HP Configuration Management System Best Practices Library Frequently Asked Questions Revision 2b, March 15, 2012
Planning and Design Guides
Documentation Updates Table 1
Document Changes
Chapter
Version
Changes
All
Initial
JR - Initial document for rev2
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Rev2b
JR – FAQ update
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CMS Best Practices Library FAQ What is a CMS? ............................................................................................................. 4 What is the CMS Best Practices Library? ...................................................................... 4 Who was the CMS Best Practices Library created for? ................................................ 4 What is in the Library? .................................................................................................. 4 How do I get started?.................................................................................................... 5 What other CMS Resources are available from HP? .................................................... 5 How Can I get a copy of the CMS Best Practices Library? ............................................ 6 How Do I Provide Feedback on the CMS Best Practices Library? ................................. 6 What Version of UCMDB is supported? ....................................................................... 6 What is HP’s Approach to CMS Best Practices? ............................................................ 6
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What is a CMS? A Configuration Management System (CMS) is itself a collection of tools, analytics, bases of information, and systems. The CMS complements the processes and policies implemented to provide configuration and integration capabilities for managing IT and business services. However, creating such a system is at best a complex and significant effort. Disambiguation: This concept of CMS is different than the HP-specific CMS acronym, Communications and Media Services.
What is the CMS Best Practices Library? The HP CMS Best Practices Library is a collection of documents and artifacts published by HP Software. The library is intended to provide guidance and pass on experience about configuration management, specifically how to design and use a CMS to support IT service management (ITSM) and ITIL-based projects. To progress past the current arguments and confusion of today, one must expand and reexamine certain assumptions and perspectives. The library attempts to provide tools to perform such retrospection. The library may be used as a reference for architecture, design or planning requirements, operationally, or simply as guidance for your own CMS approach. In any case we hope you find it useful.
Who was the CMS Best Practices Library created for? The CMS Best Practices Library was created to help people plan for, design, implement, and deploy a successful CMS. The best practices will not only steer sponsors and stakeholders in the right direction, but also avoid common errors, reduce risks, improve decision-making ability, and empower them to think about CMS on their own – to decide what’s right for their IT organization and business.
What is in the Library? The library itself is composed of three sub-sections: Planning and Design, Deployment and Implementation, and Integrations. The current library is revision 2, published in June 2010, by the CMS Product Marketing Management group of HP Software.
Planning and Design Section The CMS Strategy Guide in the Planning and Design section is the starting point. Its companion documents, the Provider Onboarding Guide and the Consumer Onboarding Guide provide the process governance layer around the CMS to ensure it is created and operated successfully. Other documents in this section provide more focused guidance on topics such as discovery planning and understand staffing roles and responsibilities.
Deployment and Implementation Section This section contains a range of technical documents focusing on specific best practices throughout the lower CMS stack: technology, data and data modeling. Many documents focus on DDM and how to optimize
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discovery and integrations. Others give guidance on creating UCMDB content efficiently, administration of a CMDB and MDR in a CMS, and monitoring data quality.
Integrations Section This section contains technical best practice documents for designing, deploying, and customizing CMS-related integrations. Rev2 contains documents for HP Business Service Monitoring, HP Service Manager, and HP Storage Essentials. Integration documents are also available outside this library for other UCMDB integrations with products such as HP Asset Manager and DDMi.
Strategy Guide The spearhead document of the library is the CMS Strategy Guide. This guide attempts comprehensive coverage of CMS and is organized into the following sections: -
Introduction (what is a CMS and why do we care) SACM and CMS Demystified (better definitions, critical missing variables, and understanding boundaries) CMS Process Governance (how to focus on data quality and build a successful data governance process) CMS Planning and Design (process and details of creating a blueprint for building and deploying a CMS) CMS Deployment (implementational approaches and issues) Glossary and Index (expanded and refined definitions)
How do I get started? First, obtain a copy of the CMS Best Practices Library. There are two starting documents which can allow you to read a small amount, then skip to whatever subject you want to see next. The CMS Strategy Guide is the starting point if you are a stakeholder, sponsor, manager, project manager, consultant, or otherwise critically involved in a CMS project. It explains the facts, concepts, terms, and helps you link the concepts into an actionable plan for proceeding with a CMS project. The readme.html file provides a quick reference link to each of the documents in the Library. You can use this document to quickly link to several documents at once or jump to documents covering specific topics.
What other CMS Resources are available from HP? Professional Services - HP offers additional resources and services to assist you in all stages of a CMS project. Contact your local HP person for more details. Additional downloads and tools – download supplemental how-to documents, updates to the CMS Best Practice Library, DDM Content Packs, calculators and other spreadsheet-based tools, and more on the Communities Portal. Practitioner Communities - HP offers more than consulting – we have an active and growing community of practitioners you are encouraged to join. You have access to a weekly, moderated conference specifically for CMS/UCDMB/DDM practitioners. This is one of the most successful programs to keep HP and its customers in
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constant communication throughout their CMS projects and into operation. Email
[email protected] for more details. Communities Portal- You have access to the CMS/UCMDB/DDM communities, a portal where you can download the CMS Best Practices Library, and discuss CMS topics on discussion forums with your peers. To access go to https://hpln.hp.com/group/configuration-management or https://hpln.hp.com/group/universalcmdb or https://hpln.hp.com/group/discovery-and-dependency-mapping for the respective communities.
How Can I get a copy of the CMS Best Practices Library? You can obtain the library either from your local HP contact or download it from the CMS Community site at https://hpln.hp.com/system/files/CMS%20BP%20Library%20rev2a.zip. You must have a valid HP Passport ID associated with a SAID which is license to either HP Universal CMDB (UCMDB) or HP Discovery and Dependency Mapping (DDM) to access.
How Do I Provide Feedback on the CMS Best Practices Library? Send email to
[email protected] and your feedback will be promptly reviewed. If you would like a reply to your email, please indicate this along with your feedback.
What Version of UCMDB is supported? Rev2 was based on version 8. Much of the library is version-independent since it deals with CMS strategy. The DDM best practices are still useful even if the UI has improved since version 8. The biggest loss of version value is with the best practices of the “workaround” sort, those that deal specifically with version 8. These will be updated in the next revision.
What is HP’s Approach to CMS Best Practices? Our approach has always been one of community. Best practices cannot be written, in the sense that they cannot be merely thought up, within a software organization or a lab. It is the customers, the practitioners, that are the focus of a best practices project. A Best Practices project should be in charge of developing, collecting and organizing content from actual practitioners. This takes effort ahead of time, to build a user base into a community, and effort on the back end to harvest the best practices and generate the library. Most best practices efforts miss this critical first part. However, HP has nurtured the CMS community, as a community, since 2006, as the UCMDB Practitioner’s Forum. This forum is a group of practitioners who meet on a weekly basis to discuss best practices and leading developments. The reader is encouraged to contact HP at
[email protected] to learn more.
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