Getting started with Catalog Builder to scale your catalog development

[Dawn Jurek]

The Service Catalog team at ServiceNow is busy cooking up innovation for scaling your catalog development, and the first iteration of the new Catalog Builder is available in the Quebec release.

In Catalog Builder, catalog administrators build templates for catalog items. Then business owners build catalog items from those templates. Even if you're a business owner and you've never programmed or built a catalog item before, the Catalog Builder allows you to create your own catalog items via a safe, controlled process, in a user-friendly interface.

We've created the Catalog Builder video series to show you how Catalog Builder works, and we've compiled the tips below for both administrators and business owners to help you get started.

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Tips for creating catalog item templates

If you're a catalog administrator and need to create a catalog item template, watch our video for an example scenario and to see a demo. Then read the tips below to get started.

Gather requirements for the template

You'll need to answer the following questions for the catalog items that your template will produce.

Standard catalog item versus record producer?

Should this template create standard catalog items or record producers? You need to pick one or the other for each template. Standard catalog items will automatically insert records into the Requested Item table. For record producers, you need to specify the table in the Destination tab.

Do you want to provide item owners with suggestions for name and description?

You can provide suggestions for the item name and description in the Details tab. The item owner can edit these values.

Who can access the template?

Who will have access to the template to create catalog items? Business owners need the catalog_builder_editor role to access all catalog templates, but you'll want to set additional user criteria that users must meet to access your template in the Template Details tab. If the criteria that you need doesn't exist, create a new user criteria record by navigating to Service Catalog > Catalog Definition > User Criteria and clicking New.  

Where will catalog items appear?

Catalog items will automatically appear in one or more catalogs that you select in the Locations tab. You can also specify in which category (or categories) catalog items will appear.

What questions should appear in the catalog item?

You can specify question sets (variable sets) that will appear in every catalog item in the Questions tab. Business owners will add additional questions as needed. To create or edit a question set, navigate to Service Catalog > Catalog Variables > Variable Sets.

Do you need to restrict the types of questions that can be added to the catalog item?

For questions that the item owner adds, you can restrict the available question types, such as Text, Yes or No, etc., by clicking Define owner permissions in the Questions tab.

Do you need to control attachments or other portal settings?

You can hide attachments, or make them mandatory, in the Settings tab. You can also control other portal settings such as hiding the Add to wishlist or Add to cart options.

After you are done specifying all the attributes of the catalog, you may now want to specify the guard rails to control what you want the business user to edit. There may be attributes that you may not want them to edit at all, while you may want some of them mandatorily filled in. On the other hand, there could be attributes like catalog, category and user criteria where you’d want to allow them to edit selections, but only from within the options you specify. These guard rails can be specified in the Overrides section of the template.

Who can access the catalog item?

You can set who catalog items are available for, or not available for, by selecting user criteria in the Access tab. 

Duplicate and repurpose templates

Once you have templates set up for creating catalog items, you can duplicate them and edit them as needed to streamline your template building process. In the Catalog Builder, click Catalog item templates for a list of available templates. Click a template to select it, then click Duplicate.

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Tips for creating catalog items

If you're a business owner and you need to create a catalog item, watch our video below for a demo, then see our tips below to get started.

Gather requirements for the catalog item

You'll need the catalog_builder_editor role to create a catalog item from a template. Open the template in Catalog Builder and click through the tabs to see what information you'll need. Items that appear with a lock are set in the item template and are not editable.

What additional information do we need from the user?

The template may already have questions set up, but you'll need to add additional questions as needed.

Do you need to control how/when questions display?

Catalog UI policies allow you to control when a question is visible, mandatory, or read-only. We're using the term dynamic behavior settings in Catalog Builder to describe the same functionality. To access dynamic behavior settings for a question, point to the question and click on the UI policy icon.

What if my catalog item requires more complex capabilities?

The Catalog Builder is designed to cover most use cases, but if your catalog item requires more capabilities than what's in the template, your catalog administrator can add that functionality for you.

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Let us know what you think!

