CMDB Relationship List Reporting

[AllieB]

Hi All,

I'm hoping to get some advice on reporting CI relationships. I’m pretty comfortable with general reporting, CMDB tables, and Query Builder, but I’m running into a challenge that I haven’t been able to solve for a customer.

Right now, we have two custom fields on the cmdb_ci  table that identify the business service and its domain. We're planning to retire those fields and shift to a more out-of-the-box CSDM approach. We've already built out the relationships and are refining them so users can find their CIs based on the business service relationship rather than relying on those custom fields, which aren’t automagically tied to any relationships.

The issue is: users can’t easily pull a list of incidents or CIs and say, “Show me all where the parent is X Business Service and the relationship type is ‘Depends on’” without creating either an incident/relationship custom view or advise them to use the cmdb_rel_ci table. We’re trying to justify removing the custom fields by offering a clean solution that doesn’t involve:

1. More customization (like database views or keeping those fields), or
2. Using Query Builder
3. Using the cmdb_rel_ci table simply because it's confusing for many end users

We’re open to keeping the fields and automating their values via workflow if needed, but before we go that route has anyone had success reporting on parent relationships for CIs without using cmdb_rel_ci or Query Builder?

Any tips or ideas would be super appreciated!

[k_lutz]

Hi AllieB,

Not sure I understand completely what you are trying to do. When you mention relationships like "Depends on" that implies a relationship between CI Classes. Then it was mentioned CI to Incident. A CI to Incident would not have such a relationship. When you link a CI to a record like Incident, that is storied in the task_ci table which does not utilize a relationship type like "Depends on". So I would see if task_ci meets your requirements to a certain extent.