Hi saranyavs,
To address your question "I have created 1 topic with category as 'Small talk topic'. But its not available in between any conversation," there are a few things you can check:
1. Check that you have 'Published' your Small Talk topic. If it is not published, it will not be available in chat window. 'Saving' will make the current version available under 'Test', but it will need to be Published to be available in the instance outside of the test chat window (i.e., in the Service Portal). To check that it has successfully published, return to the Virtual Agent Designer and type the topic name in the 'search by topic name' search bar and ensure that your topic panel has the status 'Published'.
2. In the Virtual Agent Designer for your small talk topic, on the right hand side of the header under 'Active', check that 'included in list of topics' toggle is turned on. This toggle capability can be helpful when you have a large amount of topics and only want a certain selection available for a certain user. TIP: 'Included in topic discovery' enables you to be directed to the topic via typing a configured list of keywords, instead of clicking 'Show Me Everything'.
Your Small Talk Topic should now be available after clicking 'Show Me Everything' in the Virtual Agent.
For simple exercises to get started with creating a Small Talk topic, please refer to the article below:
Getting Started with the Virtual Agent - Small Talk:
- The Virtual Agent is a powerful and convenient feature of ServiceNow that allows users to enter human-readable language to a chatbot and retrieve answers and resources quickly. The Virtual Agent processes these natural sentences through Natural Language Understanding (NLU) models, which can be trained. There are numerous and often complex configuration options, which is why Small Talk can be a great place for beginners to start exploring and benefitting from the amazing features of the Virtual Agent before building more complex configurations.
What is a Small Talk topic?
- In the Virtual Agent, a ‘Topic Type’ is a collection of a specific subject matter within a conversation. A topic defines the flow of a conversation for a task or requirement. Small Talk is a type of topic that is built for the purpose of small, casual enquiries, such as the time and date, weather, and common and small table enquiries.
Create and Configure a Small Talk Topic:
Roles Required:
virtual_agent_admin or admin
Pre-Requisite:
- Install and activate com.glide.cs.chatbot
All > Conversational Interfaces Guided Setup > Plugins and Store Applications > Virtual Agent* > Configure *Installation may take ~10 minutes*.
Steps:
1. All > Virtual Agent Designer > Create a Topic
2. Basic Properties: Type > Small Talk
Internal name, display name > Give any. Press 'Create'.
3. In the Virtual Agent Designer (topic), there are four banner links: Flow, NLU Intent, Properties and Languages. For the purpose of this exercise, we are focusing on 'Flow'. This is where the flow of the conversation is configured. On the left hand side panels are Components ‘User input’, ‘Bot response’ and ‘Utilities’, describing the different data types that the user can enter, the bot will provide an answer in, and the flow of the conversation can be configured with.
In this example, we will explore the 'Grouped Choice' user input, 'Decision' utility and 'Table' and 'Image' bot responses in a simple flow design. Note: Each flow starts with a ‘Start’ and ‘End’ node. Drag and drop the elements from the left-hand side panel to configure.
4. Drag User Input 'Static Choice', Utility 'Decision', two Bot Response 'Table''s and a Bot Response 'Image' icons onto the main flow diagram like so:
5. Configurations:
a.) Configure Static Choice:
Click 'Static Choice', Node name > 'User Choice', Prompt > 'What do you want to search?'
Display Name: | Value: |
Current Open Incidents | Open Incidents |
What’s my last name? | Table |
I want to see my Image | Image |
b.) Configure Decision Utility Branches:
-Click on left-most branch, Branch Name > 'If In-Progress Incident', Condition: User Choice | Is | 'Current Open Incidents'
-Click on the middle branch, Branch Name > 'If last name', Condition: User Choice | Is | 'What's my last name?'
-Click on right-most branch, Branch Name > If Image', Condition: User Choice | Is | 'I want to see my image'
c.) Configure Table Response 1:
Node Name: 'Current 'In Progress' Incident
Populate this table by: Table
Table: Incident [incident]
Filter rows: Condition (All > State = In Progress)
Select any columns you wish to display from the incident table in the chatbot.
d.) Configure Table Response 2:
Node Name: 'Last Name Return'
Populate this table by: Table
Table: User [sys_user]
Filter rows: Condition (All > User ID > (Dot-Walk)
e.) Configure Image Response:
Click 'save' and 'Publish'.
6. Testing:
Go to your Service Portal and open the Chatbot > 'Show Me Everything' > 'Small Talk Topic name'
a.) Click 'Current Open Incidents'
Expected Result: 10 currently open incidents. The default number of 10 can be configured.
b.) Click 'What's my last name?'
Expected Result: A print of the last name of the current user
c.) Click 'I want to see my image'
Expected Result: Your uploaded image will appear within the chatbot window.
You have now learned some of the powerful capabilities of ServiceNow's Virtual Agent by creating a 'Small Talk' Topic flow. I hope you are inspired to explore more of the Virtual Agent's configuration possibilities.
