Normalization Data Services - Questions About Existing Data, Canonical Companies and Mappings

[Mika Latvala]

I'm investigating Normalization Data Services (NDS) in depth and have reviewed OOTB Business Rules, Script Includes and runtime behavior.

Confirmed findings

1. NDS consists of three separate concepts (tables)

• cds_client_name = canonical/normalized names
• cds_client_mapping = discovered name → canonical name mappings
• core_company = actual Company records

I have not found a direct reference relationship between core_company and cds_client_name. The OOTB logic appears to connect them primarily through hashes and names.

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2. canonical=true does NOT require a matching cds_client_name record

Example:

core_company: Mircosoft, canonical=true

but:

cds_client_name:

This matches the OOTB logic in Make Canonical Company:

if (!cdsmap.next())

setCanonicalFlag(current);

which effectively treats unmapped companies as canonical.

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3. Real-time normalization works for some fields

I added a mapping:

Mircosoft -> Microsoft Corporation

Then I created a new CI and selected:

Manufacturer = "Mircosoft"

Manufacturer was automatically changed to "Microsoft Corporation"

So Manufacturer normalization clearly works.

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4. Normalization is NOT generic

Using the exact same Company record:

Vendor = "Mircosoft"

did not normalize.

This suggests normalization is implemented for specific fields/tables rather than for all core_company references.

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5. Reference qualifier updates are NOT the same thing as normalization

I found:

CanonicalServiceFilter

which returns:

canonical=true

when:

glide.cmdb.canonical.company.qualifier.enabled=true

This means:

"show only canonical companies"

and:

"automatically replace aliases with canonical companies"

are two different mechanisms.

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What I still cannot explain

Question 1

When a new mapping is created later:

Mircosoft -> Microsoft Corporation

what OOTB process revisits existing core_company records?

I have not found any logic that changes canonical=true -> canonical=false for an existing alias Company.

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Question 2

What exactly does CanonicalUpdaterWorker do?

I've found many references to it through:

AJAXCanonicalizationWorker

but not the implementation itself.

Is it native code?

Does it:

• update existing references?
• update canonical flags?
• process existing Company records after new mappings are introduced?

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Question 3

How is stale data supposed to be handled?

Company record created on 2019 with name "Mircosoft" with attribute canonical=true

Later "Mircosoft" -> "Microsoft Corporation" mapping was added.

What is the intended OOTB outcome?

• Keep both records?
• Mark Mircosoft as canonical=false (and how to actually do it)?
• Delete it?
• Something else?

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Question 4

Has anyone successfully deployed NDS beyond Manufacturer/Publisher use cases?

Most of the OOTB logic I found appears focused on Manufacturer, Publisher and Model Manufacturer, `

but qualifier updates affect Company references much more broadly.

How are people handling:

- Vendor

- Customer

- Partner

- Service Provider

references in real-world deployments?

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Question 5

How are we supposed to implement normalization to other than manufacturer fields? This includes ootb fields, like "Vendor" but also custom fields we have created referencing to core_company table.

Any insight from somebody familiar with NDS internals would be very helpful, especially around existing data reconciliation and canonical flag lifecycle.