Configuration guide: Sustainable IT

Configure your library pack

To get started with this library pack, please ensure all related content is installed and configured appropriately. This page provides guidance on which content is included and how to configure it.

Please keep in mind this is just a guide and represents suggested configurations. You can customize and edit content as you see fit based on your specific environment.

Pre-requisites

This library pack contains content from the following expansion products

Some of these products offer default access to their respective content and can still be used without the expansion products. To learn more about the default thresholds for expansion products, visit the extended documentation.

Note that certain widgets in the sustainable IT dashboard leverage data from the connections events table, which are only available for devices with collectors that report "Infinity only".

Content and dependencies

This library pack contains the following content and dependencies:

TypeNameDescriptionDependencies

Sustainable IT

Data visualization through widgets to detect and drill down into specific information.

Get Consumption Information hourly (Windows)

Returns energy consumption (Wh) data from Microsoft's powercfg.exe tool with a parameter to convert to kgCO2e using a chosen carbon factor.

  • Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.

Get Battery Status (Windows and macOS)

Returns Windows device power plan information.

  • Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.

Get Power Plan Mac (macOS)

Returns macOS Sleep, Hibernation, and Caffeinated status information.

  • Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.

Get Outlook storage info (Windows)

Returns outlook file size and quantity.

  • Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.

Get OneDrive storage info (Windows)

Returns the size of the Business and Personal OneDrive tenant folders.

  • Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.

Set Power Plan (Windows)

Sets a Windows device to a pre-defined power plan.

Sustainable IT: Awareness Survey

Surveys targeted users about how important it is to them for their company to reduce their environmental impact on a scale of 1 to 5. The responses will provide insight into employee sentiment around Sustainable practices.

  • Required to populate specific dashboard widgets.

Sustainable IT: Disable screensavers

Informs users of the best practices for using screensavers and sleep mode. Links are included to offer self-help opportunities.

Sustainable IT: External monitor survey

Ask users about the number of external monitors they use while informing them of the best practices for using multiple monitors. A link is included to offer employees additional information about this topic.

Sustainable IT: Green your inbox

Informs users of the best practices for reducing unnecessary emails. A link is included to offer self-help opportunities.

Sustainable IT: Measuring impact

Informs users of the organization's current sustainable IT goals and impact. An empty space is left open for Nexthink users to populate with relevant information.

Sustainable IT: Repurpose surplus monitors

Informs users of how they can repurpose and/or recycle their old monitors through their service desk. An empty space is left open for Nexthink users to populate with their service desk contact details. A link is included to offer employees additional information about this topic.

Sustainable IT: Save energy and protect your eyes

Informs users of the best practices for reducing screen brightness and keyboard backlight. Links are included to provide additional information about this topic and offer self-help opportunities.

Sustainable IT: Turn off devices

Informs users of the best practices for turning off their devices at the end of the day. Links are included to provide additional information about this topic.

Set Power Plan - Invoke

Asks the user if they agree to change their device's current power plan to the recommended power plan.

  • Required to include self-help with the "Set power plan" remote action.

Configuration guide

To effectively use this library pack, the content must be installed and configured appropriately. Below are some suggested steps to install and configure the content properly before use.

Step 1) Install library pack content

Go to the Nexthink Library and install all required content.

Step 2) Configure remote action(s)

Navigate to the manage remote action administration page to review and edit your remote actions.

We recommend the following configurations for these remote actions:

Name

Trigger schedule

Parameters to edit

Get Consumption Information hourly (Windows)

Scheduled, hourly and every day.

Create separate schedules across different regions to trigger at effective working hours.

Choose CO2 emission factor to automatically output KgCO2e. By default, a factor of 0.436 kgCO2e/kWh is chosen.

Get Battery Status (Windows and macOS)

Scheduled, weekly

Get Power Plan Mac (macOS)

Scheduled, weekly

Get Outlook storage info (Windows)

Scheduled, weekly

Get OneDrive storage info (Windows)

Scheduled, weekly

Set Power Plan (Windows)

Manual

By default, this remote action refers to its dependent ‘Set Power Plan - Invoke’ campaign.

Get Consumption Information hourly

This remote action returns energy consumption data directly from Microsoft’s powercfg in watt-hours, broken down by individual components: CPU, display, network, and disk. When triggered, the remote action returns the energy consumption from the last hour of each active device that successfully executed it.

To retrieve data at the appropriate time across different time zones, you should create separate schedules across different regions.

Step 3) Edit campaigns

Navigate to the manage remote action administration page to review and edit your campaigns.

For each installed campaign, please ensure to:

  • Customize the sender name and image.

  • Review and adjust questions.

  • Publish the campaign when you are ready to use it.

We recommend the following configurations for these campaigns:

Name

Trigger

Priority

Name

Trigger

Priority

Sustainable IT: Awareness Survey

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: Disable screensavers

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: External monitor survey

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: Green your inbox

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: Measuring impact

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: Repurpose surplus monitors

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: Save energy and protect your eyes

Manual

Not urgent

Sustainable IT: Turn off devices

Manual

Not urgent

Set Power Plan - Invoke

Remote action

Not urgent

Survey campaign

The Sustainable IT: Awareness Survey campaign gathers sentiment data to output and visualise on the Sustainable IT live dashboard. Based on preference, this survey can be sent out to chosen user groups by, for example, location.

Awareness and self-help campaigns

All other awareness and self-help campaigns are optional and should be sent out based on information discovered in the dashboard.

Usage guide

Your content is now configured and ready to be used. For usage overview and recommendations, you can visit the usage guide:

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