KB review – add, edit, or remove KB and FAQ entries

This screen for editing KB entries allows both the Question AND the Answer to be edited. It also allows any Categories associated with the question to be reset, if your library uses Categories, and for a KB review period to be attached to the question as it gets saved into the KB (and the FAQ where appropriate). 

The KB is a subset of the RefTracker database that indicates that this is a a quality answer.  If the KB is made available for public access (parameter 0.15 for the KB and 0.16 for the FAQ), clients will be able to see the information in the question and answer field and search on them through the KB and FAQ screens in the client interface.

Only Regular users and above who have KB edit permission can use this KB review screen, and they find it in the Actions screen or menu list for closed questions.

If you indicate in the Answer screen that a question should be “Recommended for KB inclusion”, the Question is placed in KB review status. If you have permission to put questions in the KB, you will be immediately shown this KB review screen. The question is not included in the KB until you complete this KB review screen. If you do not have permission to put questions in the KB, the question will simply be placed in KB review status – you will never see this KB review screen. Should a user with KB review permission click on a question in KB review status the question will be displayed using the KB review screen on the presumption that they will want to complete the KB review process.

Some organisations have policies as to the way in which Answers should be formatted for inclusion in the KB, for example the inclusion of library specific keywords to aid in retrieval, so be sure to follow your library’s policies when using this screen.

A common policy is that any Question attachments should be removed before questions are added to the KB (for privacy reasons).  A [Manage question attachments] link is provided in this screen to allow the attachment to be removed.  You may want to consider adding any relevant parts of any attachments as images within the body of the question.

Note that because clients can ONLY see the Question and Answer fields (and any attachments to them) you may need to adjust the information showing in these fields so that the question and answer fields include all of the relevant information.  You should take this opportunity to ensure that the data in the Question and Answer fields provide a complete summary of the information that you want to make available for clients to see and search. For example, if a question arrived as an imported email, the Subject line is not part of the Answer field and information in that Subject line, may need to be included in the Answer field as you use this KB review screen to include it in the KB (and FAQ where appropriate). Even more importantly, is a question contains personal information it needs to be removed.  You will also want to remove things like staff signoff’s.

When you are happy with the Question and Answer text, choose any appropriate Categories and Expertise if they are in use, and then choose a Review period. The review period is the amount of time until this question needs to be reviewed for continued relevancy for remaining in the KB. (System administrators can control the values appearing in this Review period drop down list by going to System>Code tables menu and choosing the Review period code table.)

This screen can also be used to add or remove questions from the FAQ (Frequently asked question subset of the KB) using the “FAQ status” line, if this concept is enabled in your system (parameter 0.16). Including a question in the FAQ, means that it will appear in a special Frequently Asked Questions list in your web site (or, if you use it that way, to indicate that this is a KB entry should be provided to your web master for approval before they include it in your web site).

You will also be able to record Resources used if they have been defined for use with the Request form used for this question.

Fields like “Closing status” that are mandatory for completion, but have been previously set are highlighted by a coloured box immediately to the left of the field.  The coloured box provides a reminder that even though these fields have been previously set, they should be reviewed for correctness before saving this this screen. 

Then click on Save and your updated entry will be updated and included into the KB.

But what if I don’t want to complete the process of putting it in the KB right now?

To have been presented with this screen, your question will be in KB Review status, or you will have chosen to use the KB review function from Actions. If you decide not to go ahead with inserting this question in the KB at this time you can simply move away to another screen. Your question will remain in KB review status (not in the KB, but indicated as ready for review for inclusion) and can be edited for KB entry again at any later time.

If you want to make some changes, but do not complete them, you should save the question into the KB, then immediately use the KB review function again – when the KB review screen displays, simply move away to another screen without making any changes. This process will remove the question from the KB, and re-set a status of KB review so it can be edited again at a later time.

What if I’ve changed my mind and I no longer want this question to go in the KB?

If you decide that this question should not be included in the KB after all, simply change the KB status line radio button to “Exclude from Knowledge base” and click on Save. The question will not be put in the Kb and will no longer be indicated as being in KB review status.

Exercise

When you have made any required changes (e.g. removal of private information, rewording of the question to be more generic, inclusion of keywords, removing any private attachments, etc.), click on Save, and the changes to be saved and the question will be placed in the KB.

Finding and reviewing questions in KB review status

When you place a question in the KB, a KB review date is set for that record.  There are two ways to find questions in the KB that have passed their KB review date, and so need to be reviewed.

Firstly you can go to System>Statistics>Statistics reports and run the Data extract report.  Ever data extract report includes the KB review date information.  Sort on that column to find the records that need to be reviewed.

Alternatively, go to the Simple Search screen, and in the Database parameter tick just “KB”, then whatever other parameters you need to use.  When ONLY KB is ticked in the database parameters the far right column of the display will show the KB review date.  Click on that column heading to sort by most or least recent date to aid your review.