Integrating chatbots with Nexthink

Chatbot integration flow

The integration follows the scheme below:

The chatbot system controls the interaction with employees, the content of the conversations and the logic used within the conversation.
The Nexthink platform provides APIs that the chatbot calls during conversations. Through the APIs, the chatbot either retrieves data from Nexthink related to a particular conversation using the NQL API or triggers a remediation with the Remote Action API.
Optionally, Nexthink provides outbound connectors to export large amounts of data using Data Exporters and Webhooks. Use these to export:
- A large amount of user data and information about their devices.
- Event data to trigger proactive chatbot conversations.

The need	Integration approach
Identify employee or device context Retrieve properties from user or device objects, including their Nexthink identifiers.	NQL API - Retrieve user or device object data for a specific username or device identifier. (Optional) Data Export - cache device or user objects data required for identification, such as username, device name and type, last seen date and other information on a systematic schedule. Use this approach to enrich the CMDB system used by the chatbot solution.
Diagnose employee device issues For a given device or user object, identify possible issues that the employee is facing to narrow down remediation actions to follow.	NQL API - Retrieve detailed information about an employee device including device health metrics, application metrics or any other data collected by the Nexthink platform.
Remediate user device issues Trigger an automatic remediation based on diagnostics. Trigger an automatic remediation based on a user specific request.	Remote Action API - Trigger the execution of a remote action on an employee device. NQL API - Retrieve the results of a remote action execution.
Proactive identification of issues Retrieve all users or devices potentially impacted by an issue in order to proactively communicate the issues with employees.	Data exporters - Retrieve detailed and extensive information from the Nexthink platform and export it into a data lake or other solution to analyze and determine if proactive communication should be initiated with the employee. Webhooks - Get a notification if specific events or specific alerts are triggered so that impacted employees can be proactively identified.

The need

Integration approach

Identify employee or device context

Retrieve properties from user or device objects, including their Nexthink identifiers.

NQL API - Retrieve user or device object data for a specific username or device identifier.
(Optional) Data Export - cache device or user objects data required for identification, such as username, device name and type, last seen date and other information on a systematic schedule. Use this approach to enrich the CMDB system used by the chatbot solution.

Diagnose employee device issues

For a given device or user object, identify possible issues that the employee is facing to narrow down remediation actions to follow.

NQL API - Retrieve detailed information about an employee device including device health metrics, application metrics or any other data collected by the Nexthink platform.

Remediate user device issues

Trigger an automatic remediation based on diagnostics.
Trigger an automatic remediation based on a user specific request.

Remote Action API - Trigger the execution of a remote action on an employee device.
NQL API - Retrieve the results of a remote action execution.

Proactive identification of issues

Retrieve all users or devices potentially impacted by an issue in order to proactively communicate the issues with employees.

Data exporters - Retrieve detailed and extensive information from the Nexthink platform and export it into a data lake or other solution to analyze and determine if proactive communication should be initiated with the employee.
Webhooks - Get a notification if specific events or specific alerts are triggered so that impacted employees can be proactively identified.

Prerequisites

The following are the preliminary steps required for your Nexthink environment:

Planning

Verify that your API usage complies with Nexthink’s API usage limits. Refer to the Nexthink developer portal documentation for more information.
Understand how to match users between your chatbot solution and Nexthink. Nexthink Collector collects the username, SID, and UPN, if it is activated. You can use additional data for mapping, including user email, if you activated the Connector for Microsoft Entra ID in your Nexthink instance.

Credentials

The system requires credentials to secure the calls from your chatbot solution to your Nexthink tenant, and to secure outbound connections from the Nexthink platform for Data Exporters and Webhooks.

Configure API credentials. Refer to the API credentials documentation for more information. Ensure that you have the following permissions activated:
1. NQL API
2. Remote Actions API
(Optionally) Configure connector credentials if you plan to use outbound integrations. Refer to the Connector credentials documentation for more information.

Preparing content

Configure and activate the Nexthink content that your chatbot integration retrieves:

Preconfigure NQL queries within the Nexthink user interface so that the NQL API can call them. Refer to the Chatbot use cases documentation for more information. Typically, required queries include:
1. Query to retrieve devices and their basic information for a given user.
2. Query to retrieve ad-hoc diagnostic information for a given user or device.
3. Query to retrieve the status and outputs of a remote action.
Remote actions need to be created, configured and activated for the trigger type API. Nexthink library offers a large set of remote actions that you can use for various use cases.