archiving/cleaning up question_answer table

[Rim1]

hi all!

We are working on ticket (incident) data archiving and one of the related tables which poped up is question_answer. Interestingly I am not able to pick or see this table as related table for archiving, and of course we don't want to leave this table hanging with orphan records.

Before getting into custom scripting options and jobs for clean up, just wanted to double check if I am not missing anything, or maybe there is a more graceful options...

[Peter Bodelier]

Hi @Rim1,

Are you already on Vancouver?

According to the releasenotes, this can now be handled OOTB:

Prevent records from being orphaned with table cleaner
Prevent records from being orphaned in the Sys Audit [sys_audit], Audit Relationship Change [sys_audit_relation], Attachment [sys_attachment], Attachment Document [sys_attachment_doc]. Attachment Document V2 [sys_attachment_doc_v2], and Journal Entry [sys_journal_field] tables using new options in table cleaner.

Source: Combined Core Now Platform release notes for upgrades from Utah to Vancouver (servicenow.com...

[Rim1]

Thanks for response Peter. Yes, I've seen this release note, and it will definitely find its place in some of my use cases, but I don't believe this address question_answer table, well, at least not officially 🙂 As per documentation:

It works with one or more peripheral tables:

• sys_attachment
• sys_attachment_doc
• sys_audit
• sys_audit_delete
• sys_journal_fields

[Peter Bodelier]

Hi @Rim1 

True, but the exact document you're referencing also says:

 related records in peripheral tables remain after deleting records, you can specify the peripheral tables to clean in this system property and then run the Orphan Record Cleaner scheduled job.

So you can simply add the table to use the OOTB solution for this 🙂

[Rim1]

I will definitely try this when we get to Vancouver, but I don't have much hope. The reasoning behind this that each peripheral table has its own dictionary structure - field storing the reference can be of different type, name, etc. It's easy to make it work for predefined tables (as table structure is clear), but if you though in some random table for cleaning, I am not sure if it can figure out. But anyway, surely, I will try once I get to vancouver:) Thanks!