We want to hear from you! After you've had a chance to take Catalog Builder for a test drive, let us know if you have any ideas for improvements on the Idea portal. Your feedback can help us decide what enhancements we make and when! 

For more information:

Catalog Builder video series - playlist on the ServiceNow Support YouTube channel

Catalog Builder - Product documentation

Your catalog is ready to fly the nest - Blog post on the Community by Harsh

First Impressions of the Catalog Builder - Blog post on the Community by joseph.yamoah

[Miran Alam]

Hi,

Is there any workaround to get step-based fullfillment in Quebec? 

This video was good --> Catalog Builder | Defining and configuring a pre-publish subflow thank you! that solves the first part. But now, we will probably need a generic standard flow if we dont have step-based fullfillment experience?

[Miran Alam]

Will this approval workflow work in Quebec? 

[Les1]

Based on Dawn's response provided by the catalog builder team, i dont see how they are comfortable with this being done in PROD vs subprod.  Or at best it can only be allowed for simple or worked through catalog item build use cases (analogous to Standard Change Templates).  The workflow/flow would need to have already been thoroughly worked through and tested (in a subprod).

Typically my experience has been that often times one needs to test out workflow/flow, UI policy or client scripts, etc  which of course needs to be done in a subprod.

[Les1]

would be great to see the team's recommend process for if using Catalog Item Builder in a subprod vs prod.

such as, would  an example process be: 

1. users build items in sub prod using Catalog Builder, making use of templates built by admin.

2. admin builds flow/workflow and assists with any other aspects not available to Catalog Builder.

3. Once Approved and complete whats the method for moving to PROD.. and then is there issues to contend with after a clone down (we'd need the catalog item template to also be in PROD so as to not  lose it or use data preservers) ... seems to be some extra layers of complexity inherent with attempting this type of process..

OR

Catalog Item builder is in PROD with a pre-publish approval process.

1. users build out the item.

2. Flow/workflow and any other items needing tested to be done by admin in subprod (using a dummy catalog item or by importing the unapproved catalog item from PROD  via xml).  once these items are worked through, they can be rebuilt in PROD to be available to the unapproved catalog item.

3. the Approved catalog item can be published, though never having truly been tested as a complete development item unless testing it in PROD (then requiring data cleanup)

all in all, its looking like this is primarily only gonna be straightforward with already proven workflow and catalog builds that are straight forward not needing any testing (similar to the concept of a standard change template)

[SB87]

@Dawn Jurek 

Hi Dawn,

Forgive my ignorance as I am only just learning about the Service Catalog on ServiceNow. Am I correct in stating the Catalog Builder is separate from the Catalog Item Designer? 

The reason for my question is that we are working on some external reporting and are midway through a migration project. I have been looking at Catalog Item Designer to understand how this functions and what tables it uses. Some tables that I have identified are:

Display Name [Table Name]	Description
Requesting Item Designer Category Request [sc_ic_category_request]	Requests made by users for a new category.
Item [sc_ic_item_staging]	Item definitions, used when designing the item.
Approval [sc_ic_aprvl_defn_staging]	Approvals for items.
Approval Definition [sc_ic_aprvl_defn]	Approvals for catalog items.
Approval Definition (Requested Item) [sc_ic_req_item_aprvl_defn]	Approvals for requested items.
Approval Type [sc_ic_aprvl_type_defn_staging]	Approval types for items.

(there are more).

If Catalog Builder is to replace Catalog Item Designer then are there new tables added? If so, could you provide a list of tables and definitions so that I can prepare for them - as this will be extremley helpful.

I did look through the docs but it seems to very much be targeted towards users of the application i.e. admins and end users.

Kindest regards,
Sal

[Stephen Marks]

The video for creating the pre-published sub-flow doesn't explain the step on how to create the "generate catalog builder URL" which makes it difficult to complete the example provided in the video as it is required for the additional steps. I can't seem to find additional documentation on this or other examples of pre-published flows. Does anyone have information on this?

https://youtu.be/Vtv8LPnfwbM?t=174