The meaning of cryptic table prefixes and names in the ServiceNow Database

[sebastian_g_snc]

"What do these cryptic prefixes stand for ?"

In my last training, I was asked, what the prefixes on the ServiceNow tables mean. Since I thought that this was a good question from a newbie, I started compiling a "glossary".

If you spot errors or know what to put instead of the ?, please let me know and I will amend the article 🙂

alm Asset Lifecycle Management
ar Archive table
asmt Assessment
ast Asset (Software Asset?)
atf Automated Testing Framework
aws Amazon Web Services
bsm Business Service Map (Schema Map)
bom Financial Services Operations (formerly Banking Operations Management)
cab Change Advisory Board
cert (CMDB Audit ?)
chg Change Request
clm Contract Lifecycle Management
cmn Common Tables (Master Data Tables)
cmdb Configuration Management Datbase
csm Customer Service Management
cxs Contextual Search (?)
dl Data Lookup
dmn Demand
dscy Discovery
ecc External Communication Channel
expert Wizard functionality
fm Financial Management
fx Foreign Exchange (Rate)
gsw Guided Setup
ha (High Availibility?)
_ih_ / _ihub_ Integration Hub
imp Import Set Table
jrobin some round robin tables
jwt (JSON Web Token?)
kb Knowledge Base
live Live Feed and Connect
m2m Many to many relationship tables
mtg Meeting
ngbsm Next Generation Business Service Map
planned_task
pa Performance Analytics
pc Product Catalog
pm Project Management
pwd Password
rm Release Management
sa Service Analytics
sam Software Asset Management
sc Service Catalog
sla Service Level Agreement
sn_bm ServiceNow Benchmark functionality
sn_bom Financial Services Operations (see also "bom")
sn_bom_credit_card Financial Services Card Operations
sn_bom_loan Financial Services Loan Operations
sn_bom_payment Financial Service Payment Operations
sn_ind_tmt_orm Order Management for Telecom
sn_ins Insurance (part of Financial Services Operations)
sn_nowebonding eBonding for Telecommunications
sn_rpa_fdn Robotic Process Automation
sp Service Portal
svc Service
sysauto Scheduled Job
sys_amb Asynchonous Message Bus
sys_atf Automated Test Frame
sys_aw Agent Workspace (?)
sys_db Database Objects
sys_playbook playbook Experience
sys_push Push Messages
sys_sg Mobile Development (SkyGiraffe)
sys_soap SOAP Web Services
sys_ux User Experience
sys_ws REST Web Services
tm Test Management
ts Text Search
ua Usage Analytics (?)
vtb Visual Task Board
v Database View
wf Workflow

[alonsotorres]

I thought ALM stood for "Asset Lifecycle Management"

[sebastian_g_snc]

Hi Alan, thank you for the correction: I changed it. This is what I am lookin for: collaboration 🙂
Did you spot anything else?

[alonsotorres]

CLM - Contract Lifecycle Management

DSCY - Discovery

[sebastian_g_snc]

thank you 🙂

[Bryan Tay3]

sa -> "Service Analytics"

[Jonathan F]

Here is another mystery one: "st"

Example table names in my company's instance: st_portal_favorite, st_on_call_hour, st_license_detail_metric. They seem completely unrelated.

[sebastian_g_snc]

good one - let me see what I can find...

[YASHIK RAMMOHAN]

ds - i am guessing is Document Services or simply documents. Below are the table names

ds_document

ds_document_lists

ds_document_list_entry

[Joel L]

Hello, when i look into database views none of them start with v_ but there are quite some in a OOTB instance. A collegue told me this is more kind of a virtual table but it seems also not the whole truth. Some attributes he checked will have a created date of 'now' when refreshing which will change to to actual now when refreshed again. I try to understand it better in the context of plugins. Maik Skoddow hast written a comprehensive article on that which i want to review, maybe it is explained there... 

[jayragavan]

st - remote tables in scoped applications

u_st_ - remote tables in global applications

[Slava Savitsky]

There are two tables with "core_" prefix: [core_company] and [core_country]. I've always wondered what makes those tables so special that they have deserved a dedicated prefix instead of the seemingly suitable "cmn_", which is used for departments. locations and other master data tables.