Asset Import in Servicenow

[Ranjit Singh Ra]

I am importing assets in the Servicenow, however I am not sure for the following this:

1) What should be the Model Category of these Assets? I have read other community articles and mostly everyone have selected the Model Category what is provided in the Excel sheet. I have about 1000 Assets and some of them have different Vendor Names.

2) Is it necessary that the CI should also be created for those Assets? If Yes, how and why? If No, how and why?

Can anyone help me with these things?

Thank you

[Abhishek_Thakur]

Hello @Ranjit Singh Ra ,

Model Category in ServiceNow typically categorizes assets based on their type or function. If the Excel sheet provides this information, it's a good practice to use it for consistency. However, if some assets have different vendor names, you might need to adapt the model category accordingly. It's essential to maintain consistency and accuracy in categorizing assets to ensure efficient management and reporting.

Creating Configuration Items (CIs) for assets depends on your organization's configuration management practices and requirements. Generally, CIs are used to track and manage the relationship between assets and other configuration items in your environment. If your organization follows ITIL or similar practices, creating CIs for assets can help in configuration management, impact analysis, and change management processes. However, if your organization doesn't require CIs for assets or if it's not practical for all assets, you can skip this step. Just ensure that you have a clear understanding of your organization's configuration management policies and requirements.

If my answer helped with your question, give thumbs up and accept my solution.

Regards,

Abhishek Thakur

[Ashok Sasidhara]

As you are manually importing the data, you need to ensure that you are defining the correct model category based on the type of device which you are going to import (E.g. Computer for any records whose model indicates that it is a computer). If you are not sure about any record, connect with suitable stakeholders to find out the type of device. It is very important to ensure that model category is correctly specified during creation itself.

Also the vendor names and model names which you use should be aligned with the exact nomenclature of the records present in the core_company and product model table respectively. If the company or model for any of the records is not existing already, it is better to create them first and avoid creating any new records in these referenced tables while importing. 

If your organization requires to treat those assets as CIs also (e.g. to manage incidents or changes related to those), CI should be created for those. For example, computers are typically treated as both asset and CI. So for the records that you are importing, you need to finalize this after discussing with relevant stakeholders to understand the requirements of the organization. Refer the following URL for information on asset and CI management. 

https://docs.servicenow.com/bundle/washingtondc-it-service-management/page/product/asset-management/...

[Dlam]

I am interested to know how other sites manage hardware assets in your ServiceNow instance.

This is how our business process work

1. New hardware asset records are imported into the hardware table (alm_hardware) and coalesce on Service tag / Serial number without a linked Configuration Item (CI) because no CI is available at the time.

2. PCs are enrolled into Intune which creates CI.

Recently, a duplicate asset record is created in alm_hardware and Now support advise us it was created via an OOB Business rule: hen a new record is inserted into any table that starts with cmdb_ci provided the following condition is met:

javascript
(current.asset.nil() || (!current.asset.ci.nil() && current.asset.ci != current.sys_id))
&& (!SNC.CMDBUtil.isExcludedFromBR(current.getTableName()))

We are advised not to modify the OOB Business rule but create a new businese rule and deactivate the OOB one.