Automating Application Management with Freestyle Orchestrator in Omnissa Intelligence

Introduction

Omnissa Intelligence provides organizations with deep insights and analytics by aggregating and correlating data from multiple sources across their entire digital workspace. IT admins can generate reports and view dashboards on the status of devices, applications, delivery process, workflow, and even employee productivity, all with a focus on mitigating issues, making informed business decisions, and sharing information across additional teams and departments. 

Additionally, Intelligence offers administrators the ability to accelerate IT tasks and issue resolution using automation through Freestyle Orchestrator (formerly Intelligence Automations). Freestyle is a low code orchestration platform for automating complex business use cases by sequencing tasks based on a trigger. The automation engine within Intelligence eases the burden of application management by taking automatic action based on specific rules created by IT admins. Freestyle can even be extended to third-party services using REST API through out-of-box and custom connectors.

Let’s look at a few examples of how Freestyle Orchestrator in Intelligence can help IT admins with application management.

Application License Reclamation

Licensing software for end users can be a costly proposition for any organization. Therefore, companies must ensure that the licenses they purchase are assigned to users who are using the software. But how do IT admins ensure that licenses are assigned to the correct end users? 

Using Freestyle Orchestrator in Omnissa Intelligence, IT admins can automate the process of monitoring application usage and uninstalling applications that are not being used, thus freeing up software licenses for other end users. Using the app usage data collected by Experience Management (DEEM), a Freestyle Orchestrator workflow can trigger tasks to flag an app on an end user’s device for uninstallation if it is not used within a defined period. If the application is not used within the timeframe specified, the workflow can then execute an uninstallation process, removing the app from the device. 

Let’s look at how this workflow would function. We’re going to use Docker Desktop as the example app for this workflow. We start by setting the Data Source to App Activity Data and schedule the workflow to run on a weekly basis. We are specifically looking at when the Docker Desktop was last in the foreground on the device. To get this, we are using the App Last Foreground value.

This workflow is scheduled to run once a week, which allows it to re-evaluate the configured triggers against each device and respond dynamically based on changing circumstances. Configuring the workflow in this fashion allows you to address multiple trigger scenarios with a single workflow. As you read through the steps included in this workflow, you should see how executing the workflow on a weekly basis can address conditions within your ever-changing environment.

As you can see, we have two possible triggers in the workflow. The first triggers the workflow if App Last Foreground is NOT WITHIN the last 90 days. A second trigger uses two values; first if App Last Foreground is within the last 14 days AND if the device contains the tag Docker Underused in Workspace ONE UEM.

Once the workflow is triggered, it checks the App Last Foreground value, and if it is NOT WITHIN the last 90 days, the workflow checks to see if the device has been assigned the Docker Underused tag in Workspace ONE UEM. If the device hasn’t yet been tagged, Intelligence will tell Workspace ONE UEM to add the tag to the device, and then send an email to the end user, letting them know that the Docker Desktop app will be uninstalled if they do not use the app within the next 30 days.

If the device is already tagged in Workspace ONE UEM, the workflow checks if App Last Foreground is NOT WITHIN the last 120 days. If this is true, Intelligence tells Workspace ONE UEM to uninstall the Docker Desktop app from the device and open a ServiceNow ticket to inform the IT admins that the license has been reclaimed.

If App Last Foreground is WITHIN the last 120 days, the workflow will end, and the triggers will be rechecked the next time the workflow executes. Returning to the earlier filter where the workflow checked if App Last Foreground value was NOT WITHIN the last 90 days, if this check is false, the workflow then checks to see if App Last Foreground is WITHIN 14 days and if the device is tagged with the Docker Underused tag. If both are true, Intelligence will tell Workspace ONE UEM to remove from the tag the device.

Software Engineer Device Onboarding

Ensuring that new employees receive the appropriate software is crucial to a smooth onboarding experience. When dealing with software engineers, it is important to make sure they have access to the right development tools as soon as possible. Freestyle Orchestrator in Intelligence can help with getting the right software to the right employees.

This example requires two workflows. The first workflow sends a survey to the end user’s device once it is enrolled, and the second deploys appropriate software based on the survey results. Let’s start by looking at the survey.

The survey is created within Experience Management and requires Workspace ONE Hub Services to be configured. In this example, the survey asks three questions related to the development software required by the end user.

In Freestyle Orchestrator, the first workflow is configured to run automatically when a device Enrollment Status is Enrolled AND when the User Groups CONTAINS ALL OF the group Software Engineer. This will trigger the survey on the device, and the end user can answer all the required questions.

Once the survey is completed by the end user, another workflow is triggered which will install the software selected by the end user. This new workflow will cycle through each question from the survey and evaluate the end user’s answers. In this example, the first question asks the end user to select the programming language they will be using. Based on the response, this new workflow will tell Workspace ONE UEM to execute a script which will install the appropriate software on the device. For instance, if the end user has selected Python as their programming language, the script will install the development tools required for Python. You are not limited to executing scripts, you can also configure the workflow to tell Workspace ONE UEM to install internal or public apps as well, or any other action available, including creating a ticket in a third-party helpdesk system such as ServiceNow.

This process will cycle through each possible answer in the survey and execute any configured scripts or actions per the end user’s survey answers. When the workflow is complete, any development software required by the end user should be installed on their device.

As mentioned above, you can also have the workflow create a ticket in a third-party helpdesk system using a Custom Connector. For our example, we are creating a helpdesk ticket in ServiceNow if the end user has identified a need for GitHub Co-Pilot. The ticket submits a request for license approval for the software. Once approved, the helpdesk staff can install Co-Pilot on the end user’s device.

Prompting for Application Management on Unmanaged iOS Devices

In this third example, we look at a simple but necessary workflow for ensuring that critical apps are managed on unmanaged devices. In some BYOD situations, organizations may wish to have certain apps, such as Microsoft Outlook, managed to apply specific settings and controls. However, end users might either reject the app management request outright or simply not understand the prompt. When this happens, organizations might wish to trigger a re-prompt for app management for the managed application.

Like the first workflow discussed above, this one is scheduled to run on a weekly basis. For this example, the workflow is scheduled to run on Mondays at 10:00 AM. The workflow checks Apps Data from Workspace ONE UEM. The filters check to see if the App Name value INCLUDES Outlook, if Platform value INCLUDES Apple iOS, and if the Installation Status Reason value INCLUDES ManagementRejected.

If all three conditions are met, the workflow will tell Workspace ONE UEM to trigger a Sync Device action. This will result in a new prompt to the end user requesting management of Microsoft Outlook on their iOS device. If the end user rejects the request, the workflow will run again a week later until the end user accepts the management of Outlook.

Summary

As demonstrated in the above three examples, Freestyle Orchestrator in Omnissa Intelligence is a powerful automation platform that offers IT admins increased efficiency when it comes to managing applications on devices. Whether you manage Android and iOS mobile devices or Windows and macOS desktop devices, Freestyle Orchestrator can ease the burden of software license management, accelerate the device onboarding process, enforce application management on unmanaged devices, and much more. With its access to a wealth of data from across your entire digital workspace and its integration with third-party services, Freestyle Orchestrator can help organizations take application management to a whole new level.

For more information on Omnissa Intelligence, check out the Getting Started with Workspace ONE Intelligence tutorial on Tech Zone.