Service Catalog - Default Catalog Item availability

[Bharath Padaki]

I had an interesting service catalog enhancement request come up the other day and I was hoping the larger community could help me validate it. The basic use case is as follows -

Currently on Service Catalog, every active catalog item is available to all users of the platform unless specific user criteria has been applied on the item to restrict its availability. Before user criteria, entitlement scripts allowed admins to restrict availability. The enhancement request is focused around the default availability of the catalog item. The request asks us to deny access by default, which means that when a catalog item is created or published to the Service Catalog, it wouldn't be immediately available for users. Specific user criteria would need to be applied on the item to make it available.

My opinion, based on my experience in the field, is that this is not the right approach. I would assume that more catalog items are generally available for all users of the platform than ones with restricted availability. Hence, it would be easier to restrict individual items as needed than making items available on a need by need basis.

Looking forward to hearing what you folks think about this!! If you would respond by voting in the following manner, that would help me build consensus around the topic -

1. Vote 1 - If you believe the current behavior is sound. Allow by default, Deny by choice
2. Vote 2 - If you believe the behavior needs to change. Deny by default, Allow by choice

[Community Alums]

In my opinion, a catalog offers all the available services/items to users so practically it would be wise to allow items by default and restrict them by choice.

Regards, Bharat

[tiyasa]

Sharing my experience from past project. We had similar requirements where a catalog item will be visible to end user only when user has been granted specific roles.

To achieve this , two SC's were created : one to grant access - which adds user to a group having specific roles to view the 2nd SC. Once this item is completed, user will be able to view the original SC.