Start with CI population first or start with population of conceptual and logical entities?

[Suggy]

Hi,

For a greenfield implementation, is there any best practice/recommendation of populating CI's first or populating conceptual and logical entities first?

[Andreas Borell]

There is an online guide with recommendations for how to implement CSDM. The answer is in there. 

Implementing the CSDM framework in stages (servicenow.com)

Hint : the guide says that you don't start with the "discoverable" mass number CIs.

[VivekSattanatha]

In my perspective, it's feasible to execute both tasks concurrently. While you're in the process of populating the Configuration Items (CIs), you can also work on constructing the associated logical entities.

[Barry Kant]

Hi Sunny, 

it depends what your short term goal is (ITSM or APM) or what data is ready to use. (quick win). 
Sometime a support model does exist on paper and can be put in Technical Services/Offerings fairly quick. Maybe the same for the business side (this in general requires more discussions).
Provisioning a CMDB is most of the times a longer term activity. Discovery requires security discussions and searching for data sources/data owners requires time as well. 

I have done projects were we only had a service model and no CMDB at all for the first months. That model was ready to consume CMDB when provided but still the user could start register tickets on business offerings. 
The other way around is also possible. When the CMDB is provided it does make sense to at least have your technical services and offerings so the CIs are supported. 

Like many times the answer is....it depends...

BR, 

Barry

[Diego Peukert · Accepted solution]

Hi Suggy,

I've been implementing Discovery for a while, and I follow this sequence in the implementation:

1 - Discovery SN capturing the OOTB of the technologies;

2 - Important Non-Discoverable Attributes I verify a way to automate based on data I receive from Discovery, such as putting the team that supports that CI based on Technology + CI Name, filling in whether the environment the server serves is Production, Homologation or Development based on its IP range, etc;

3 - Following the CSDM, I begin to help the client deal with the layers that are not automatically discovered, such as Business/Technical Services and Service Offerings;

4 - As these layers are loaded onto the platform and what connects them is the Application Service, if Discovery is already evolved enough, I start with Service Mapping, if not, I can make the Service Map manually or via Query Builder, using the CIs that Discovery has previously created/updated, in which case it's not a 100% automated service map, but a service map built using the platform's native functions;

5 - Finally, I link the Application Services with the Service Offerings they support.

This way I have both the links promoted by Discovery itself and the Link between the technical and business side following a previous mapping of Services x Applications that was carried out in items 3 and 4.

When mapping Services and Offers, it's good to bring together people from Enterprise Architecture and the client's PO's, so that they come away with the same vision of services, and for the Application Service layer, it makes more sense to bring in the application support team and IT managers, as they have a vision of how the application is actually deployed. Even if you bring in the development team to try to set up the Application Service, you won't succeed, because this team knows about the functions, configurations and layers of the program and not actually how it is deployed in the infrastructure, which could generate an Application Service with incorrect components, whether it is set up via Service Mapping or manually.

I hope I've helped.

See you later.