Halo PSA - idemeum integration

Integration options

There are several integrations that we support with HaloPSA today:

1. Create tickets for elevation requests
2. Approve elevation requests from tickets
3. Request JIT accounts from tickets
4. Disable JIT accounts from HaloPSA

Create tickets for elevation requests

Overview

With this integration when users request elevations, the ticket will be automatically created in HaloPSA. When the elevation is approved (let's say with mobile device), the ticket will be automatically closed. Inside the ticket there will be a link to navigate to idemeum and approve the request. If you want to approve the elevation request with a button click, please also read through the next section → Approve elevation requests from tickets

Create custom fields in Halo

These fields are used to associate the request ID as well as the idemeum customer name in the ticket. These fields are mandatory if you want to use the approval from tickets with custom integration.

• We need to create two custom fields - CFidemeumCustomerName and CFidemeumElevationRequestId
• Navigate to Configuration → Custom objects → Custom fields
• Click New

• For Field Name use idemeumCustomerName
• For Field Label use idemeum_customer_name

• Keep the rest as defaults and save the configuration
• Repeat the same steps for creating the second field idemeumElevationRequestId

Configure HaloPSA agent

In this step we will create an API-only agent to use with HaloPSA application.

• Navigate to Configuration → Teams and agents → Agents and add a new agent by clicking New button

• Provide the agent username
• Make sure you check the box for Is an API-only Agent

• Assign agent to the Default team of your choice and add the working hours
• Save the configuration

Now we will need to configure the proper permissions:

• Click Edit to configure the agent
• Navigate to Departments and teams tab
• If you are using teams, make sure the team you have chosen has the following permissions:
  • Can be assigned to
  • Can see unassigned tickets for this Team
  • Can see Tickets assigned to other Agents in this Team

• If you are using departments, make sure the permission Modify all is added
• Now click on Permissions tab and do the following:
  • For Feature access choose the following:
    • Tickets Access Level to Read and Modify
    • Clients Access Level to Read Only
    • Users Access Level to Read Only
    • Assets Access Level to Read Only

• For Ticket permission choose the following:
  • Can add new Tickets
  • Can edit closed Tickets
  • Can view Unassigned Tickets
  • Can view Tickets that are assigned to other Agents
  • Can Re-assign Tickets
  • Can Edit Tickets Which Are Not Assigned To Them
  • Can always update Ticket Statuses and re-assign Tickets outside of actions
• For Asset type restrictions choose the following:
  • Allow use of all Asset Types

• Save the agent configuration

Configure HaloPSA application

The way HaloPSA allows other systems to make calls into their system is by creating an application.

• Navigate to HaloPSA admin portal
• Access Configurations → Integrations → HaloPSA API and click View applications

• Now click New to create a new application
• Provide application name
• Choose Client ID and Secret for Authentication method. Save the Client ID and Client Secret as you will need this information for idemeum configuration.
• For the agent drop down choose the agent that we created in the previous step

• Click on the Permissions tab and add the following permissions:
  • read:tickets
  • edit:tickets
  • read:customers
  • read:assets
• Save the configuration

Configure idemeum connector

• Access your parent tenant admin portal
• Navigate to Global Settings → Integrations
• Click Add integration and then choose Outbound integration

• Choose Halo PSA from the connector dropdown
• Now enter the URL of your HaloPSA instance and provide the Client ID and Client secret that we created in the previous step

• Save the configuration

Customers mapping

Once the integration with HaloPSA is added, you will see the new HaloPSA column in the Tenants section.

Automatic mapping

As a first step idemeum will try to automatically map the customers in idemeum to tenants in HaloPSA. Here is how we will try to do that:

1. Use the Display Name of the customer in idemeum to search for a customer in HaloPSA
2. If no match was found using the Display Name, then we would use the Name of the customer in idemeum to search for a customer in HaloPSA
3. If no match was found using the Name, then the admin will have to manually link the customers

Manual mapping

The admin can manually link a tenant from idemeum with one in HaloPSA by providing the name of the customer from HaloPSA.

• Navigate to idemeum admin portal and access Tenants section
• Search for the customer name
• Click on the Link button

• Enter the HaloPSA customer name to map this idemeum customer to
• Once found we will display the customer name from HaloPSA in the PSA column.

