Virtual Agent Designer interface reference

The Virtual Agent Designer interface lets you create, modify, test, publish, and localize topics, topic blocks, and custom controls.

Virtual Agent Designer provides the following views. Some tabs may not be available, depending on how you configured your instance or the type of topic you are working with.

• Virtual Agent Designer Topics page
• Create a topic form
• Topic Properties tab
• Topic Flow tab
  The topic Flow tab contains the following elements:

  • Virtual Agent Designer controls
  • Virtual Agent Designer user input controls
  • Virtual Agent Designer bot responses
  • Virtual Agent Designer utilities
• Topic NLU Intent tab (visible if the topic type is NLU)
• Topic Languages tab

• Virtual Agent Designer Topics page
  The Virtual Agent Designer Topics page lists all objects in your instance. These objects include topics, topic blocks, custom controls, setup topics, and small talk topics.
• Virtual Agent Designer All pre-built topics page
  When you install pre-built conversations, such as ITSM Virtual Agent, some topics may not appear on the Topics page unless you install their dependent plugins. This page shows the additional topics that are available.
• Create a topic form
  The Create a topic form is used to set the properties for a new conversational topic for Virtual Agent.
• Topic Properties tab
  Use the Topic Properties tab to identify a topic and how it's used. You can control who uses the topic and what channels it can run in.
• Topic Flow tab
  Use the topic Flow tab to build the conversation flow. Use the controls for user inputs, bot responses, and utilities to define the flow.
• Topic NLU Intent tab
  You can edit and refine ServiceNow NLU models from within Virtual Agent Designer. When a conversation topic is bound to an associated NLU model and intent, use the NLU Intent tab to review and edit utterances and associated entities.
• Topic Languages tab
  Use the Languages tab to view the topic's translation status for languages that have been activated in Virtual Agent. If NLU is enabled on your instance, you can also view model mappings for each language.
• Virtual Agent Designer controls
  A Virtual Agent topic consists of a collection of controls within a topic flow. Use these controls to collect, process, and present information to your users. Controls can also read, create, and update records on your instance.
• Virtual Agent Designer user input controls
  Use the collection of input controls provided by Virtual Agent Designer to prompt and capture information from the user in a conversation.
• Virtual Agent Designer bot responses
  Virtual Agent Designer offers various controls for displaying bot responses in a conversation. Because the bot responses occur in third-party platforms, the format for each output may vary.
• Virtual Agent Designer utilities
  You can control interactions within a topic by using utilities in Virtual Agent Designer. These utilities perform various actions such as adding topic blocks (reusable components), running a script, or adding different conversation paths (branches) in a topic. Utilities are represented as nodes in a conversation flow but do not display anything to the user.