Cranleigh School
iPads supported
operators and 1 dedicated iPad technician
1,020 students
staff members
Building efficient integrations with the TOPdesk API
The TOPdesk API is an application programming interface that opens up TOPdesk and lets other tools communicate seamlessly with our system. This allows for building stable integrations to make life easier for organizations, for example, when automating processes to improve efficiency.
Cranleigh School implemented TOPdesk in 2020, hoping to customize their service delivery with the API. We spoke to Fred Bradley, Web Developer, about how the school is using the TOPdesk API and the benefits they have experienced.
About Cranleigh School
Cranleigh School, based in Surrey, is one of the UK’s leading co-educational independent schools. Together with Cranleigh Preparatory School, it offers boarding school and day education for pupils aged between 7 and 18. Set in 280 acres of Surrey countryside, Cranleigh was founded in 1865 and is now home to more than 1,000 students across both schools.
The API allowed us to tailor the solution to our needs and build effective integrations between TOPdesk and our other systems.
Fred Bradley
Why the API?
A unique aspect of Cranleigh School is the fact that they currently have two web developers in their IT team who can work on the service desk. Therefore, when it comes to service delivery, Cranleigh is innovative in its approach by building processes from scratch.
“An API was a requirement for us when it came to choosing a new helpdesk provider,” says Fred. “This allowed us to tailor the solution to our needs and build effective integrations between TOPdesk and our other systems.”
Having built a strong foundation during the implementation process, Fred and his team immediately went to work on the TOPdesk API.
Utilizing the API: Dashboards and iPads
The team started by creating dashboards for Incident Management: “We run a dashboard in our offices to give an overview of tickets (logged, assigned, unresolved, closed, and open). We publish this dashboard to the customer-facing service desk, offering transparency as to how much we have on. The ticket tracker is also a great motivator because it shows our team how productive we are with closing tickets.”
The TOPdesk API allows the team to import data into a dashboard design that fits their needs. Having seen how easy this was to set up, thanks to TOPdesk’s documentation, Fred could see the potential of the API for Asset Management.
“The documentation is very clear. It encouraged me to experiment with different scripts and endpoints to see what we could achieve. This is when I started looking at how we could create Asset Management templates to export and import data from our audit system into TOPdesk.”
The school has 1,484 iPads that are being managed with this method. By creating a daily scheduled job that automatically processes data on the iPads, Fred and his team can see real-time information, such as a link between a person and an asset, if an iPad is out of storage space, and if the operating system is being used.
“Our next development is to create action sequences that will proactively help us to raise tickets by preempting when errors will occur on the iPads. For example, it can ensure that students are on the latest version of the iOS software so that their devices remain compatible with tools for learning.”
This will help Cranleigh to become more efficient, ensuring that pupils’ learning is never disrupted and allowing the school to take advantage of the latest developments.
An interface for streamlining
The TOPdesk API has enabled the school to streamline processes that had become unwieldy. Tracking assets manually, such as over 1,000 iPads, can lead to errors.
Cranleigh’s automated process, on the other hand, now ensures that data is as accurate as it can be and minimizes the risk of human error. This means that errors will be not only caught but avoided.