ServiceNow Update Set Batching - Best Practices & Lessons Learnt

[The SN Nerd]

Hi Community,

ServiceNow introduced Update set batching in Jakarta.

This is our experience so far:

Usage

At this stage, we have used it for Releases, where we create an empty Parent Update Set and relate Update Sets to be included in the release as children.

Pros

• Can remove individual items from the release at the last moment.
• Similar to merging, except you can essentially unmerge but unrelating a child at any time
• Easy to deploy, only need to commit Parent Update Set
• More Granular Update Sets makes it easier to tie changes to requirements and documentation

Cons

???

There isn't much information on it at the moment, especially around Best Practices, so I thought I would reach out and see what the Community Experience is so far.

Will you keep merging Update Sets, or will you start batching? Is this the way forward?

[The SN Nerd]

Does anyone know how I can change this to Discussion from a Question?

[Jason B]

Which instance are you first applying the parent? Dev -> Uat -> Prod Typically we need to move individual update sets from dev to uat ASAP so testing can happen right away.

[The SN Nerd]

It is purely situational.

In your case, I would create move the Update Sets individually to UAT, then create an empty parent in UAT and related all Update Sets for inclusion in your release.

[Daniel Billing]

i usually end up with 1 parent set and multi child set on the first move from DEV to TEST. then i move future update sets individually and on the relate them to the parent on the TEST instance.

Would be nice with an append feature so the "Retrieve" function add new child relationships based on an already retrieved batch set

[AR16]

Does anyone know the "best practice" way to move batch update sets from test to prod that have fixes. For instance, we have a batch update set called "Batch US 123" that is move to test. Once in test, we realizes changes need to be made and we create a new update set in dev called "Fix- Batch 123." We test the fix in test instance and it is ready to move to prod.  

Should we be adding the "fix- Batch 123" update set to the "Batch 123" and then moving to prod?  or do we move them individually?