Hi saranyavs,
To address your question "I have created 1 topic with category as 'Small talk topic'. But its not available in between any conversation," there are a few things you can check:
1. Check that you have 'Published' your Small Talk topic. If it is not published, it will not be available in chat window. 'Saving' will make the current version available under 'Test', but it will need to be Published to be available in the instance outside of the test chat window (i.e., in the Service Portal). To check that it has successfully published, return to the Virtual Agent Designer and type the topic name in the 'search by topic name' search bar and ensure that your topic panel has the status 'Published'.
2. In the Virtual Agent Designer for your small talk topic, on the right hand side of the header under 'Active', check that 'included in list of topics' toggle is turned on. This toggle capability can be helpful when you have a large amount of topics and only want a certain selection available for a certain user.
TIP: 'Included in topic discovery' enables you to be directed to the topic via typing a configured list of keywords, instead of clicking 'Show Me Everything'.
Your Small Talk Topic should now be available after clicking 'Show Me Everything' in the Virtual Agent.
For simple exercises to get started with creating a Small Talk topic, please refer to the article below:
Getting Started with the Virtual Agent - Small Talk:
- The Virtual Agent is a powerful and convenient feature of ServiceNow that allows users to enter human-readable language to a chatbot and retrieve answers and resources quickly. The Virtual Agent processes these natural sentences through Natural Language Understanding (NLU) models, which can be trained. There are numerous and often complex configuration options, which is why Small Talk can be a great place for beginners to start exploring and benefitting from the amazing features of the Virtual Agent before building more complex configurations.
What is a Small Talk topic?
- In the Virtual Agent, a ‘Topic Type’ is a collection of a specific subject matter within a conversation. A topic defines the flow of a conversation for a task or requirement. Small Talk is a type of topic that is built for the purpose of small, casual enquiries, such as the time and date, weather, and common and small table enquiries.
Create and Configure a Small Talk Topic:
Roles Required:
virtual_agent_admin or admin
Pre-Requisite:
- Install and activate com.glide.cs.chatbot
All > Conversational Interfaces Guided Setup > Plugins and Store Applications > Virtual Agent* > Configure *Installation may take ~10 minutes*.
Steps:
1. All > Virtual Agent Designer > Create a Topic
2. Basic Properties: Type > Small Talk
Internal name, display name > Give any. Press 'Create'.
3. In the Virtual Agent Designer (topic), there are four banner links: Flow, NLU Intent, Properties and Languages. For the purpose of this exercise, we are focusing on 'Flow'. This is where the flow of the conversation is configured. On the left hand side panels are Components ‘User input’, ‘Bot response’ and ‘Utilities’, describing the different data types that the user can enter, the bot will provide an answer in, and the flow of the conversation can be configured with.
In this example, we will explore the 'Grouped Choice' user input, 'Decision' utility and 'Table' and 'Image' bot responses in a simple flow design. Note: Each flow starts with a ‘Start’ and ‘End’ node. Drag and drop the elements from the left-hand side panel to configure.
4. Drag User Input 'Static Choice', Utility 'Decision', two Bot Response 'Table''s and a Bot Response 'Image' icons onto the main flow diagram like so:
5. Configurations:
a.) Configure Static Choice:
Click 'Static Choice', Node name > 'User Choice', Prompt > 'What do you want to search?'
Display Name: | Value: |
Current Open Incidents | Open Incidents |
What’s my last name? | Table |
I want to see my Image | Image |
b.) Configure Decision Utility Branches:
-Click on left-most branch, Branch Name > 'If In-Progress Incident', Condition: User Choice | Is | 'Current Open Incidents'
-Click on the middle branch, Branch Name > 'If last name', Condition: User Choice | Is | 'What's my last name?'
-Click on right-most branch, Branch Name > If Image', Condition: User Choice | Is | 'I want to see my image'
c.) Configure Table Response 1:
Node Name: 'Current 'In Progress' Incident
Populate this table by: Table
Table: Incident [incident]
Filter rows: Condition (State | Is | In Progress)
Select any columns you wish to display from the incident table in the chatbot.
d.) Configure Table Response 2:
Node Name: 'Last Name Return'
Populate this table by: Table
Table: User [sys_user]
Filter rows: Condition (User ID | Is | Input Variables > User > User ID (Dot-Walk))
e.) Configure Image Response:
Node Name: 'My Image'
Image URL Link: Upload the URL of your image, or upload image file.
Click 'save' and 'Publish'.
6. Testing:
Go to your Service Portal and open the Chatbot > 'Show Me Everything' > 'Small Talk Topic name'
a.) Click 'Current Open Incidents'
Expected Result: 10 currently open incidents. The default number of 10 can be configured.
b.) Click 'What's my last name?'
Expected Result: A print of the last name of the current user
c.) Click 'I want to see my image'
Expected Result: Your uploaded image will appear within the chatbot window.
You have now learned some of the powerful capabilities of ServiceNow's Virtual Agent by creating a 'Small Talk' Topic flow. I hope you are inspired to explore more of the Virtual Agent's configuration possibilities.
