ServiceNow Remote instance spoke implementation process.

[Karishma Dubey]

Integrate your local and remote ServiceNow instances to export, import,Create and manage records from your local instance.

This spoke requires an Integration Hub subscription.

Supported versions.

This spoke was built for the Orlando version and later.

Use case: Copy incident along with attachment from local instance to remote instance.

Terms to be used in this article.

• Local instance: This is the ServiceNow instance from which the communication is initiated and established.
• Remote instance: This is the ServiceNow instance with which the local instance communicates.

Step 1:

Install the ServiceNow remote instance spoke plugin sn_now_remote_spk in local and remote instance.

Step 2: On Remote instance

1. Create OAuth application registry entry.   
2. Application Registry -> New -> OAuth API endpoint for external clients.
3. In Redirect URL, specify the URL of the local instance. e.g., https://<local-instance-name>.service-now.com/oauth_redirect.do
4. Default Grant Type: Authorization Code
5. Make a note of Client ID, Client Secret and Redirect URL

Step 3: On Local instance

1. Register remote ServiceNow instance as OAuth Provider
2. Navigate to System OAuth > Application Registry.
3. Open for the record, "RemoteSpoke".
4. On the form, fill the noted values.
5. Client ID: Client Id created in the remote instance.
6. Client Secret: Client secret created in the remote instance.
7. Authorization URL: URL of the remote instance. e.g., https://<remote-instance-name>.service-now.com/oauth_auth.do
8. Token URL: URL of the remote instance. e.g., https://<remote-instance-name>.service-now.com/oauth_token.do
9. Redirect URL: URL of the local instance. e.g., https://<local-instance-name>.service-now.com/oauth_redirect.do
10. Default Grant Type: Grant type used to establish the token. Select Authorization Code.

Step 4: On Local instance

1. Create credential record.
2. Navigate to Connections & Credentials > Credentials.
3. Click New.
4. Select OAuth 2.0 Credentials.
5. On the form, fill in the fields.
6. Name - Name to uniquely identify the record.               
7. OAuth Entity Profile - Profile that got created in the step [3].
8. To generate the OAuth token, click the Get OAuth Token related link. Here during the Authorization Code flow enter the remote instance username/password (user needs to be created in remote instance). An OAuth token will be generated which will be to read/write data into the remote instance table. So please make sure that this user has enough permission to read/write into tables.

Step 5: On Local instance

1. Create a connection record.
2. Navigate to Connections & Credentials > Connections & Credentials Aliases.
3. Open the alias record, ServiceNowRemoteInstance.
4. From the Connections tab, click New.
5. Give a name and associate the credential record created in step [4]. 
6. Connection URL: URL of the remote instance. e.g., https://<remote-instance-name>service-now.com

Step 6: On Remote instance

1. Create a Credential record.
2. Navigate to Connections & Credentials > Credentials.
3. Click New
4. Select Basic Auth Credentials.
5. Name: Name to uniquely identify the record.
6. Create one user in local instance and give the required permission.
7. Username: Username of the user created in local instance.
8. Password: Password of the user created in local instance.

Step 7: On Remote instance

1. Create Connection record.
2. Navigate to Connections & Credentials > Connections & Credentials Aliases.
3. Open the alias record, ServiceNowRemoteInstanceLocalAlias.
4. From the Connections tab, click New.
5. Credential: Credential record created from step [6].
6. Connection URL: URL of the local instance. e.g., https://<local-instance-name>service-now.com/.

Step 8: On Local instance

Create a flow to create incident and copy attachment from local to remote instance.

Flow to update attachment from local to remote instance.

Note:

• For domain separated instance configuration needs to be created in global domain.  
• It is very important that the user with which you authenticate to generate the token has the necessary roles and access. It needs to have access to read from sys_db_object to retrieve the tables, read access to be able to retrieve Import Set Tables and it needs to have access to read/write on the table you are going to insert/update/delete a record.
• I was facing an issue with the flow. After saving the flow values were getting vanished. For this, ServiceNow team has updated the OOB code in our instance and problem has been created for this issue which will be taken care in further release.

[Nageswar kudupu]

Some doubt about moving update sets to prod. Do we need to configure directly in prod or can we move update sets from lower to higher instances because I configured using test and dev .

[Karishma Dubey]

Hi,

Credentials, keys etc. should be different in all environments. Flow you can move with update sets. Other steps need to be configured manually.

[Rajiv Handa]

What's the purpose of creating a connection and credential record on the local instance? And what access level should that credential have?

[Jon G1]

I have no idea what ServiceNow is doing with this spoke. The documentation is uncharacteristically bad. You can find the same set of instructions in about 6 different places with minor modifications. All seem to mention that local credential requirement and not one explains what it is for or what roles should be assigned if any. I've left feedback multiple times on documentation and KBs. Months later, still no action.