Customization and upgrade
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‎07-18-2024 05:09 AM
How does ServiceNow tool enable customization of the system structure and workflow objects while preserving these customizations during upgrades?
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‎07-18-2024 05:39 AM
What exactly is your question?
ServiceNow uses update sets (or repo's) to move customization from one instance to another and if you patch or upgrade, the OOB objects you touched and are updated, will be in your skipped changes for you to review. They don't over write your customizations (as per 'you touched it, you own it').
Please mark any helpful or correct solutions as such. That helps others find their solutions.
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‎07-18-2024 05:41 AM
At a high level it will review the artifacts contained within the patch/upgrade and look to see if the current version of the artifact has been customised by the customer. If it hasn't been customised, then it will apply the version contained within the patch/upgrade and no further action is required. If it has been customised, then it will create an Upgrade Details record for the customer to action. These Upgrade Details records can be seen from the Upgrade Monitor page on the instance when the upgrade has been completed
The customer can make one of the following determinations for each customised artifact that the upgrade process flags:
- Ignore - Leave the customisation as-is and don't accept any changes from the OOTB (Out of the box) version
- Merge - Take elements of the customisation and the OOTB configuration of the record and update the record with the changes
- Revert - Get rid of the customised version of the record and revert to the OOTB configuration
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‎07-18-2024 06:00 AM
Hi @gkumar4,
This topic could very quickly get quite complex and overly complicated, so in an attempt to keep this simple and in the spirit of your question, here's an initial and purposely high level response:
ServiceNow is a platform that both allows and supports customization throughout the system. When an upgrade takes place, various tools and steps are in place to predict and preview changes before an upgrade is applied, as well as well as steps that prevent customizations from being overwritten by system upgrades.
The upgrade process automatically skips changes to objects that have been customized.
You then have the ability to review and either keep and maintain your customization (as it could well be required as is very very normal) or you can overwrite your customizations or even merge when a software upgrade contains a feature that you would like to implement.
Check out the below links from ServiceNow official docs with more detail.
To help others (or for me to help you more directly), please mark this response correct by clicking on Accept as Solution and/or Kudos.

Thanks, Robbie
