Home Analyst Portal

Folder picker in cireson portal service offering

Dieter_SaerensDieter_Saerens Partner IT Monkey ✭
A customer asked if there is a possibility to have a folder picker to get an user his UNC path. (An offering to create a folder on a share, etc ...), more or less like the attachment selector, but only for the UNC path.

Is this possible in the cireson portal?

Answers

  • Adam_DzyackyAdam_Dzyacky Product Owner Contributor Monkey ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited December 2017
    It is possible, but how the data (folder paths) get there is a different story entirely because of how lists work inside of Request Offerings.

    1. You can't select an external data source to query (although that'd be a great idea for how to improve the Cireson Advance Request Offering)
    2. Simple List - You'll have to maintain within the Request Offering itself or PowerShell update this list through the RO. If you have multiple ROs referencing the same list, this has the potential to become a management nightmare without PowerShell. But even one list seems like it could be rather large, still demanding the need for PowerShell management of the list.
    3. Enumeration - This is as step above simple lists, because you can centrally manage them within Library -> Lists. This however will most certainly demand PowerShell updates to keep this enum updated. Then, you'll need to extend your SR Class to reference this enum.
    4. Query Results - You'd need the folders as some type of Configuration Item within SCSM which (and I could be mistaken) no such CI Class exists to perform this, so you'd have to create your own CI Class, then determine a method of keeping folders on the network in sync with folders/CIs within SCSM

    Here's a blog that uses none of the above, and instead just asks for a string but is leveraging a custom SQL table to keep all the folders, permissions, etc available to SCO. https://myinfrastructureblog.wordpress.com/2014/11/03/automate-access-to-folders-with-service-manager-and-orchestrator/

    Perhaps another way of achieving this is using SCOM as the discovery mechanism to enumerate folders, shares, etc. then take the same MP, import into SCSM, and then they'd sync over. This has a lot of the elements of option 4, but the method of keeping them in sync would be performed automatically by SCOM/SCSM. I think the only problem here is the potential amount of things SCOM could discover. Once again, I could be mistaken but I think there is some "best practices" limit on the amount of objects that SCOM should discover of a single class.
  • john_doylejohn_doyle Cireson Support Ninja IT Monkey ✭✭✭✭
    Hi @Adam_Dzyacky

    It is possible, but how the data (folder paths) get there is a different story entirely because of how lists work inside of Request Offerings.

    1. You can't select an external data source to query (although that'd be a great idea for how to improve the Cireson Advance Request Offering)


    That's why I added the @QueryList tag to the Request Offering toolbox. You can define your data source in the portal and then use that query to populate a list in a request offering.



  • Justin_WorkmanJustin_Workman Cireson Support Super IT Monkey ✭✭✭✭✭
    Adam,
    I really like the idea of pre-defining shares as a CI!  This could be used in other places too!  
  • Adam_DzyackyAdam_Dzyacky Product Owner Contributor Monkey ✭✭✭✭✭
    Oh thats right! I was typing that and thinking "Why do I feel someone curbed this." Thanks for righting me about your brilliant solution there John.
  • Dieter_SaerensDieter_Saerens Partner IT Monkey ✭
    Hi @Adam_Dzyacky

    It is possible, but how the data (folder paths) get there is a different story entirely because of how lists work inside of Request Offerings.

    1. You can't select an external data source to query (although that'd be a great idea for how to improve the Cireson Advance Request Offering)


    That's why I added the @QueryList tag to the Request Offering toolbox. You can define your data source in the portal and then use that query to populate a list in a request offering.



    How does that @QueryList tag work? 

    Adam_Dzyacky about updating an enumeration list.

    The main problem there is that the customer wants to see the UNC paths of the end-user that is logged on as these shares can change depending on the department or location. (Could be a nightmare to manage tho, unless you work with different enumeration lists and show them with the Advanced Offerings depending on the department).
  • john_doylejohn_doyle Cireson Support Ninja IT Monkey ✭✭✭✭
    Hi @Dieter_Saerens 

    The tag is documented in this thread. You need to get your source data into a database. You can then add the database as a source, and define a query to retrieve the data on the Admin Settings page on the portal.

  • Adam_DzyackyAdam_Dzyacky Product Owner Contributor Monkey ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited December 2017
    Agreed @Dieter_Saerens managing multiple enums for this one particular thing feels inherently problematic long term. So if it's based on the currently logged in user, this is where I would further lean with shares as Configuration Items. Then you could permission out which end users had access to those CIs thus performing a filter of sorts.

    This approach is actually similar to something I'm doing with Asset Management ordering requests leveraging a combination of the Catalog Item Type + Catalog Item Status properties to build several dynamic groups. Then assigning those groups to my respective User Roles. In this way, a "pre-filter" of sorts is performed through the users' permissions against CI's in SCSM rather than per Request Offering.
Sign In or Register to comment.