Alibaba Cloud virtual machine (VM) pattern-based discovery

  • Release version: Yokohama
  • Updated October 22, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Alibaba Cloud virtual machine (VM) pattern-based discovery

    This pattern-based discovery uses the Alibaba - Virtual Machine (LP) pattern to identify and map Alibaba Cloud virtual machines (VMs) during horizontal discovery in ServiceNow. It requires ensuring prerequisites are met and may need the latest Discovery and Service Mapping Patterns application from the ServiceNow Store. The discovery process populates critical VM data into the Configuration Management Database (CMDB) and establishes relationships among configuration items (CIs) for comprehensive cloud asset management.

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    Key Features

    • VM Instance Data Collection: Discovers and records details such as instance name, ID, state, vCPU count, memory size, disk count, guest OS type, install status, operational status, and attached network interfaces.
    • Network Interface Information: Captures Elastic Network Interface (ENI) attributes including name, ID, MAC address, private and public IP addresses, primary status, and linked instance ID.
    • Cloud Image Details: Gathers image IDs indicating OS version, architecture, language, release date, and distinguishes between public, custom, shared, and community images, all linked to Alibaba as the provider.
    • Hardware Type Identification: Records instance type IDs and associates them with Alibaba as the cloud provider.
    • Tag Discovery: Collects tags from VM instances and stores them as key-value pairs linked to the respective VM records in the CMDB.
    • CI Relationships: Automatically creates important relationships among discovered CIs, such as VMs hosted in datacenters, provisioned from cloud images and hardware types, and network interfaces connected to VMs.

    Key Outcomes

    • Accurate and detailed representation of Alibaba Cloud VM resources in the ServiceNow CMDB, enabling better asset visibility and management.
    • Enriched network and infrastructure data supporting operational and security processes through mapped relationships and associated metadata.
    • Tagging information integrated with CIs, facilitating categorization, filtering, and governance of cloud resources.
    • Supports ongoing cloud environment monitoring and service mapping by establishing foundational discovery data for Alibaba Cloud virtual machines.

    Discovery and Service Mapping Patterns uses the Alibaba - Virtual Machine (LP) pattern to discover VMs during horizontal discovery. Discovering some of these resources may require updating to the latest version of the Discovery and Service Mapping Patterns application from the ServiceNow Store.

    Pattern-based discovery and mapping requirements

    Verify the Alibaba Cloud discovery prerequisites section in Alibaba Cloud discovery using patterns.

    Data collected by Discovery during horizontal discovery

    Discovery populates the data in the CMDB when running the Alibaba - Virtual Machine (LP) pattern.

    Table 1. Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance]
    Field Description
    Name [name] Name of the instance.
    Object ID [object_id] Instance ID.
    State [state] Status of the instance.

    For example: Running or Stopped.
    CPUs [cpus] Number of Virtual Central Processing Units (vCPUs).
    Memory (MB) [memory] Memory size in megabytes (MB).
    Disks [disks] Number of local disks attached to the instance.
    Guest OS Name [guest_os_fullname] Type of the operating system (OS) of the instance.

    Possible values are Windows or Linux.
    Install Status [install_status] Install status of the instance. Default value is Installed.
    Operational status [operational_status] Operational status of the instance. Default value is Operational.
    Network adapters [nics] Elastic Network Interfaces (ENIs) attached to the instance.
    Table 2. Cloud Mgmt Network Interface [cmdb_ci_nic]
    Field Description
    Name [name] Name of the ENI.
    Object ID [object_id] ID of the ENI.
    MAC Address [mac_address] MAC address of the ENI.
    Private IP [private_ip] Private IP address of the ENI.
    IP Address [ip_address] Public IP addresses of instances.
    Primary [primary] A Boolean indicating whether a network interface is primary or secondary.
    Node ID [node_id] Instance ID.
    Table 3. Cloud Image [cmdb_ci_cloud_os_image]
    Field Description
    Object ID [object_id] ID of the image.
    • IDs of public images contain the operating system version, architecture, language, and release date.

      For example: win2008r2_64_ent_sp1_en-us_40G_alibase_20190318.vhd.

    • IDs of custom, shared, and community images start with m.

      For example: m-0a1b2c3defghijklm4n5o.
    Provider [provider] Image cloud provider: Alibaba.
    Table 4. Cloud Hardware Type [cmdb_ci_cloud_hardware_type]
    Field Description
    Object ID [object_id] ID of the instance type.
    Provider [provider] Image cloud provider: Alibaba.

    CI relationships

    Discovery creates these relationships to support the Alibaba Cloud virtual machine discovery.

    CI Relationship CI
    Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance] Implement End Point To::Implement End Point From Cloud Mgmt Network Interface [cmdb_ci_nic]
    Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance] Hosted on::Hosts Alibaba Datacenter [cmdb_ci_alibaba_datacenter]
    Availability Zone [cmdb_ci_availability_zone] Contains::Contained by Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance]
    Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance] Provisioned From::Provisioned Cloud Image [cmdb_ci_cloud_os_image]
    Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance] Provisioned From::Provisioned Cloud Hardware Type [cmdb_ci_cloud_hardware_type]
    Cloud Image [cmdb_ci_cloud_os_image] Hosted on::Hosts Alibaba Datacenter [cmdb_ci_alibaba_datacenter]
    Key Value [cmdb_key_value] References Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance]

    Tag discovery

    The Alibaba - Virtual Machine (LP) pattern collects tags and populates them in the Key Value [cmdb_key_value] table.

    Table 5. Key Value [cmdb_key_value]
    Field Description
    Key [key] Tag key.
    Value [value] Tag value.
    Configuration item [configuration_item] References the Virtual Machine Instance [cmdb_ci_vm_instance] table.