iWise CMDB

It is extremely difficult to describe a piece of music in words rather than sounds. In the same way, iWise software is a "see" rather than a "what." But we will do our best to describe it in both words and images. Below is a summary of iWise CMDB (Configuration Management).

iWise CMDB is used to define and manage generics, products, and components, including both voice and data. It is also used to define and maintain support structures and processes that are used to integrate generics, products, and components with the rest of the iWise product family (including incidents, problems, changes, requests, and financial objects). CMDB can be used to create and maintain the following:

• Generic Product Types (often referred to simply as "Generics")
• Products and Catalogs
• Components
• Paths
• Service Catalogs
• Availability Objects (SLAs)
• Support Objects

CMDB is used to define and manage generic product types, or generics, which are used to classify or group products and administrative areas into high-level categories. These classifications can then be referenced by the iWise product family, including Incident Management and Request Management. This allows iWise coordinators to tailor or expand information collected by these products without having to perform panel modifications.

Once a generic is defined, you can add attributes to identify properties about products and areas you want to track. For example, you can define a generic called "Server" with properties such as number of ports and/or number of slots. Alternatively, you can define a generic called Distribute with properties such as number of copies and/or destination.

Properties are automatically reflected in related iWise products, which allows you to dynamically alter and control information collected by them. The following figure illustrates this relationship:

As depicted in the above figure, generics are the peak of the iWise enterprise data dimension pyramid. Depending on rules defined for the attribute or generic, properties of each level are reflected in the next lower level. However, only properties unique to that level must be changed. This reduces the amount of data to be maintained in the lowest level, while at the same time providing a way to easily expand data dimensions as new products and configurations are announced.

Generics are also used to begin the definition of your administrative support structure and related availability rules and guidelines.

• Define valid products that can be referenced in the iWise family -- such as in Incident and Change Management
• Define product properties for configuration definitions and automatic generations
• Define groups or personnel used to automatically generate change, request, and purchase order approval lists
• Define incident determination scripts for access by helpdesk personnel
• Define escalation and alert processing on a per-product or area basis
• Define related products for incidental and actual outage calculations
• Define procedures for disaster and/or emergency recovery purposes
• Obtain an online history of product outages and activity

CMDB allows you to record the information necessary to automate time-consuming tasks. This, in turn, causes you to evaluate and document your support processes and rules. You may find this is the most time-consuming part of implementing and using products in CMDB.

• Manage configurations, including hardware, voice, and supporting equipment
• Provide a dynamically adaptable configuration which can be used with changing environments, products, and characteristics
• Interface with infraWise products for verifications, validations, Service Level Agreement measurements, and chargeback parameters
• Develop and obtain configuration reports in a variety of formats, using Crystal Reports
• Identify ports or other connection requirements when attaching new components
• Provide path analysis to help determine line saturation
• Provide a simple way to perform versioning and physical configuration planning
• Provide a way to define and access configuration paths, from both application and configuration viewpoints
• Determine if a component is involved in a currently reported incident or problem
• Determine if a component is subject to a scheduled change
• Determine availability information for a component
• Provide path summaries to quickly and accurately measure the effect of an incident or the impact of a change

CMDB is used to manage configurations as easily as possible while still maintaining the data integrity necessary to be successful. It accomplishes this by dividing the complexities of configuration management into separate but implicitly interrelated parts. Generics, products, components, and connectivity are defined separately, assets and financial data are defined in Financial Management, and employees and policies in Human Resources Administration. However, through relational data capabilities provided by iWise, this information is shared and available to each application. This approach has immediate and clear advantages:

• Product and financial personnel maintain and control their view of systems and products -- they do not need to know the intricacies of configuration processes. On the other hand, systems configuration personnel do not need to concern themselves with accrual and depreciation processing.
• Defining properties just once reduces storage and entry/update time.
• Maintaining your configuration becomes a sub-activity of Change Management.

In addition to automated configuration entry, CMDB data is used by incident, change, and financial management. It is used to calculate incidental outage, verify that assets are being actively used, determine the impact of a change, and other important systems management tasks.

Once components and connections are defined, you can obtain a summary of a series of connections called paths. You can obtain path summaries from the controller down to the work-station, or you can obtain an application's view of the same path. Paths are used by the iWise applications, such as iWise Incident Management, to determine where a component resides and its scope of effect within the configuration. Storing path data as objects is more efficient than repeatedly running the path each time the system accesses a component.

CMDB is the central component of the iWise product family. It defines relationships of incidents, changes, components, assets, and other administrative processes using key attributes and automation.

A difficult task in initially implementing CMDB is defining and categorizing products. To help you get started, infraWise provides the iWise Knowledge Base. It provides a set of common tables (vendors, symptoms, etc.), generics (application, computer, etc.), specific products (Dell Server, Microsoft Windows XP, etc.), and components. For more information about the Knowledge Base, consult your iWise Manager or System Administrator.

CMDB allows you to record the information necessary to automate time-consuming tasks. This, in turn, causes you to evaluate and document your support processes and rules. You may find this is the most time-consuming part of implementing and using CMDB.