Combined External Content Connectors release notes for upgrades from Xanadu to Yokohama

  • Release version: Yokohama
  • Updated July 20, 2026
  • 11 minutes to read
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    Summary of Combined External Content Connectors release notes for upgrades from Xanadu to Yokohama

    This consolidated release notes document assists ServiceNow customers in preparing for upgrades of External Content Connectors from the Xanadu release family to Yokohama. It summarizes new features, important upgrade considerations, configuration changes, and enhancements introduced across multiple patch releases within this period.

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    The External Content Connectors enable integration with various external source systems to retrieve searchable content and user permissions, enhancing search capabilities within your ServiceNow environment.

    Important Upgrade Information

    • Semantic Vector Indexing: Starting with version 2 of the External Content Connectors, semantic vector indexing is implemented for crawled content. After upgrading, all previously retrieved items are reindexed during the next crawl, even if their content is unchanged. To expedite this, customers should cancel any running crawls and restart them manually.
    • Full Content and User Mapping Crawls Required: When upgrading to version 4, ensure you complete both a content crawl and a user mapping crawl for each connector. This guarantees that all crawled content and security principals are properly indexed and visible in search results.

    New Features

    • Expanded Connector Support: Yokohama introduces numerous new external content connectors, including Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service, Asana, Docusign, Dropbox, GitHub Enterprise Cloud, HubSpot, Lucidchart, Miro, monday.com, Notion, SAP DMS, Smartsheet, Trello, WordPress, Workday, Zoom, Amazon S3, Box, GitLab, Microsoft OneDrive, Microsoft Viva Engage, ServiceNow instance KB articles, Webcrawler, and Zendesk Guide.
    • Connector Administration Role: The new snextconn.xccadmin role enables users to create, configure, and monitor external content connectors and their crawls.
    • User Mapping Permission Settings: Customize which source system and ServiceNow user fields are compared during user mapping, improving accuracy of permission assignments.
    • Enhanced Analytics and Crawl Statistics: New and redesigned analytics pages provide detailed insights into connector performance over time, including statistics for content and user permission crawls.
    • Now Assist Integration: External content search results can be added to Virtual Agent conversations via Now Assist, expanding the range of accessible information.
    • Warning Messages for Index Limits: Connectors now display warnings when indexed document counts exceed 800,000, alerting administrators before reaching the 1,000,000 document limit.
    • Webcrawler Connector: The predefined web sources connector has been replaced by the more flexible Webcrawler, which supports both predefined and custom web sources for indexing.
    • Improved Connection Settings: Several connectors, including Atlassian Jira Cloud, Microsoft OneDrive, Microsoft SharePoint Online, and Microsoft Teams, now accept certificate SHA1 thumbprint hashes in both hexadecimal and base64 formats.

    Changes

    • The Analytics page has been redesigned for better analysis of connector performance.
    • Some connection settings requirements were simplified, such as removing the need for an Atlassian Jira Cloud instance ID.
    • The Webcrawler external content connector replaced the predefined web sources connector to provide greater customization.

    Removed and Deprecated Features

    No features or functionalities were removed or deprecated between Xanadu and Yokohama releases.

    Activation and Installation

    To install or upgrade the External Content Connectors, request the application from the ServiceNow Store. The Yokohama release requires installing the External Content Connectors Application Suite. Refer to the ServiceNow Store version history release notes for detailed installation and update information.

    Practical Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    • Access and index a broader set of external content sources, improving search comprehensiveness across your enterprise data.
    • Leverage semantic vector indexing to enhance search recall, delivering more relevant search results.
    • Configure user permission mappings precisely to maintain secure and accurate access to external content within ServiceNow.
    • Monitor connector health and performance with improved analytics and warning messages, enabling proactive management of indexing limits and crawl activities.
    • Integrate external content search results into Virtual Agent conversations, enriching user experiences and knowledge discovery.

    Consolidated page of all release notes for External Content Connectors from Xanadu to Yokohama.

    How to use this page

    To help you prepare for your upgrade, we have combined the cross-family External Content Connectors release notes onto one page. Read this summary of the new features, changes, and updated information for your product from Xanadu to Yokohama.

    Tip:
    If there were no updates for a release notes section in a certain family release, we included a short note for your reference. For example, if a product did not have any updates in Tokyo, the row says "No updates for this release."

    Important information for upgrading External Content Connectors to Yokohama

    Before you upgrade to Yokohama, review these pre- and post-upgrade tasks and complete the tasks as needed.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    Beginning with version 2 of the External Content Connectors application, external content connectors implement semantic vector indexing for crawled items. When you upgrade to a version that supports semantic vector indexing, your existing connectors will reindex all previously retrieved items the next time they're visited by a crawl, even if those items' content is unchanged. To force semantic vector indexing of your external content items as soon as possible after upgrading, cancel any running crawls, then restart the canceled crawls manually.

