It’s official – Oracle TAP is gone!

Oracle_Service_Cloud_TAP_deprecated

There are a few posts in #DoctorCX about Oracle Service Cloud (OSvC) for mobile devices, the last one shared in Jan 2017. And lately there has been many people asking about it on the comment boxes. Mainly due to the fact that the Oracle Mobile Agent App (Oracle TAP) has suddenly disappeared from App Store and Google Play.

The truth is, as we suspected, it was discontinued. It is now official, and Oracle announced it, that from May 2017 release Oracle TAP is deprecated. However, Oracle will still leave it available for at least 2 years before the removal of the functionality.

The main reason Oracle is giving for the deprecation of Oracle TAP is that it “doesn’t meet customer needs due to the limited availability on iOS and the lack of extensibility and configurability“… and, in all honesty, I agree. Even though it was an easy way to provide mobile capability out-of-the-box.

The recommendation or suggestion for customers who are using it, or for those who are looking for a mobile interface, is to start using the Agent Browser UI (which will only really render well in tablets) or use the Mobile Accelerators to build their own mobile apps.

The Mobile Accelerator is based in the principle that the customer, or a specialist partner, would develop a mobile app using the Oracle Mobile Application Framework (MAF), which is a Java/HTML5-based framework, that allows developers to create apps for Apple iOS and Google Android devices from a single code base.

Oracle Tap – Service Cloud on Mobile

Mobility is key in today’s digital world, where information travels “at the speed of light” and businesses need to be always aware, and have real-time data feeds.

The Oracle Service Cloud Mobile Agent App – named Oracle TAP – was introduced back in 2013. Since then Oracle has enhanced its capability significantly.

Its aim is to allow Customer Service directors, managers and team leaders to be on top of things, and be able to see what is happening, remotely, from a mobile device.

It is important also to say that the Oracle Service Cloud Mobile Agent App is not a full-blown Agent Desktop, where users can see everything and anything.

The data available in the Mobile Agent App is only that related to the open Incidents. Meaning that you will only be able to see Organisations, Contacts, Tasks, etc. related to open Incidents (i.e. not “Solved”).

That said, the capability is actually outstanding. First, it is very easy to set up, as you just need to add the Server URL (https://YourSiteURL/cgi-bin/InterfaceName.cfg/php/tap/v1), and it is possible to have multiple sites set up.

20170127 Oracle TAP - login.png

The user can create his/her own home page with Charts, and other useful elements that can give an immediate overview of the customer service operation.

20170127 Oracle TAP - Charts.png

The main menu allows the user to access the list of staff (and drill down into the Incidents assigned to each of the staff members), Incidents, Contact, Organisation, Tasks, and even Answers in the knowledge base. The Incidents area, for example, shows “My Inbox”, but also the list of all open Incidents.

20170127-oracle-tap-incidents

Tapping on one of the records (e.g. an Incident) allows the user to see the key details (e.g. Subject, Status, Queue, etc.) as well as the detail associated to it (e.g. Message Thread, Tasks, etc.).

20170127 Oracle TAP - Tasks.png

Mobile Agent app: Customisation coming up!

Following the previous posts about the Mobile Agent app for RightNow CX – Oracle Tap Service and Support – here are some interesting news that will certainly please RightNow CX consultants and developers.

The August 2013 release will allow the customisation of the Incident workspace. Developers will be able to add standard or custom fields for Incidents, Contacts or Organisations into certain areas of the Incident workspace. Those areas are: the Summary section, the Additional Information section and the Contact Details section.

Planned for the November 2013 release, is the ability to create additional tabs and additional sections in the Incident workspace, to add standard or custom fields.

The ability to customise other mobile workspaces is not there yet. But Oracle is planning to provide that in 2014. Custom Objects and Contacts workspace will probably be the two priorities, which would make RightNow CX consultants and developers very happy.

Already available is the ability to customise the descriptive text strings seen in the mobile application via the Message Bases editor in the Dynamic Agent Desktop. Navigating to Configuration > Site Configuration > Message Bases.

Note that the Mobile Agent app main menu will display Incidents, Contacts, Organizations, or Tasks based on the Navigation Set and Profile of the logged in user.

Notice also that any change made via the Mobile Agent app will appear in the record’s Audit Log as has been done via mobile device.

Mobile Agent app: How to get started

Following the previous post about the Mobile Agent app for RightNow CX – Oracle Tap Service and Support – here are the steps on how to get started.

Step 1: Enable and configure the mobile agent app in the Configuration Settings.

Navigate to Configuration > Site Configuration > Configuration Settings > RightNow Common > Mobility.

Step 2: Give your staff members permission to access the mobile agent app.

Navigate to Configuration > Staff Management > Profiles > (Open Profile) > Permissions > Administration > (check the Account Authentication check box in the Mobile Agent App section)

Step 3: Go to the Apple App Store, search for Oracle Tap app and install it.

Step 4: Configure the Customer Service and Support cloud option on your iPad

Enter the URL to your Oracle RightNow CX application:
https:// <your virtual host> /cgi-bin/ <your interface> .cfg/php/tap/v1

Editing settings

Taping the Settings button on the main menu, a user can specify if login credentials are saved, how long the app will wait for a server response, if the data cache is cleared when the application is closed or restarted, and which server is used. Additionally, user can view the version and the license agreements.

Admins can specify the time periods used to initiate an automatic logout and to maintain offline authentication.

By default, the number of seconds the agent can leave the application idle before being logged out is 300 (5 minutes). To change this go to the MOBILITY_IDLE_TIMEOUT configuration setting.
By default, the number of seconds the application will store the agent’s credentials for offline authentication is 28800 (8 hours). To change this go to the MOBILITY_SESSION_TIMEOUT configuration setting.

RightNow Mobile Agent app

In the 2013 releases Oracle introduced the Mobile Agent app for RightNow CX – Oracle Tap Service and Support. A native iPad app that allows users to deal with the daily issues when they’re away form their desks.

A field agent can access critical information (e.g. contact location or phone), find incidents and update them while onsite. A specialist agent can find, reply and update incidents wherever or reassign them. A Manager can monitor every incident and have an overview of what’s going on.

The Mobile Agent app let’s users:

View, filter, search and update Incidents
View, filter and search Contacts
View, filter and search Organisations
View, filter and search Staff
Navigate between objects

And this can all be done offline and then synchronized.

As an image is worth a thousand words, I will leave you a video with a small demo:

Oracle Tap Service and Support from Hernan Capdevila on Vimeo.