CEOS CINTEX Federation Help Desk

Help Desk Services.

The following is a list of services that participating Data Centers/Help Desks might implement. This is an extensive list and it is meant only as a guideline to list the types of services that might be useful. It is understood that services will be provided by individual agencies on a "best effort" basis.

1.	Provide a help desk.
2.	Assist users in accessing and understanding CINTEX systems.
3.	Assist users in identifying and locating data sets.
4.	Coordinate with other Centers to assist users. a) Determine site(s) to which a user inquiry should be referred. b) Inform the user of these site(s), and include support contact information. c) The site(s) which receive the referral should acknowledge receipt of the inquiry to both the user and the referring site.
5.	Provide information on the status of orders to users. Suggested Order Status Fields: a) Received b) Processing c) Pending d) Completed
6.	Provide an order history to individual users.
7.	Track data order accuracy and completion.
8.	Provide a means (perhaps a utility) for users to submit questions and comments.
9.	Comments regarding Web Gateway/client functionality or usability should be copied to the Federation Help Desk.
10.	Data availability inquiries not pertaining to the data center which received it should be forwarded to the appropriate site.
11.	Compile user services statistics.
12.	Generate reports/statistics on orders received through CINTEX.
13.	Provide system demonstrations.
14.	Arrange support from science and data personnel.
15.	Provide a bulletin and update with the latest news.
16.	Provide up-to-date data valids information.
17.	Be knowledgeable of processing history and product revisions.
18.	Provide support for field experiments.
19.	Develop and maintain an explanation of data center services.
20.	Collect and compile data quality comments from user/investigators.
21.	Provide information/literature on other areas/activities that the agency is involved in.
22.	Provide contact points to other areas of the agency.
23.	Provide a summary brochure or flyer that highlights popular data sets. This literature can be distributed to other participating data centers as reference material, and can be included in public outreach activities.
24.	Put a description in routine user correspondence of the local data center's involvement in the CINTEX program. " The XXX data center is a member of the CEOS Interoperability Extensions (CINTEX), whose mission is to enable Earth Observation data and information services to be more accessible and usable to data providers and data users world-wide through international coordination. Developing international standards for catalogue systems and achieving greater catalogue system interoperability are among its priorities."

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11. Compile user services statistics.

Helpful procedures to assist in compiling user services statistics:

1. All emails with questions and problems should go into a daily email folder until answered, and then go into a monthly folder and at the end of the month everything that has been satisfied should go into a yearly folder.
2. Log all phone questions and problems on a telephone message log.
3. At the end of each month compile monthly user statistics.

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