Ticket creation

Here is how idemeum will create the tickets in HaloPSA:

• Idemeum will create a ticket of type Incident
• We will use these default values for the ticket:
  1. category - Business Applications
  2. urgency - Medium
  3. impact - Single User Affected

• In the ticket there will be information about the user that requested access to which application from which device.

• idemeum knows from which desktop name the elevation was initiated from so will lookup that name in your assets list. If found then we will associate that asset with the HaloPSA ticket.

• There is also a link to navigate to idemeum portal and respond to the request

• Once the ticket is approved or denied the HaloPSA ticket will be updated with the status Closed. If we can find an agent in HaloPSA with the email address of the idemeum user that approved/denied the elevation request then we will assign that agent to the ticket. 

• When a ticket is closed we will add some information on how the ticket was closed in the closure notes: who closed it, was the elevation approved or not, for this user or at a tenant level, etc.
• We will also add a closure time of 5 mins. If you want to use other value rather than 5 mins contact idemeum support.

Approve elevation requests from tickets

By default there is a link in the ticket details that allows you to approve the elevation request. The new tab will open and you will be redirected to idemeum to approve the request. You can simplify this process by configuring an API-based integration to approve / deny the elevation request with a single click.

Create custom integration in HaloPSA

• Navigate to Configurations → Custom integrations

• Click New
• Provide the integration name Idemeum API integration
• For base resource URL enter the URL of your parent tenant. i.e. https://nikmsp.idemeum.com
• For Authorization choose API key
  • For Key enter X-Idemeum-Api-Key
  • For value obtain the API key from idemeum (navigate to Global Settings → Integrations and view the API key there)
• Add the API key to header

• Save the configuration

Create custom methods in Halo PSA

• Navigate to Configurations → Custom integrations → Custom methods
• Click New to add the custom approve method
  • Provide the method name idemeum - approve elevation request
  • For integration dropdown choose Idemeum API integration
  • For method choose POST
  • For method URL add /api/integrations/elevation/request/approve

• For Authorization choose Inherit from integration settings
• Add the following to Headers
  • Key Content-Type
  • Value application/vnd.dvmi.sdk.elevation.request.approval+json

• Add the following to JSON Body. Here we will use the custom variables that we created before.

{
    "idemeumElevationRequestId": <<CFidemeumElevationRequestId>>,
    "idemeumCustomerName": <<CFidemeumCustomerName>>,
    "userElevationMode": "USER"
}

• Save the approve method
• Now we will create the deny method
  • Click New to create second method
  • Provide the method name idemeum - deny elevation request
  • For integration dropdown choose Idemeum API integration
  • For method choose POST
  • For method URL add /api/integrations/elevation/request/deny

• For Authorization choose Inherit from integration settings
• Add the following to Headers
  • Key Content-Type
  • Value application/vnd.dvmi.sdk.elevation.request.approval+json

• Add the following to JSON Body. Here we will use the custom variables that we created before.

{
    "idemeumElevationRequestId": <<CFidemeumElevationRequestId>>,
    "idemeumCustomerName": <<CFidemeumCustomerName>>
}

• Save the deny method

Create ticket actions in HaloPSA

Now we will create two custom ticket actions that will call these approve and deny methods.

• Navigate to Configuration → Tickets → Actions
• Create New to create the first method
  • Provide the name Idemeum - approve elevation request
  • Choose the sequence you desire
  • Assign the icon, color and button name
  • Action type is Generic action

• For System use choose Execute an Integration Method
• For method choose the idemeum approve method that we created
• Check Allow users to use this action
• Choose Is a quick action
• Choose the status to Closed after the action is executed

• Save the configuration
• Now we will create the second Deny action.
  • Provide the name Idemeum - deny elevation request
  • Choose the sequence you desire
  • Assign the icon, color and button name
  • Action type is Generic action

• For System use choose Execute an Integration Method
• For method choose the idemeum approve method that we created
• Check Allow users to use this action
• Choose Is a quick action
• Choose the status to Closed after the action is executed

• Save the configuration

Assign these methods to your workflow

This will depend on your HaloPSA configuration and what workflow you are using. We are using a standard incident workflow for our demo.

• Access Configuration → Tickets → Workflows
• Choose the workflow where you will enable these actions
• Edit the workflow and make sure methods are assigned to it

Now these methods will start showing up on your elevation request tickets and you can approve / deny requests with a single button click.

