#### Configuring E-Mail Gates to Receive Problem Reports

The Trouble Ticket System e-mail support in Parallels Business Automation - Standard works as follows:

1. Provider or reseller system administrator creates one or more support mailboxes to receive problem reports (e.g., support@provider.com, vip-support@provider.com, etc., where provider.com is provider's or reseller's domain). Later, these e-mail addresses are to be passed to customers to send problem reports.
2. Then provider system administrator sets forwarding from the support e-mail addresses created to the special e-mail address ts_gw@management-node.com (in actual Parallels Business Automation - Standard installation management-node.com is replaced with the actual hostname of the computer that runs Parallels Business Automation - Standard, i.e., the Management Node). The ts_gw@management-node.com e-mail address is created by default during Parallels Business Automation - Standard installation and cannot be changed. This e-mail address designation is to deliver problem reports to the Parallels Business Automation - Standard Trouble Ticket System.

   Note: If a firewall is configured on a Management Node, a system administrator must configure it in such a way that mail that came from support e-mail addresses could pass the firewall. Thus, resellers shall agree upon the support e-mail addresses with provider.

3. Provider or reseller staff member creates one or more Mail Gates for each of the support e-mail addresses. Mail gates recognize and accept problem reports by e-mail they are addressed to. After a problem report is accepted, the corresponding trouble ticket is created automatically and placed in the queue defined in the corresponding mail gate.

   Important: For the fresh Parallels Business Automation - Standard installation, the default mail gate is already set up. The default mail gate is a special one. It cannot be deleted or even edited. It does not have any support e-mail address in its settings and this means that this mail gate is pre-set to the ts_gw@...address. The default mail gate works like a 'catch-all' e-mail for all problem reports sent by e-mail that do not match any other mail gate but were not rejected and somehow have fall into Parallels Business Automation - Standard. Thus, the default mail gate allows not to lose problem reports that do not match any other mail gates. Please remember that the ts_gw@.. e-mail address is a service one and do not tell it to your customers.

4. Support e-mail addresses can be offered to customers.

Messages Content Type Supported and Attachments Handling

MIME multipart message content type is supported. The messages that contain attachments and both text and HTML content in the message body, are processed as follows:

- The first found message body part of either text/plain or text/html Content-Type is taken as Problem Description, converted into a text format and shown on a trouble ticket details screen. This allows always having well readable text in trouble ticket description.
- Attachments (if any) are detached from message before creating a trouble ticket for security purposes. Thus, the built-in Trouble Ticket system does not support attachments sent with problem reports. To process e-mail problem reports with attachments, you can use the external helpdesk.

To configure the e-mail communication for the Trouble Ticket System:

1. Create support e-mail addresses and set up the forwarding in the way described above.
2. Open the Account Director submenu and select Support Manager.
3. Click Setup on the Support Manager submenu.
4. Select the Mail Gates tab from the set of Trouble Ticket System settings that appear.
5. Click the Add Mail gate button.
6. Fill the form that appears:
   1. Enter the mail gate name into the Title field. This name is just for your reference and it does not affect the Trouble Ticket functionality in any way.
   2. Type one of the previously created support e-mail addresses into the Mailbox field.
   3. You can activate or disable the mail gate by checking or clearing the Enabled box respectively. When a mail gate is enabled, it creates trouble tickets in accordance with problem reports that came to the support e-mail address specified for a mail gate. If a mail gate is disabled, it accepts mail anyway, but does not create trouble tickets.
   4. If you want to check the sender e-mail address and create trouble tickets for problem reports that came from the registered Parallels Business Automation - Standard users e-mails only, then check the Only registered users box. If you want to accept problem reports from all senders (without respect to whether a sender e-mail belongs to Parallels Business Automation - Standard user or not), then leave this box clear.
   5. Specify the maximal size of an e-mail containing a problem report: select an e-mail size units (Kb or Mb) from the drop-down menu next to the Max length field and type the maximal e-mail size (in selected units) into this field.
   6. Select the queue the problem reports coming to the mail gate are to be placed from the Default queue drop-down menu.

      Note: A queue defines the default problem watcher (one of your staff members). When a trouble ticket is created or a ticket status is changed in any way, the watcher is notified by e-mail. Watcher can be re-assigned later, per ticket.

   7. Select the category the problem reports coming to the mail gate are to be labelled from the Default category drop-down menu.
   8. Select the priority the problem reports coming to the mail gate are to be labelled from the Default priority drop-down menu.
7. Click the Save button.

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