parameter.13=127.0.0.1

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7. Verification Steps

This section provides the tests that can be performed to verify proper configuration of Avaya Proactive Contact and NICE IEX Workforce Management.

7.1. Verify Avaya Proactive Contact Service Status

From the Avaya Proactive Contact Supervisor PC, launch the Health Manager by selecting Start  Programs  Avaya  Avaya Proactive Contact  Health Manager. From the Health Manager screen, select Data under Dialer Services in the left pane. Verify that all services are up, as shown below.

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7.2. Verify NICE IEX Workforce Management Connection Status

From the IEX Workforce Management Supervisor PC, open the

c:\acdconnectors\totalviewasc\proactive5asc\bin\bridge.log file and verify that there are no errors on connecting to Event Services. The text highlighted below indicates successful connection.

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [proactivebridgeThread] WARN

c.i.t.i.c.a.p.r.proactivebridgeThread - Logging into the Avaya Proactive Event Service...

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [proactivebridgeThread] INFO jacorb.orb.giop - ClientConnectionManager: created new ClientGIOPConnection to

10.10.16.95:23120 (1395dd5b)

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [proactivebridgeThread] DEBUG jacorb.util.tpool - [0/1] creating new thread

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [ClientMessageReceptor1] DEBUG jacorb.util.tpool - [0/2] removed idle thread (job scheduled)

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [ClientMessageReceptor1] DEBUG jacorb.giop.conn - ClientGIOPConnection to 10.10.16.95:23120 (1395dd5b): will wait until connected

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [proactivebridgeThread] DEBUG jacorb.giop.conn - ClientGIOPConnection to 10.10.16.95:23120 (1395dd5b): sendMessage() -- opening transport

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [proactivebridgeThread] DEBUG jacorb.iiop.profile - Selecting SSL for connection

2012-11-20 11:50:27,292 [proactivebridgeThread] DEBUG jacorb.orb.iiop - Trying to connect to 10.10.16.95:23121 with timeout=90000 using SSL. 2012-11-20 11:50:27,308 [proactivebridgeThread] INFO jacorb.orb.iiop - Connected to 10.10.16.95:23121 from local port 11677 via SSL

2012-11-20 11:50:27,308 [proactivebridgeThread] DEBUG jacorb.orb.iiop - wrote 100 bytes to 10.10.16.95:23121

From the Proactive Contact command line enter the command netstat –a | grep

<iexserverhostname>, verify ESTABLISHED connections from IEX Workforce Management on both the Oracle database port 2484 and the enserver_ssl service. Note: this command must be executed during the scheduled period that IEX Workforce Management connects to the Oracle database for historical reports. i.e. at the end of each interval.

$ netstat -a | grep niceitester

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7.3. Verify Real-Time Information

From the IEX Workforce Management Supervisor, navigate to the operations management menu and select the Real-Time Adherence option. Click on the Management Unit container in which the relevant Proactive Contact Agents have been configured.

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7.4. Verify Historical Reports

Using the IEX Workforce Management Supervisor application, view the report information and verify its accuracy against a report provided by the Proactive Contact Analyst application.

8. Conclusion

These Application Notes describe the configuration steps required for NICE IEX Workflow Management to successfully interoperate with Avaya Proactive Contact and Avaya Aura® Communication Manager via the Oracle database for historical data and the Event Service interface for real-time data. All test cases were completed successfully. Please refer to Section 2.2 for test results and observations.

9. Additional References

This section references documentation relevant to these Application Notes. The Avaya product documentation is available at http://support.avaya.com where the following documents can be obtained.

[1] Administering Avaya Aura® Communication Manager,Release 6.2, Issue 7.0, July 2012 Document ID 03-300509

[2] Implementing Avaya Proactive Contact 5.0

All information on product installation and configuration for NICE IEX Workforce Management can be obtained by visiting http://www.nice.com

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recommendations provided in these Application Notes are believed to be accurate and

dependable, but are presented without express or implied warranty. Users are responsible for their application of any products specified in these Application Notes.

Please e-mail any questions or comments pertaining to these Application Notes along with the full title name and filename, located in the lower right corner, directly to the Avaya