Request JIT accounts from tickets

Overview

MSP technicians can request Entra ID JIT accounts right from HaloPSA tickets. HaloPSA and idemeum integration leverages embedded iFrame sections.

Configure session length

This step is optional, but will improve technician experience when accessing just-in-time accounts. By default the idemeum session length is set to 8 hours, meaning you have to re-authenticate with mobile every 8 hours. You can extend this session to 30 days so that you can seamlessly access JIT accounts for any customer tenant right from HaloPSA and you will stay authenticated for 30 days.

• Navigate to your MSP tenant admin portal
• Access Settings → Global and then define the Session expiration duration

Configure HaloPSA

Overview

In HaloPSA you can create a Custom tab that will point to your idemeum tenant. When managing PSA ticket you can click on that tab and get immediate access to your idemeum portal.

You have 2 options for navigation:

• Navigate to parent MSP idemeum tenant - you can simply specify the URL for your MSP tenant, i.e. <msp name>.idemeum.com. In this case technicians will access custom tab, MSP idemeum tenant will be loaded, then technician will search for customer tenant, access it, and will request JIT account.
• Navigate directly to idemeum customer tenant - you can leverage HaloPSA variables to navigate directly to customer idemeum tenant.

Set up HaloPSA variables

We will set up the integration to directly navigate to idemeum customer tenant from PSA ticket.

• Say we have an idemeum tenant with the display name Demo PAM tenant and the URL demo-nikpot.idemeum.com.
  • We can route based on Demo PAM tenant with the following URL https://<tenant name>.idemeum.com?customerDisplayName=<value>
  • Or we can router based on demo URL with the following https://<tenant name>.idemeum.com?customerName=<value>
  • In this guide we will use display name
• In HaloPSA we will use default variable Client reference and assign the value Demo PAM tenant to this variable

• We populate this variable with Demo PAM tenant value in the customer section by simply editing a customer in HaloPSA

• We can tag all our customers in the same way in HaloPSA so they are mapped to a customer tenant in idemeum with the display name that is used.

Set up custom tab

• Navigate to Configuration → Custom objects → Custom tabs in HaloPSA
• Create a custom tab like in the image below. As you can see for URL we are using the URL of MSP idemeum tenant, and we are passing a parameter from the variable $CLIENT_REFERENCE. You can specify the variable that you have chosen for integration.

Test integration

• Open any ticket in Halo PSA
• Click on idemeum tab
• You will be presented with the idemeum user portal for that customer. You can see all workstation and Entra apps to request JIT accounts and view credentials

Disable JIT accounts from HaloPSA

Overview

Technicians can request Entra ID JIT accounts right from HaloPSA with our existing iFrame integration.

However, requested JIT accounts will be disabled after a certain period of time, by default it is 4 hours. If you want to immediately disable these requested JIT accounts, you can leverage idemeum APIs.

Obtain API key

• Access your MSP portal admin dashboard
• Navigate to Settings → Integrations → Inbound integration and create a new integration
• Provide an integration name
• The API key will be displayed. Make sure you save it somewhere safe as we only display it once (you can always delete the client integration and recreated the client in case you lose the API key).

Configure HaloPSA

• In HaloPSA navigate to Configuration → Integrations → Custom integrations
• Click New

• Create an integration and provide the following details:
  • Base resource: https://<yout_tenant>.idemeum.com/api/integrations
  • Authorization: API key
  • Key: X-Idemeum-Api-Key
  • Value: <SDK_API_KEY that you obtained in the idemeum admin portal>
  • Add to: Header

• Save the configuration
• Now in the same tab click on Methods to create an HTTP POST method
• Configure the following:
  • Provide method name
  • HTTP method → POST
  • Path → /entrajitaccounts
  • Headers:
    • Content-Type: application/vnd.dvmi.entra.app.user.disable+json
  • Body provided below

{
    "customerDisplayName" : "<your_customer_display_name>",
    "technicianEmailAddress" : "<user's email address>"
}

As an example here is what we used:

{
    "customerDisplayName" : "Demo PAM tenant",
    "technicianEmailAddress" : "nik@nikpot.com"
}

• Once you Save the configuration you can test the API call for this integration. You should see the success response.
• Now you can navigate to Integrations → Custom integrations → Integration runbooks and create a run-book to call idemeum API when the ticket is closed.