Specifying Usage Criteria

You can specify the types of CMDB item to/for which software products and inventory items can be allocated or reserved. This determines which allocations and reservations can be made.

For example, you may want to specify that a particular software product is only allowed to be used with a particular model of laptop.

By default, no usage criteria are applied and the Inventory or Software Product record can be allocated to, or reserved for, any CMDB item.

Applying usage criteria only affects reservation, allocation and transfer ownership transactions. It does not prevent you from linking an Inventory or Software Product to a CMDB item using the Linked Items tab.

Applicability and Use

The usage criteria will apply to all areas where you can perform asset management transactions, including performing transactions against a software product or inventory on a call, request, or task, as well as automatically through the Manage CMDB Task.

The usage criteria that you specify here are applied throughout the IPK and workflow management cycles. The CMDB item filters the allocated CMDB items according to the usage criteria when allocation or reservation from a call or request task is done.

The No Usage Criteria option is available as a search criterion on the CMDB Item Search window.

Applying usage criteria only affects asset management transactions (in particular, reserve, allocate, and transfer transactions), and does not prevent analysts from linking inventories or software products to CMDB items.

Automation

In a Manage CMDB Task, if the allocation or reservation does not meet the usage criteria during runtime, the transaction fails and the error is written into the execution history for the Manage CMDB task.

Adding Usage Criteria

Before you start

You must have CMDB Item Update selected in the CMDB Items tab of your Configuration Management security role.

  1. Select the Edit icon to display the details in edit mode if necessary.

  2. Scroll down to the Linking Panel, and select Usage Criteria. CMDB items, manufacturers, and models already specified as the usage criteria appear in the browse table.

  3. Clear the No Usage Criteria checkbox.

  4. Select Add.

  5. In the Usage Criteria Details section below the table, select the CMDB type using the button, and select manufacturer and/or model from the drop-down lists. If manufacturers are linked to models by the system administrator, you can only choose a model which is linked to the selected manufacturer. You do not have to select all three, for example, if you only want to restrict the usage by CMDB item type, only select a CMDB Type.

  6. Select Save Usage Criteria to add the new criteria. This adds a new row to the browse table with the values you chose specified in the CMDB Item Type, Manufacturer and Model columns.

If you clear the No Usage Criteria checkbox, you must add a usage criteria otherwise you will not be able to save the software product or inventory details.

Removing Usage Criteria

There is no usage criteria applied to software product or inventory by default. If you impose usage criteria and no longer want them, you can remove the restrictions by re-applying this setting.

Updating Usage Criteria

  1. Select the Edit icon to display the details in edit mode if necessary.

  2. Scroll down to the Linking Panel, and select Usage Criteria. CMDB items, manufacturers, and models already specified as the usage criteria appear in the browse table.

  3. In the Usage Criteria Details section below the table, select the row you want to update.

  4. Select Edit.

  5. Select, update or clear the CMDB type, manufacturer and/or model. If manufacturers are linked to models by the system administrator, you can only choose a model which is linked to the selected manufacturer.

  6. Select Save Usage Criteria to update the criteria.