Catalog items vs Make/Model

Stephane_Bouillon

Hi,

I'm wondering how to best use the catalog item functionalities. Should I have a catalog item for every make/model of pc in my environment ? I understand the catalog is for use in service requests, so in fact I would rather just have a few catalog items, like standard desktop Pc, standard laptop, etc... but the make and model of what is a standard device changes over time. As the model is part of the properties of a catalog item, I don't see how I could link catalog items to hardware assets if there are different models for what is a "standard laptop".

On the other hand, I don't want to offer a catalog list of outdated items in the service request.

Geoff_Ross

Hi Stephane,

Good to see you thinking everything through as you use more and me of the product. Keep the questions coming, its all good.

You are right that Catalog Items are useful in Self Service, in which case, have a few such as 'Standard Desktop PC' etc is much more useful. The business don't want or need to know what an HP 800 Prodesk is and the different between that and another model.

However, Catalog Items also perform a second function which to enforce uniformity across HWAs. The Catalog Item Workflow will set all related HWAs to the Make, Model, Price, Type and Vendor (as required) from the Catalog Item. The most useful of these is Type as all items from HWA Sync Workflow get created a 'Comptuer' the Catalog Item Workflow can come along after, match to a Catalog Item on the Make and Model, relate the HWA to the Catalog Item and then pull back these properties from The Catalog Item, setting the correct Type eg. 'Laptop', 'Desktop'.

So, for this to work, you need 1 Catalog Item per model which will be related only to those HWAs of that exact model. As models come and go from your business, you can use the Catalog Items for you Model Management process, moving them through a lifecycle of statues such as:

• IT Testing
• Business Testing
• Imaging Testing
• Rejected (if any of the above fail)
• Production
• End of Life
• Retired

Then, when a model goes End of Life from the manufacture, all you need to do is update that one Catalog Item to 'End of Life' and then you can report on all HWAs that are End of Life, for example.

How then, can you deal with the initial requirement around self service? The answer is Standard. A little know or used class that is part of Cireson Asset Management. Its a really simple object, it pretty much has a name, a type and then a relationship to one or more other Configuration Items. I suggest you create a Standard called 'Standard Desktop PC'  and inside it, you place the Catalog Item(s) that are you current Standard Desktop PC model(s). Repeat for all the types of device you want to offer, and the make an Offering showing Standards (filtered on the Standard Type field if you want to show a subset). 

This gives you best of both worlds. The business will be ordering a Standard Desktop PC. They don't need to know what model is what. When the models that are currently a Standard Desktop PC change, you just create new Catalog Items for the new models and update the 'Standard Desktop PC' Standard with the new Catalog Items. Business point of view will not change so all process around ordering, staff entitlement, approval, procurement etc can all remain constant as models come and go. Once the SR comes in, and says 'Standard Desktop PC' if the IT Fulfiller does not know what that means they can hop into Cireson Asset Management, pull open the Standard and see what Catalog Items are inside.

Hope this helps,

Geoff

Geoff_Ross

Hi Stephane,

Good to see you thinking everything through as you use more and me of the product. Keep the questions coming, its all good.

You are right that Catalog Items are useful in Self Service, in which case, have a few such as 'Standard Desktop PC' etc is much more useful. The business don't want or need to know what an HP 800 Prodesk is and the different between that and another model.

However, Catalog Items also perform a second function which to enforce uniformity across HWAs. The Catalog Item Workflow will set all related HWAs to the Make, Model, Price, Type and Vendor (as required) from the Catalog Item. The most useful of these is Type as all items from HWA Sync Workflow get created a 'Comptuer' the Catalog Item Workflow can come along after, match to a Catalog Item on the Make and Model, relate the HWA to the Catalog Item and then pull back these properties from The Catalog Item, setting the correct Type eg. 'Laptop', 'Desktop'.

So, for this to work, you need 1 Catalog Item per model which will be related only to those HWAs of that exact model. As models come and go from your business, you can use the Catalog Items for you Model Management process, moving them through a lifecycle of statues such as:

• IT Testing
• Business Testing
• Imaging Testing
• Rejected (if any of the above fail)
• Production
• End of Life
• Retired

Then, when a model goes End of Life from the manufacture, all you need to do is update that one Catalog Item to 'End of Life' and then you can report on all HWAs that are End of Life, for example.

How then, can you deal with the initial requirement around self service? The answer is Standard. A little know or used class that is part of Cireson Asset Management. Its a really simple object, it pretty much has a name, a type and then a relationship to one or more other Configuration Items. I suggest you create a Standard called 'Standard Desktop PC'  and inside it, you place the Catalog Item(s) that are you current Standard Desktop PC model(s). Repeat for all the types of device you want to offer, and the make an Offering showing Standards (filtered on the Standard Type field if you want to show a subset). 

This gives you best of both worlds. The business will be ordering a Standard Desktop PC. They don't need to know what model is what. When the models that are currently a Standard Desktop PC change, you just create new Catalog Items for the new models and update the 'Standard Desktop PC' Standard with the new Catalog Items. Business point of view will not change so all process around ordering, staff entitlement, approval, procurement etc can all remain constant as models come and go. Once the SR comes in, and says 'Standard Desktop PC' if the IT Fulfiller does not know what that means they can hop into Cireson Asset Management, pull open the Standard and see what Catalog Items are inside.

Hope this helps,

Geoff

Stephane_Bouillon

Thank you Geoff for your extensive answer. Why would you choose to have another item type than "Computer" for subtypes desktop, laptop, etc... ? Doesn't that add a layer of complexity ? What is the benefit ?

Geoff_Ross

Just to provide a better understanding of the asset estate. Eg

• How many laptops do we have in total?
• We need to provide home working functionality for Accounts Department. How many of them use a Desktop?
• What percentage of senior management have a Windows tablet?

It adds complexity to the configuration I guess but not much. Using the Catalog Items means it adds no complexity to process because it will happen automatically.

Robert_Osterberg

Thx for the explanation. So we are in the process of implementing HWA in ITAM and pretty much automate alla HWA ordering and so on. We are going to make use of the Standard class in ITAM. But my thinking is that i wan´t to do PC ordering by workrole/userrole. We have standard pc`s laptop and desktop and also highend pc`s for CAD and CAM work. Also there is 2-3 models of the same type.
So today we get alot of users ordering the wrong type of HW because they don`t know the difference so by setting standards per user and adding pc types and applications the user only need to know what type of work they are hired to do to get the correct setup. We can alos relate other types of accessories to this as a maybe in need of a spacemouse for cad and so on. 
I think that standards have a lot of power to streamline and for IT it becomes much more simple.