Manage CI details in CI Form

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 12 minutes to read
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    Summary of Manage CI details in CI Form

    The CI Form in CMDB Workspace serves as a centralized interface for ServiceNow customers to view, edit, and manage comprehensive details of Configuration Items (CIs). It consolidates CI attributes, related lists, relationships, tags, services, health status, and CMDB 360 records into organized sections. This form applies Identification and Reconciliation Engine (IRE) rules during updates to prevent issues like duplicate CIs, ensuring data integrity. CI Form configurations derive throughout the CMDB class hierarchy, and access is role-based, with CMDB Admins and Editors able to edit, while CMDB Users can view.

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    Key Features

    • Explore CI View: Defines the form layout, sections, and attributes, with system-provided forms for many CMDB classes and inheritance for child classes.
    • Form Configuration: Controlled via system properties and customizable through Form Builder and list configurations, allowing tailored CI detail views.
    • Highlighted Attributes: Key attributes are visually emphasized based on status (e.g., operational status highlighted green or red) to draw attention to critical CI states.
    • Summary and Important Attributes Tiles: Display essential CI attributes at the top of the form for quick reference, with adjustable visibility.
    • Attributes Section: Shows all CI attributes excluding summary and important attributes, enforcing mandatory fields and applying IRE rules on updates.
    • Tags Section: Manages cloud-related key/value tags important for ITOM applications and tag-based discovery; tag management requires appropriate roles.
    • Resources Section: Displays related CI resources like file systems or network adapters with options to add, remove, or delete entries, respecting role-based permissions and IRE rules.
    • Activity Section: Presents related open incidents, changes, problems with interactive charts and activity streams, configurable per user preferences and admin settings.
    • Relationships Section: Visualizes CI relationships in tree or flat views and integrates with Unified Map for editing; operational state influences availability of certain functions.
    • Services and Offerings Section: Highlights associated service instances and offerings classified by business or technical services, with drill-down capability.
    • Health Section: Shows aggregated CMDB Health KPIs such as completeness and compliance with color-coded pass/fail indicators, dependent on CMDB Health setup.
    • CMDB 360 Section: Displays multi-source discovery data comparing current CI attribute values with those reported by discovery tools, available only if CMDB 360 is enabled.

    Practical Implications for ServiceNow Customers

    • CI Form provides a single, comprehensive interface for managing CI data efficiently, improving data quality and operational insight.
    • Role-based access ensures that only authorized users can make changes, maintaining governance and security.
    • Applying IRE rules during CI updates minimizes risks of duplication and inconsistent relationships.
    • Customizable views and sections allow organizations to tailor the form to highlight the most relevant CI information for their processes.
    • Integration with Unified Map and CMDB Health supports advanced relationship management and CI health monitoring within the same interface.
    • Tag management and resource linking facilitate better asset categorization and discovery alignment, especially in hybrid and cloud environments.

    Role Requirements

    • Viewing CI Details: CMDB User role.
    • Editing CI Attributes and Relationships: CMDB Admin or CMDB Editor roles, with additional roles such as personalizeform and personalizelist needed for form customization.
    • Managing Tags and Resources: Requires sncmdbeditor role and appropriate table access rights.
    • Configuring Related Items and Preferences: Requires sncmdbws.configeditor or personalized user settings.

    Use CI Form in CMDB Workspace or in another workspace, to view, edit, and manage a comprehensive set of details of a CI such as its attributes, related lists, and CMDB 360 records. When updating CIs, IRE rules are applied to avoid potential issues such as duplicate CIs. CI Form supports derivation of form configurations throughout the CMDB hierarchy.

    The CI Form feature is a centralized location with a comprehensive set of CI details, organized in sections. Anywhere CMDB Workspace provides a function to view a CI record, such as a list or a chart, CI Form is used for the selected CI when you select that function. Use the forms provided by CI Form to examine and edit CI attributes, relationships, tags, services and offerings, CMDB Health and CMDB 360 data associated with the CI, related lists, and activities.

    General operations you can perform in CI Form:

    In general, a CMDB Admin and a CMDB Editor can view and edit CI records, and a CMDB User can view CI details on the form.

    Explore CI view

    By default, CI Form uses the Explore CI view, which is stored in the UI Views [sys_ui_view] table. The Explore CI view defines the structure of the view, its sections and attributes, and related lists that appear on the form. The system provides predefined Explore CI forms for many CMDB classes. Those forms are derived by child classes, which don't have their own form definition, throughout the CMDB hierarchy.

    The various sections in Explore CI view are described in this topic.

    Configuration

    You can control the use and content of CI Form as follows:

    • Set system property sn_cmdb_ws.explore_ci.record.enabled:

      This property toggles the use of CI Form when viewing CI records in CMDB Workspace, or in another workspace, if applicable. This property is set to true by default, enabling the experience of CI Form. For more information about this property, see Components installed with CMDB Workspace.

    • Configure the Explore CI view:

      Select the More Actions icon (...) on the form and then select an option to modify the Explore CI view:

      • Select Configure attributes to modify the Summary and Attributes sections on the form, in Form Builder. For example, to add sections, modify section titles or the attributes included in sections: Requires the personalize_form user role.

