Change Calendar

The Change Calendar is a global calendar view for Change Requests that enables you to efficiently schedule changes in your organization.

This calendar displays scheduled start and end dates for Change Requests, and various events that may affect planned changes. These events are called Change Management Events, and you and other technicians can add, modify, and delete these Change Management Events right on the Change Calendar. You can also reschedule Change Requests simply by dragging their bars on the calendar. If your organization has several offices with different work calendars, you can switch between work calendars to see scheduled changes for any office.

To access the Change Calendar, select either Service Desk > Change Calendarin the Sidebar or Go > Change Calendarfrom the main menu. You can view the calendar information by day, by week, or by month. For details, see Changing Calendar views.

NOTE: To refresh the calendar, press F5.

Filtering Change Requests in the calendar

The Change Calendar displays Change Requests as bars from their Scheduled Start Date (or Start Date, if specified) to Scheduled End Date (or End Date, if specified). You can filter the Change Requests in the calendar to display only those that belong to one or more particular Types, Categories, Statuses, Projects, or assigned to particular technicians.

• To filter Change Requests:

  • Expand the corresponding pane in the right side bar and select the appropriate check boxes. You can combine any properties as you want.

  • Type shows Change Requests of the selected types.

  • Category shows Change Requests of the selected categories.

  • Status shows Change Requests in the selected lifecycle phases, i.e. having the selected Status values.

  • Project shows Change Requests that belong to the selected Projects.

  • Assignee shows Change Requests that are directly assigned to the selected technicians, i.e. Change Requests where one of these technicians is selected in the Assignee field.

  NOTE: The most of panes have the <Unassigned> check box, which allows you to decide whether the calendar would display Change Requests having an empty value in the corresponding field.

• To remove filtering:

  • To remove filtering by a particular Change Request field, select the <All> check box in the corresponding pane. This will select all other check boxes in that pane, and the calendar will show Change Requests having any value in that field.

  NOTE: Clearing the <All> check box will clear all other check boxes in the pane. Make sure that you have selected some values in each of the Type, Category, Status, Project, and Assignee panes. Otherwise, your calendar will be empty.

Configuration panes with filters will show the asterisk in their title bars.

Scheduling Change Management Events

A Change Management Event is any event that can affect your Change Request workflow, such as a planned outage or a maintenance window. The Change Calendar enables you to create, modify, and delete these Change Management Events, so that you and other technicians can quickly visualize when some events conflict with the scheduled Change Requests or when there is a maintenance window for changes.

You can manage Change Management Events as follows:

• To add a Change Management Event:

  1. Select the cell that you want to bind with a new Change Management Event and click New > Change Management Event on the Module menu. Alternatively, right-click the cell, and then click New > Change Management Event. You can also select a range of cells to immediately specify the event's start and end date and time. The Change Management Event window opens.

  2. Type the event name and description.

  3. Select a color for the event bar from the Color list. Alternatively, you can click the ellipsis button and select one of standard colors or define a custom one using the Color window.

  4. Specify the start and end date and time.

  5. Click OK. A new event bar appears in the calendar.

• To view the details of a Change Management Event:

  • Rest the pointer on the event to display its details. The ScreenTip displays the event name, its dates and description.

• To reschedule a Change Management Event:

  1. Drag the start or end border to the new position. You can also drag events between dates within the calendar area or to a particular date in the mini-calendar in the top-right corner.

  2. Click Save on the calendar's Module menu to save your changes in the database.

  NOTE: To change other event details (for example, add a new description or change the color of its time bar), double-click the event and make your changes using the Change Management Event window.

• To delete a Change Management Event:

  • Select the event and click the Delete button on the Module menu. Alternatively, right-click the event, and then click Delete Selected Item(s).

Viewing and rescheduling Change Requests

The Change Calendar shows Change Requests flow from their Scheduled Start Date to Scheduled End Date and enables you to reschedule or re-assign them before the work actually begins.

• To view the details of a Change Request:

  • Point to the Change Request to display its status, start and end date and time. If you want to view more details, such as the priority and description, double-click the Change Request to bring up the Change Request window.

• To reschedule a Change Request:

  1. Drag the start or end border to the new position. You can also drag Change Requests between dates within the calendar area or to a particular date in the mini-calendar in the top-right corner.

  2. Click Save on the calendar's Module menu to save your changes in the database.

As soon as the change begins, a Change Request gets the Start Date value, and the calendar displays that Start Date instead of the Scheduled Start Date. When the Change Request is completed, the technician specifies the Completed Date value, and the calendar displays that Completed Date instead of the Scheduled End Date.

The Start Date and Completed Date are fixed, and you cannot "move" them. Unlike Change Requests with flexible scheduled dates, Change Requests with fixed dates are marked with purple borders: or .

Switching between work calendars

If your organization has multiple offices with different work calendars, you can switch between their calendars and see scheduled changes for any office in the Change Calendar.

• To switch the Change Calendar to another work calendar:

  • In the drop-down list on the Module menu, select the calendar that you want to see.

NOTE: Alloy Navigator administrators can manage work calendars in the Settings App. For details, see Setting up work calendars.

Change Management Event window

You use the Change Management Event window to view, add or modify an event that can affect your Change Request workflow, such as a planned outage or a maintenance window. Change Management Events are displayed on the Change Calendar as colored time-bars. You can assign a desired color for the event.

Name - the event name.

Description - the description for the event.

Color - the color for the event bar on the calendar. You can select the desired color from the drop-down list. Alternatively, you can click the ellipsis button and select one of standard colors or define a custom one using the Color window.

Start Date and Time - the start date and time for the event. To specify a date, click the down arrow in the Start Date field to bring up the calendar and select a date.

End Date and Time - the end date and time for the event. To specify a date, click the down arrow in the End Date field to bring up the calendar and select a date.

Related Information:

My Calendar

Changing Calendar views

Related information for Administrators:

Setting up work calendars