    Yokohama

    Beginning with version 2 of the External Content Connectors application, external content connectors implement semantic vector indexing for crawled items. When you upgrade to a version that supports semantic vector indexing, your existing connectors will reindex all previously retrieved items the next time they're visited by a crawl, even if those items' content is unchanged. To force semantic vector indexing of your external content items as soon as possible after upgrading, cancel any running crawls, then restart the canceled crawls manually.

    When you upgrade to version 4 of the External Content Connectors application from an earlier version, searches may not show all previously crawled content until you've completed both a content crawl and a user mapping crawl for each upgraded connector. The first content crawl run after the upgrade will reindex all searchable content from the source system, and the user mapping crawl will reindex all security principals from the source system. All crawled content should be shown in searches after both of these crawls are complete.

    New features

    Between your current release family and Yokohama, new features were introduced for External Content Connectors.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    Xanadu Patch 9
    Atlassian Jira Cloud external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from projects in your Atlassian Jira Cloud source system.
    Google Drive external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from shared drives in your Google Drive source system.
    Microsoft Teams external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from teams in your Microsoft Teams source system.
    Predefined web sources external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content from pages and subdomains in predefined public web sites.
    ServiceNow product documentation external content connectors
    Retrieve searchable content from the ServiceNow product documentation site.
    Slack external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from public channels in your Slack source system.
    Warning messages for indexed document counts
    When an external content connector's indexed document count exceeds 800,000, a warning message appears in the connector's UI to indicate that it's approaching the indexing limit of 1,000,000 documents.
    Add external content search results to Now Assist in Virtual Agent conversations
    Expand the range of information available to Virtual Agent users by adding external content search results to Now Assist in Virtual Agent conversations.
    Xanadu Patch 7
    Semantic vector indexing for crawled content
    Improve recall for external content searches with support for semantic vector indexing of crawled content. Semantic vector indexing is supported for all external content connectors.

    Yokohama

    Yokohama Patch 11
    Connector admin role
    Users with the sn_ext_conn.xcc_admin role can create, configure, and review details for external content connectors and crawls.
    Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service source system.
    Asana external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Asana source system.
    Docusign external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Docusign source system.
    Dropbox external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Dropbox source system.
    GitHub Enterprise Cloud external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your GitHub Enterprise Cloud source system.
    HubSpot external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your HubSpot source system.
    Lucidchart external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Lucidchart source system.
    Miro external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Miro source system.
    monday.com external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your monday.com source system.
    Notion external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Notion source system.
    SAP DMS external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your SAP DMS source system.
    Smartsheet external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Smartsheet source system.
    Trello external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Trello source system.
    WordPress external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your WordPress source system.
    Workday external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Workday source system.
    Zoom external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from your Zoom source system.
    Configure user mapping permission settings
    Specify the source system and User [sys_user] table fields to examine for matches when an external content connector maps source system users to your ServiceNow AI Platform users.
    Statistics for content crawls
    Review statistics about the documents (items or files with searchable content and metadata) retrieved by a content crawl.
    Statistics for user permission crawls
    Review statistics about the permissions (user and group-membership security principals) retrieved by a user permission crawl.
    Analytics
    Review metrics that show how your external content connector has run over time.
    Yokohama Patch 6
    Amazon S3 external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from buckets in your Amazon S3 source system.
    Box external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from user boxes in your Box source system.
    GitLab external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from issues, wikis, merge requests, tags, branches, and commits in your GitLab source system's groups, projects, and repositories.
    Microsoft OneDrive external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from individual drives in your Microsoft OneDrive source system.
    Microsoft Viva Engage external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from conversations in your Microsoft Viva Engage source system's communities.
    ServiceNow instance external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from KB articles in your ServiceNow AI Platform instance.
    Webcrawler external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from pages and subdomains in public web sources. Select a predefined web source or specify a custom web source.
    Zendesk Guide external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and metadata from articles in your Zendesk Guide source system's knowledge bases.
    Statistics for content crawls
    Review statistics for searchable items retrieved by a content crawl.
    Statistics for user permission crawls
    Review statistics for user and group permissions retrieved by a user permission crawl.
    Yokohama Patch 3
    Atlassian Jira Cloud external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from projects in your Atlassian Jira Cloud source system.
    Google Drive external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from shared drives in your Google Drive source system.
    Microsoft Teams external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from teams in your Microsoft Teams source system.
    ServiceNow product documentation external content connectors
    Retrieve searchable content from the ServiceNow product documentation site.
    Slack external content connector
    Retrieve searchable content and user permissions from public channels in your Slack source system.
    Warning messages for indexed document counts
    When an external content connector's indexed document count exceeds , a warning message appears in the connector's UI to indicate that it's approaching the indexing limit of 1,000,000 documents.
    Add external content search results to Now Assist in Virtual Agent conversations
    Expand the range of information available to Virtual Agent users by adding external content search results to Now Assist in Virtual Agent conversations.
    Yokohama Patch 1
    Semantic vector indexing for crawled content
    Improve recall for external content searches with support for semantic vector indexing of crawled content. Semantic vector indexing is supported for all external content connectors.