        For more information about Form Builder and Table Builder, see Forms in Table Builder and Add fields to a form layout in Table Builder.

      • Select Configure resources to modify the Resources section on the form. For example, to add or remove subsections or items within subsections: Requires the personalize_list user role.

    Highlighted attributes

    Several key attributes are preconfigured to be highlighted on a CI form when specific conditions are met. Those highlights are meant to draw your attention to specific states, which are either healthy, or that indicate a problem and require your attention. Attribute highlight definitions are stored in the Highlighted Values [sys_highlighted_value] ServiceNow AI Platform table, which you can search for records where Table is prefixed by 'cmdb_ci'. For example, the operational_ status attribute is configured as follows:
    • If the attribute value is 'Operational', then the attribute appears with a green highlight.
    • If the attribute value is anything other than 'Operational', then the highlight is red.

    To see those preconfigured highlight records that are used in CI Form and in various other CMDB Workspace features, navigate to All > Workspace Experience > Administration > Highlighted Values.

    For more information about configuring attribute highlights in the ServiceNow AI Platform, see Highlight list fields.

    Summary

    By default, the Summary tile shows the most meaningful CI attributes and appears at the top of all other form sections. You can select Show more or Show less to adjust the page layout. The Summary tile shows attributes such as Created, key ownership attributes such as Managed by, and other important attributes such as Discovery source and Operational status. The attributes that appear in this section map to the first section defined in the Explore CI view.

    By default, the Important attributes tile shows CI attributes such as Operating System and Serial number. The attributes that appear in this tile map to the Important attributes section defined in the Explore CI view, if one exists.

    Role requirements for operations in this section:
    • Editing attributes by selecting the Edit icon: Permitted for attributes that you have permission to
    • Modifying this section in the Explore CI view: personalize_form

    Attributes

    This section shows all the UI sections that are configured in the Explore CI view for the class, excluding:
    • The first section (which populates the Summary tile).
    • The Important attributes section, if one exists (which populates the Important attributes tile).
    Select Attributes to access the subsections within. By default, the Discovery and the Operational attribute subsections map to the Discovery and the Operational sections in the Explore CI view. The All subsection shows all the CI attributes. Mandatory attributes are noted on the form by an "*" and must be set with a value.

    When updating CI attributes, any Identification and Reconciliation Engine (IRE) rules that exist for the CI class are applied to help prevent potential problems with the update. IRE processes detect potential issues such as CI duplication and a dependent CI missing valid parent relationships. In these situations, the update is paused and you're presented with mitigation options to avoid the issue. Applying IRE processes might result in a partial update of attributes as reconciliation rules might block updates to some attributes and enable updates of others.

    If there are no IRE rules for the class, the CI is updated directly without using IRE processes.

    A CI that is updated in CI Form, has its discovery_source attribute set to Manual via IRE unless you set it to a different value.

    More information:
    Role requirements for operations in this section:
    • Updating attributes: sn_cmdb_editor
    • Modifying this section in the Explore CI view: personalize_form

    Tags

    This section shows the list of tags, stored as key/value pairs in the Key Values [cmdb_key_value] table. These tags are typically associated with CIs and resources for cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud Platform, and in general are referred to as cloud tags. Cloud tags are used in ITOM applications, such as Tag Governance, and function as key dependencies in Tag-based discovery in Service Mapping. Discovery and Service Graph Connectors automatically populate cloud tags, which can then be grouped and managed as needed in an organization.

    The Tags section in CI Form doesn't contain details about Platform tags, which are another type of tags that are stored in the Tags column that exists in most platform tables.

    To manage tags, select Manage in the Tags tile, and then, in the Manage tags dialog box you can:
    • Enter a Key and a Value pair, and then select the Add new tag ('+') icon.
    • Select the Delete tag icon for a tag.
    • Modify the Key or the Value fields for a tag.
    • Select Save to save any changes to tags.
    Managing tags requires the sn_cmdb_editor user role.
    More information:

    Resources

    This section shows resources linked to the CI, and maps to the Related Lists specified in the Explore CI view. By default, resources include tables such as File Systems [cmdb_ci_file_system], Software Installed [cmdb_ci_spkg], and Network Adapters [cmdb_ci_network_adapter].

    In this section, you can:

    • Select Manage to add or remove records from a resource list, which is applicable to related lists that have many-to-many relationships. If you're authorized to update in the CMDB Workspace scope, then you're navigated to a list selector for the resource where you can add or remove multiple items. If you aren't authorized, then you're navigated to the Core UI experience.

    • Select one or more related items and then select the Delete button, which is visible only if you have delete access to any of the related list tables.
    • Select New to add a related list item. The New button is available for all the resource tables that you have access to.
      Important notes about creating a new related list item:

      • If the related list table is within the cmdb_ci hierarchy, has an IRE identification rule, and isn't an excluded table, then you're navigated to the Create CI experience in CMDB Workspace or another workspace if applicable. In the Create CI experience, some CI attributes are pre-populated with the proper values for the class. For example, in the Required attributes section for dependent CIs, the Dependent-upon CI attribute is pre-populated with the parent of the current CI. Relationships and resources are also pre-populated according to the CI class definitions.

