Integrating with ServiceNow Native Tables

Starting with the Flexera Integration app version 5.0.4, Flexera integration brings the capability to populate ServiceNow native (out-of-the-box) tables with Flexera data. Prior to this version, users can only view Flexera data in separate custom Flexera tables. This new capability allows users to use Flexera software and hardware models as well as installation data natively in various ServiceNow modules. For example, in the Incident-Problem-Change module, users can populate software and hardware model fields using ‘pristine,’ normalized models from Flexera.

This capability is not enabled by default (the default behavior is not to populate the native tables, and only custom Flexera tables will be populated with Flexera data). To enable this capability, go to the Integration Properties page (located under the Flexera Integration menu), and click the Integrate Flexera Models/Installations in ServiceNow Native tables check box so that the option is set to Yes.

When Integrate Flexera Models/Installations in ServiceNow Native tables is set to Yes, further customizations can be done to allow users to choose which native tables will be populated with Flexera data. This can be done by clicking any of the following check boxes in the Native Table Integration page (located under the Flexera Integration menu) so that they are set to Yes.

Adding Flexera Hardware Models into "cmdb_hardware_product_model" table
Adding Flexera Software Models into "cmdb_software_product_model" table
Adding Flexera Software installations in "cmdb_sam_sw_install" table
Populate "software_model" field into "cmdb_sam_sw_install" table

By default, when the user enabled the option to Integrate Flexera Models/Installation in ServiceNow Native tables option, these four check boxes will be checked (set to Yes). Unchecking any of the boxes will exempt the tables and/or fields from being populated with Flexera data.

The following provides the expected behavior when each of the boxes is checked.

Adding Flexera Hardware Models into “cmdb_hardware_product_model” table—Checking this box populates the referenced table with “pristine,” normalized hardware models from Flexera’s Technopedia catalog. Any existing hardware models in the table (either coming from ServiceNow or manually created by the user) are preserved. The new Flexera hardware models will be inserted, and identified with corresponding Technopedia IDs.
Adding Flexera Software Models into “cmdb_software_product_model” table—Checking this box populates the referenced table with ‘pristine,’ normalized software models from Flexera’s Technopedia catalog. Any existing software models in the table (either coming from ServiceNow or manually created by the user) are preserved. The new Flexera software models will be inserted, and identified with corresponding Technopedia IDs.
Adding Flexera Software installations into “cmdb_sam_sw_install” table—Checking this box populates the referenced table with new software installation records from Flexera’s normalization process. A new installation record is inserted only when it has not already existed in this table.
Populate “software_model” field into "cmdb_sam_sw_install" table—Checking this box populates the referenced field in the referenced table with “pristine,” normalized software models from Flexera’s Technopedia catalog. This behavior applies only to existing software installation records which have not been normalized by ServiceNow (the software_model field is empty). When the record has been normalized (the software_model field is already populated by ServiceNow’s software model), Flexera does not touch this field.

Notes on cmdb_sam_sw_discovery_model table

Consider the following with respect to the cmdb_sam_sw_discovery_model table:

Any changes in this table are merely byproduct of changes in cmdb_sam_sw_install table to keep the integrity of the CMDB system.
A new discovery record will be inserted into this table only to accommodate a corresponding new installation record inserted in the cmdb_sam_sw_install table. This new discovery record has a corresponding Technopedia ID.
Flexera does not touch any pre-existing discovery records in this table.