    Changes

    Between your current release family and Yokohama, some changes were made to existing External Content Connectors features.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    Yokohama Patch 11
    Analytics
    Analyze connector performance and behavior in a selected time period using the redesigned Analytics page. You can access this page from the connector editor.
    Atlassian Jira Cloud connection settings
    The Atlassian Jira Cloud external content connector no longer requires your Atlassian Jira Cloud instance ID as a connection setting.
    Microsoft OneDrive connection settings
    The Microsoft OneDrive external content connector now accepts certificate SHA1 thumbprint hashes in hexadecimal format as well as in base64-encoded format.
    Microsoft SharePoint Online connection settings
    The Microsoft SharePoint Online external content connector now accepts certificate SHA1 thumbprint hashes in hexadecimal format as well as in base64-encoded format.
    Microsoft Teams connection settings
    The Microsoft Teams external content connector now accepts certificate SHA1 thumbprint hashes in hexadecimal format as well as in base64-encoded format.
    Yokohama Patch 6
    Webcrawler external content connector
    The predefined web sources external content connector has been subsumed into the new Webcrawler external content connector, which allows you to specify a custom web source or select a predefined one.

    Removed

    Between your current release family and Yokohama, some External Content Connectors features or functionality were removed.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    No updates for this release.

    Deprecations

    Between your current release family and Yokohama, some External Content Connectors features or functionality were deprecated.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    No updates for this release.

    Activation information

    Review information on how to activate External Content Connectors.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    Install External Content Connectors by requesting it from the ServiceNow Store. Visit the ServiceNow Store website to view all the available apps and for information about submitting requests to the store. For cumulative release notes information for all released apps, see the ServiceNow Store version history release notes.

    Yokohama

    Install External Content Connectors by requesting the External Content Connectors Application Suite from the ServiceNow Store. Visit the ServiceNow Store website to view all the available apps and for information about submitting requests to the store. For cumulative release notes information for all released apps, see the ServiceNow Store version history release notes.

    Additional requirements

    If any additional requirements were introduced or changed for External Content Connectors we have noted them here.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    No updates for this release.

    Browser requirements

    If any specific browser requirements were introduced or changed for External Content Connectors we have noted them here.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    No updates for this release.

    Accessibility information

    Review details on accessibility information for External Content Connectors, such as specific requirements or compliance levels.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    No updates for this release.

    Localization information

    If there are specific localization considerations for External Content Connectors we have noted them here.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    No updates for this release.

    Yokohama

    No updates for this release.

    Highlight information

    If there are specific highlight considerations for External Content Connectors we have noted them here.

    Release Release notes

    Xanadu

    • Expand your search by indexing searchable content and user permissions from your Atlassian Jira Cloud, Google Drive, Microsoft Teams, and Slack source systems.
    • Make web content locally searchable by indexing pages from predefined public web sites or from the ServiceNow product documentation site.
    • Know when your external content connectors are approaching their crawl limits with new warning messages.
    • Expand the range of information available to Virtual Agent users by adding external content search results to Now Assist in Virtual Agent conversations.
    • Improve recall for external content searches with support for semantic vector indexing of crawled content.

    See External Content Connectors for more information.

    Yokohama

    Yokohama Patch 11
    • Expand your search experience with external content connectors for Adobe Experience Manager as a Cloud Service, Asana, Docusign, Dropbox, GitHub Enterprise Cloud, HubSpot, Lucidchart, Miro, monday.com, Notion, SAP DMS, Smartsheet, Trello, WordPress, Workday, and Zoom source systems.
    • Customize user permission settings, choosing the fields you want to compare when mapping source system users to ServiceNow AI Platform® users.
    • Make external content connector crawl results searchable by linking connector search sources to search profiles from the connector editor.
    • Monitor connector behavior on individual crawl runs and over time with improved crawl statistics and analytics.
    Yokohama Patch 6
    • Expand your search experience by indexing searchable content from your Amazon S3, Box, GitLab, Microsoft OneDrive, Microsoft Viva Engage, and Zendesk Guide source systems.
    • Search KB articles from your ServiceNow instance.
    • Make web content locally searchable by indexing pages from predefined or custom public web sites with the Webcrawler external content connector.
    • Configure connector settings and schedule crawls as part of connector creation using the revamped UI.
    Yokohama Patch 3
    • Expand your search by indexing searchable content from your Atlassian Jira Cloud, Google Drive, Microsoft Teams, and Slack source systems.
    • Make web content locally searchable by indexing pages from predefined public web sites.
    • Find answers about your ServiceNow deployment by indexing searchable content from the ServiceNow product documentation.
    • Know when your external content connectors are approaching their crawl limits with new warning messages.
    • Expand the range of information available to Virtual Agent users by adding external content search results to Now Assist in Virtual Agent conversations.
    • Improve recall for external content searches with support for semantic vector indexing of crawled content.

    See External Content Connectors for more information.