how to populate business applications, business services and their CIs

[Efra Pruneda]

I just watched this video

CSDM In A Nutshell - YouTube

it explains a lot of theory of how the CSDM data model is meant to be used but it doesn't provide any examples.

I would like to see a video or a document that explains in detail how to use ServiceDesk OOB forms to build business applications, business services and their CIs. I tried to used the form for the cmdb_ci_business_app table and I do not see anywhere how to tie application services to a specific app. Do I need to start from the bottom? in other words, I need first to find/create all the CIs that are part of each environment? but then how do I link them to an application service that will eventually be tied to the business application. can I please have someone send me an actual example where you see how this should be done?

thank you

Efra

[EricDohr · Accepted solution]

A few tools to become familiar with

Service Builder - Here is a great video from Mark Bodman and Caitlin Morse on the topic.  This is a really nice guided setup for Business Services, Technical Services, and Service Offerings.  As part of this process, you can note what Application Service(s) an Offering has a relationship with.  

Application Service Wizard - In this video, Mark walks through the various Application Service population methods and how it ties to a guided setup for the Application Service Wizard.  Part of the wizard, you can relate the Application Service to Business Application(s), Service Offering(s), and parent Application Service(s).  This will automatically build out the CI Relationships as a result following CSDM.

If you were to create a Business Application record directly on the form, via an API, or a data load, you would need to manually create a CI Relationship.  You can do this via a few methods

• On the Business Applicaiton form, you can add a CI Relations (formatter) that allows you to add or remove relationships following the CI Class Heirarchy suggested relationships.  See below for a screenshot.  Note, if you have multiple views of the form, they may all need this added.
• On a record producer for a Business Application, you could script a CI Relationship based on input
• You could create a CI Relationship directly on the cmdb_rel_ci table

Hoping these videos may help you out

CI Relations formatter

[robert_w]

Hi Eric,

Is there any guidance on what the standard relationship definitions should be? For example, if you add a dependency between a Business Application and one (or more) Application Services (DEV / QA / PRD in my case), do you use "depends on" or "runs on" or "consumes" or something else entirely? The list can be overwhelming and I'm not always sure which one is the right one to pick. I also want to make sure that I choose the correct relationship type to support other functions on the platform, for example when you "refresh Impacted Services" on a Change or Incident, I'm worried that having the wrong relationship type specified will influence that functionality.

Thanks!

Robert

[EricDohr]

My go to for relationships is the CSDM 4.0 draft.  Business Applications Consume Application Services.  Application Services would either depend on or run on underlying infrastructure. 

Definitely check out the CSDM Overview for relationships (suggested).  There is a good visual as seen below. 

[Cassandra Kittl]

Hi Eric - is there a way to create a new Business Application outside of APM through a role?