Google Wave: Up and Running

Sample Use Case: Running an IT Help Desk in Google Wave

College Bopper, Inc., is a small business that provides a wide array of products for college students, including school-themed clothing and knick-knacks. The company’s divisions rely on an internal IT department that provides comprehensive support for everything from desktop computers to the company’s intranet. College Bopper, Inc., has witnessed increased sales in recent years, necessitating an expansion in staff and IT resources.

The IT department has decided that it has outgrown its help-desk application, which was developed in-house when the company was much smaller. Rather than purchasing a new help-desk system, the IT department has decided that it will first experiment with the use of Google Wave as a help desk. The real-time, multiparticipant nature of waves and ease of use of the Google Wave Client seem like a great match for the company, given that most of the other staff is already used to other online tools.

The IT department decides that it will use the standard Google Wave service prior to investing in setting up its own internal wave provider service. After enlisting some volunteers from various departments around the company, the IT department proceeds to train these users on how to use Google Wave and how support calls should be logged via waves.

In the next couple of months, employees begin to initiate waves to request help-desk support with a variety of issues. Rather than exchanging emails or telephone calls, ...