Specifications

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pointing to a subdirectory containing
scripts and other required files. This is
the Web home directory where the cus-
tomers would first attempt to contact
the customer service department.
Now it was time to create the CENTS
database in SQL Server. The installation
notes gave us a detailed roadmap to
build the CENTS database. From the
enterprise manager, we created the
CENTSDB database in the CENTSDB
device. We followed that with creating
the logging database for CENTS,
CENTSDB_LOG. We then had to create
the CENTS tables and other related
database objects. We accomplished this
task by executing the CENTSALL.SQL
file from the SQL window which creat-
ed all the appropriate data structures in
the CENTSDB database. The database
setup was complete, and the SQL Server
Enterprise Manager showed us the
tables that had been created (Figure 12).
Finally, we set up the Web server with
a virtual directory that a client would
access through his/her Web browser. An
HTML file within the corresponding
physical directory would be the client’s
first point of contact with the customer
service department. CENTS had pro-
vided some sample files for this directo-
ry, so we copied these files into this
directory and made a change to a file
called “RESPONSE.CEN” to point to
our server address. Several cascading
CENTS servers can be designated in
this file to form a server rollover group.
If one server is unable to connect a
caller to the appropriate CSR, the next
server is enlisted to attempt the connec-
tion. Our Server CENTS setup was
complete.
Workbench CENTS
Workbench CENTS is the adminis-
trative part of the CENTS system.
From here the CENTS administrator
can setup various options of the system
such as Stores, Topics, CSR Groups,
and CSRs. A store is the Internet site
that CENTS handles and can contain
multiple Topics.
A Topic is a reference to what the
customer issue is about. For example,
Topics could be sales information, cus-
tomer support, technical support, etc.
CSRs are individual customer service
representatives which are entered in the
system. They must be placed in a CSR
Group before they can handle customer
issues. As you may deduce, Workbench
CENTS is used prior to the system roll-
out to set up the entire customer service
center. All data entered into the system
is saved in the CENTS database on the
Server CENTS machine through
ODBC connections.
We installed the Workbench CENTS
on a Windows 95 client on our net-
work. The setup program copied the
appropriate files into the Workbench
CENTS directory. It also created the
CENTS ODBC data source on our
machine.
Before starting the Workbench, we
had to set up the CENTS data source to
point to the CENTS database on our
server. We accomplished this task by
invoking the ODBC32 applet from the
control panel and specifying our server
as the database source (Figure 13). This
step was required since Workbench
would employ ODBC to communicate
with the CENTS database on the server.
When we started Workbench, the
application displayed its main window
C T I LABS
FFiigguurree 1122..
CENTS: Tables
viewed from MS SQL Server
Enterprise Manager.
FFiigguurree 1133..
CENTS: Data source configured
from the ODBC Setup screen.
FFiigguurree 1144..
CENTS: Main window
of the Workbench component.
FFiigguurree 1155..
CENTS: Creating a
new CSR in Workbench.