Many to Many relationship between Business Application and Business Process

[sstrobel]

In V4 of the CSDM Model, the cmdb_ci_buisness_process became a foundational data element.  I have some stakeholders that want to tie business applications to business processes.  In the cmdb_ci_business_application table there is a column apm_business_process.  This would indicate that the thinking was that this would be a "related" relationship between the two, but a one to many relationship between app to process.  I do have business applications that can potentially service multiple business processes.  I'm not certain yet if the need for a business application to be tied to multiple business processes is solved by utilizing the platform host/platform app capability and being more granular with the business application definitions.  Has anyone else encountered this and if so, what solutions have you tested and/or are using?

[CMDB Whisperer]

I would not expect the platform host/app aspect to eliminate the need to have multiple business processes associated with the application.  While it's true that it could reduce the multiplicity of those relationships due to more granularity of the business application breakdown, there are still areas where the same platform hosted app or component application is involved in multiple business processes, since business processes can also be broken down and made more granular, and since the nature of any given business application could provide shared services that are used across multiple business processes.  In my view the single business process field has always seemed more problematic, to the point that I have considered hiding it and using the many-to-many list exclusively.

[sstrobel]

Good morning @CMDB Whisperer , thank you for your assistance.  Please clarify when you say using the many-to-many list, are you referring to defining a relationship between a business process and business application?  If you have a relationship, what relationship type do you propose and do you know of any impact of this choice on using the full APM module? I see a couple of relationships that might work, provisioned:provisioned by, provided:provided. 

[CMDB Whisperer · Accepted solution]

Sorry, I misspoke.  I was thinking about the many-to-many table between Business App and Task.  You are correct, there is no many-to-many list for Business App and Business Process.  I would tend to think about this as a Business Process ==depends on==> Business Application.  That said, to my knowledge there is no prescriptive relationship defined for Business Process at this time, at least not in CSDM.  So it's still a bit subjective.  But in my view you are more likely to have a Business Process that depends on multiple Applications than an Application that depends on multiple Processes.  Business Process seems like the thing that you would want to understand from a Business Continuity perspective, for example.  And this means you would want to understand what Applications and Services the Process depends on, so that you can manage the risks associated with each one.  But again, this is still ambiguous from CSDM perspective.  You could even have a Business Service that depends on a Process which depends on another Business Service.  One of the big questions for sure.

[Community Alums]

i would use Business Application ---Supports:Supported By --- Business Process relationship , for now