To first understand what Call Home Web can do for you, here is a brief description of IBM Call Home:
IBM Call Home constantly monitors the health and functionality of your system. Should an event requiring service occur, the Call Home function first notifies both you and IBM Support of the event. The function then automatically opens a service request and transfers preliminary critical diagnostic data to authorized support personnel. By obtaining information in this way, IBM Support can quickly identify problems and develop an action plan for problem resolution giving you a more effective first contact support session and ultimately, an overall reduction in time to resolution. And rest assured, all information transmitted to IBM is encrypted and sent via secure protocols. Only critical diagnostic information is provided; none of your business data is ever transmitted.
To complement the Call Home function, IBM has announced a new Web interface, Call Home Web, which lets you view Call Home information for your systems. It provides a consistent consolidated view from multiple types of IBM Systems.
Call Home needs to be enabled on your system before you can use Call Home Web.
Call Home Web Features
The Dashboard contains a view of your most recent events and a summary of the last 7 days as well as an exportable system summary. The Manage my systems area allows you to view and edit your system information. You may also organize your systems into groups. An additional feature lets you view details specific to your systems of your Call Home data along with information such as the last automated problem report received, contract expiration, last inventory received and last heartbeat received. The Events by my inventory section shows events for all of your systems, for a group or for an individual system. Call Home Web also contains a comprehensive Call Home assistance section that provides How-to and help information.
Support Notifications
You can subscribe to receive notifications about reported events, missed heartbeats and pending warranty or contract expirations for your system from the System detail page within Call Home Web. This allows you to stay up-to-date with your Call Home activities and system information.
To use Call Home Web, you must first have Call Home enabled on your system and then add your system to Call Home Web. For information on how to register your system(s), go to Registering systems.
Products Supported
Call Home Web supports most Power Systems and PureFlex Systems based on Power Architecture, as well as IBM Storage Systems that report Call Home information.
Learn More
Visit YouTube to view the informative IBM Call Home Web videos:
If you are unable to view YouTube videos, or prefer to use an IBM site, they are also available at our Inside Systems Support blog. Just search on “Call home web video” to locate the videos. Additional Electronic Support information and blog entries are also available.
I’d like to thank Linda Edd for this week’s blog. Linda is a senior software engineer and support portal enablement specialist, responsible for ensuring IBM provides accurate, quality support content to our clients. She works closely with individual support representatives from all the Systems brands, with the client-facing websites and online applications that provide support and fix information.
This blog post was originally published on IBMSystemsMag.com and is reproduced here by permission of IBM Systems Media.