        For information about the Create CI experience, see Create a CI manually in CMDB Workspace.

      • If the related list table doesn't have an IRE identification rule, then you're navigated to a basic list view page instead of CI Form.
      • The system automatically creates the matching reference back to the current class. For example, for a dependent CI the system creates the file system and the necessary relationship to connect the file system to the computer CI.
      • For some resources such as CI IPs, New isn't available and the Dependent-upon CI isn't pre-populated. This behavior applies to CIs with scripted relationships.
      • After creating a new related list item, select the Refresh List icon to show the new record in the list on the Resource section.
    • Configure the Resources section in the Explore CI view by selecting the More actions icon and then selecting Configure resources. Use the related lists slushbucket to add or remove resources and then select Save: Requires the personalize_list role.
    Role requirements for operations in this section:
    • Configuring resources in the Explore CI view: personalize_list
    • Creating, updating, or deleting records in related tables included as Resources for a CI record: Requires create, update, and delete access to the resource table.

    Activity

    This section shows related items such as open incidents and the activity stream for the CI on the following tabs:
    Related items

    Pie charts that by default include Open incidents (Incidents table), Open changes (Change Request table), and Open problems (Problem table), broken down by priority or state.

    In this tab, you can:
    • Select a chart to drill down to the records associated with different chart sections. Depending on configuration, records open in CMDB Workspace or in another workspace.
    • Configure the list of tables for which charts appear, which is stored in the Explore CI Related Item Configurations [sn_cmdb_ws_explore_ci_related_item_config] table. You can add records to that table, or modify behavior settings such as where a record opens when selected: Requires the sn_cmdb_ws.config_editor role.
    • Configure your preferences for which of the available charts appear when you log in. Select the Related Item Settings icon in the Related Items tab and in the Related item settings dialog box, select any charts that you prefer to hide.
    CI history

    History of the activities related to the CI, such as value changes in the CI attributes, listed in chronological order.

    More information:
    Role requirements for operations in this section:
    • Accessing the Explore CI Related Item Configurations [sn_cmdb_ws_explore_ci_related_item_config] table to configure the list of charts that appear in the Related Items tab: sn_cmdb_ws.config_editor
    • Configuring your preferences for which related item charts appear by selecting the Related Item Settings icon in the Related Items tab: Any logged in user

    Relationships

    This section shows the CI relationships, which include:
    • Total relationships: Total number of relationships for this CI
    • Duplicate relationships: Total number of duplicate relationship for this CI
    • Stale relationships: Total number of stale relationship for this CI
    In this section, you can:
    • Switch between the following view types:
      • Tree view: Shows the downstream and upstream relationships in a tree format. You can expand and collapse any level that you want to see more or less details for.
      • Flat view: Shows the CI relationships in a flat view. You can adjust the number of levels of relationships to show, or filter to show only specific CIs.
    • Select Edit relationships to open Unified Map for the CI in edit mode and with the following map settings:
      • Home node set to the current CI.
      • Relationship levels set to 1 level.
      • Layers set to show Business, Service Instances, Applications, and infrastructure.
      • Layout is set to Vertical.

      This function isn't available for a non-operational CI. For information about using the Life cycle stage attribute to define a CI's operational state, see Configure CIs to appear based on life cycle stage value.

      If the CI class is a Service Instance [cmdb_ci_service_auto] or a derived class, then you must either use Service Mapping (if installed) to edit a map for a Service Instance, or edit dependency relationships in Unified Map.

    • Select Refresh after saving changes in Unified Map, to reflect your updates in the Relationship section.
    More information about relationships and about editing relationships in Unified Map:

    Role requirements for operations in this section: Edit relationships requires sn_cmdb_editor

    Services and Offerings

    This section shows cards with counts of the following services and offerings associated with the CI:
    • Service Instance: Any CI related to the Service Instance [cmdb_ci_service_auto] table where Service Classification is Application Service.
    • Business Service Offering: Any Service Instance (Service Classification is Application Service) that this CI is related to, and which has a relationship to Service_Offering where Service Classification is Business Service.
    • Technology Management Offering: Any Service Instance (Service Classification is Application Service) that this CI is related to, and which has a relationship to Service_Offering where Service Classification is Technical Service or the CI is related to a Dynamic CI Group, which is part of a Technical Service Offering.
    • Technology Management Service: Parent of a Technology Management Offering.

    Select a tile to drill down to the specific records associated with the tile.

    More information:

    Health

    This section shows aggregations from the latest CMDB Health test results for the Completeness, Correctness, Compliance, and Relationship KPIs, and the aggregated state of attestation. Color codes are used to denote pass/fail scores.

    This section shows meaningful details only if CMDB Health is set up and the associated dashboard jobs are running.

    More information:

    CMDB 360

    This section shows discovery sources data from the CMDB 360 data store for the CI. It shows the CI attributes and for each attribute, its current CMDB value, and any values that were reported by discovery sources for that attribute.

    This section appears only if CMDB 360 is enabled and configured.

    More information: