ServiceNow

The BigPanda application for ServiceNow is a native ServiceNow application that enables easy setup of multiple different integrations between BigPanda and ServiceNow, including Incidents, Changes, Maintenance Plans, and CMDB.

Supported Versions

ServiceNow Incidents

The ServiceNow Incidents integration allows you to automatically create incidents in ServiceNow from correlated, insight-rich incidents in BigPanda. Incidents in ServiceNow and BigPanda are automatically synchronized throughout their life-cycle, ensuring relevant workflows are triggered as needed and teams are always up-to-date so they can quickly resolve critical issues.

Reference the ServiceNow Incidents and ServiceNow Incident Advanced Customization documentation to learn about:

• Configuring the Integration in BigPanda and ServiceNow.
• Data Shared With ServiceNow
• Custom Headers
• OAuth 2.0 Support
• Override URLs
• ShareIncident Transform Map
• BigPandaUtility Functions

ServiceNow Changes

The ServiceNow Changes integration immediately notifies BigPanda of any new or updated changes in your ServiceNow Change Management, ensuring these changes are available for machine-language-driven root cause analysis in BigPanda, with the root RootCause Changes feature.

In the ServiceNow Changes documentation, learn more about:

• Key Features of the integration
• ServiceNow Changes Data Model
• Configuring the integration

ServiceNow CMDB

The ServiceNow CMDB integration allows you to enrich your incoming BigPanda alerts with contextual information from your ServiceNow CMDB. The added context enables NOC operators to quickly assess and resolve incidents.

In the ServiceNow CMDB documentation, learn more about:

• Key Features of the integration
• Configuring the integration

ServiceNow Maintenance

The ServiceNow Maintenance integration provides a method for suppressing alerts originating from infrastructure during a maintenance window.

In the ServiceNow Maintenance Plans documentation, learn more about:

• Key Features of the integration
• Configuration for common fields
• Configuration for Change Request-based integrations
• Configuration for Outage-based integrations

Install the BigPanda ServiceNow Integration

To install any of the integration modules, follow the Install the ServiceNow Integration instructions, then configure the module settings.

Upgrade the BigPanda ServiceNow Integration

The latest BigPanda ServiceNow integration includes support for recent ServiceNow versions and additional functionality. Upgrading your integration allows you to take advantage of the latest functionality.

Identify the Needed Update Steps

Updating the BigPanda ServiceNow app may involve different steps depending upon the version that you are currently running. Determine which version you are on, and follow the steps below to upgrade.

• If you are installing ServiceNow for the first time, follow the Install the ServiceNow Integration instructions.
• If you are using BigPanda ServiceNow v1, first update to the BigPanda ServiceNow v2 app.
• If you are running the non-customized ServiceNow Store version, update to the Developer Custom App (Update Set) prior to installing the latest version.
• If you are running the version downloaded from the Developer Store, follow the Update instructions below to install the latest version.

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BigPanda App Version

To determine your BigPanda ServiceNow application version, navigate to System Applications > My Company Applications within your ServiceNow instance. The BigPanda Application tile will list which version has been installed.

Uninstall the Integration

Deleting an integration requires that you remove the integration in both the integrated system and BigPanda. We recommend that you first uninstall the integration on the integrated system to prevent traffic from being sent and rejected by BigPanda, since the app_key will not exist once you delete the integration in BigPanda.

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Caution During Replacement

When replacing an existing integration with a new tool or system, we recommend configuring the new integration first to ensure no data is lost.

Disable the Integration

You can stop sending change data to BigPanda but preserve your configuration settings by disabling the integration in ServiceNow.

1. In the ServiceNow application, navigate to BigPanda > Configuration.
2. In the Incidents, Alert Processing - Add On, or Maintenance Plan section, de-select the Active checkbox
3. Save the configuration

Stop sending data to BigPanda

Disable any settings that send data to BigPanda.

Within ServiceNow, navigate to System Applications > Applications.

1. Click on the BigPanda app.
2. Select the module you wish to delete and click the related Uninstall link.
3. Click OK.
4. Confirm when the dialogue box appears.

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Process will Vary

Coordinate with your system architects to ensure that any changes to your ServiceNow integration follows your organizational processes and policies. If you have questions about downstream impacts within BigPanda, please reach out to your account team.

Delete the Integration in BigPanda

Take the following steps to delete the integration from BigPanda:

1. In BigPanda, navigate to the Integrations tab and select the desired integration from the list.
2. In the integration details on the right of the page, click the trash icon, then confirm you want to delete the integration. The integration will be removed immediately.

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No Data Removal

This procedure does not remove any data from BigPanda or the integrated system. As needed, remove data from each system before deleting the integration.

Release Notes

v2.9.1 (Sep 5, 24)

The ServiceNow version 2.9.1 deepens the integration with BigPanda incidents and improves the usability of cross-platform data in ServiceNow.

• A new menu item Active Incidents lists active incidents synced to BigPanda and gives you access to a BigPanda view so you can access detailed tabs without changing your standard incident list. Available tabs in the BigPanda view include:
  • The Automated Incident Analysis tab includes the AIA summary generated in BigPanda (for orgs with the Advanced Insight Module).
  • The BP Alerts tab provides a real time view of BigPanda alert data. These alerts used to be added to the incident description but can now be accessed in a much cleaner view. This data can also be added to the ServiceNow Alert Table. Talk to your BigPanda account team about enabling this feature.
  • The Incident Tasks tab improves visibility and accountability by listing all alerts where the task tag is set to true.
  • The Root Cause tab will show you changes matched with the incident through Root Cause Change Analysis
  • The Activity tab displays work notes and the activities log for the incident.
  • The Resolution tab allows you to add codes, notes, and other resolution details to the Incident.
• The Task SLAs, Affected CIs, Impacted Services/CIs, and Child Incidents tabs now connect to BigPanda alerts.
• Related link buttons make it easy to take action or view data in BigPanda with just a click.
• You can now access individual alert records from the BP Alerts table through Alert Processing - Addon menu. The Description field for these records include all alert data sent from BigPanda, including status, source, configuration item, assignments, and all alert tags.
• Alerts that cannot match the alert hostname or CI to the CMDB will appear in their own table to provide better awareness for troubleshooting.
• Missing alert hosts can be configured to automatically be added to the CMDB via CI Discovery.
• Additional advanced configuration options for alerts enable you to customize what data you receive in the BP Alerts table.
• New script includes drive automation and AI features:
  • BigPandaAIM script include - provides processing for RCC and AI features
  • BigPandaAlert script include - processes alert data for alert tables

Install the BigPanda app from the ServiceNow Developer Portal.

If installing the BigPanda ServiceNow integration for the first time, you will want to use the download button to retrieve the latest full version.

If upgrading from 2.9.0, use the UPDATE link in the developer portal or through this update link. Read more about upgrading your integration in the Update the BigPanda ServiceNow App documentation.

v2.9 (2/9/24)

New Features

• Application: Introduced a toggle to store BigPanda integration configurations within BigPanda for improved troubleshooting capabilities
• Changes: Proper date formatting is used in BigPanda regardless of date format used in ServiceNow
• CMDB: "Choice Table" SNOW records now use Display Value in CMDB
• Incident Reports: Updated default fields to improve reporting capabilities
• Incident Reports: Proper date formatting is used in BigPanda regardless of date format used in ServiceNow
• Incidents: Updated the default settings for Transform Field Maps to remove maps that have no logic associated
• Incidents: Suppressed callback activity back to BigPanda from resolved ServiceNow incidents
• Incidents: Restructured SNOW Layout to match design language in BigPanda Unified Console
• Incidents: Added RCC Suspect/Matches to ServiceNow Incident Description
• Incidents: Added AIA Summary to ServiceNow Incident Description
• Incidents: Updated Impact/Urgency fields, removed Priority field
• Incidents: Added a dropdown to control direction of incident tag sync ("to and from BigPanda," "to BigPanda only," or "to SNOW only")
• Incidents: Added option to insert description of incident in the worknotes
• Incidents: Created Button Elements in ServiceNow that open BigPanda

Bug Fixes

• Changes: Ensure support for all ServiceNow timezone options
• CMDB: Rows will now be skipped when records contain non UTF-8 compatible values
• Incidents: Incident Tags Sync Configuration is now case-insensitive
• Incidents: OK alerts excluded fromsetPrimaryAlert()utility

v2.8 (4/28/23)

The BigPanda team resolved logical bugs related to the newly introduced event-type metadata tracking that were present in v2.5-2.7.

New Features

• Application: The Javascript Mode has been updated to ES12 (ECMA2021) For more details check this ServiceNow Developer Blog post.
• CMDB: Support for inactivating individual tables, which can be used to test the addition of new tables
• CMDB: Improved logging (track incorrect queries, missing columns, etc.)
• CMDB: Prepopulate configuration with most frequently used tables (only for new downloads; these will not be applied when updating)
• Configuration: Set Affected CIs checkbox in Changes to true as default
• Incident Reports: Sync historical incidents with BigPanda for MTTR analysis
• Incidents: Flapping - Block Resolve toggle will only resolve a ServiceNow incident if it is not flapping
• Incidents: When tickets fail to get created in ServiceNow, Comments are now posted back to BigPanda with details
• Incidents: Description and Short Description defaults were updated based on feedback from users
• Incidents: Update BigPanda incident tag to use HTML anchor link
• OAuth: Support for OAuth-based authentication when creating tickets from BigPanda

Bug Fixes

• Incidents: Prevent occasional duplicate notifications on initial ticket creation
• Incidents: Support syncing BigPanda Incident Tags with space characters
• If using v2.7, clearing browser cache may be required to fix configuration form entries
• Resolve issues when using CMDB and upgrading from version < 2.2.1
• Updated the CDMB Script Includes to retrieve the display names of glide_list and Choice Table records

v2.7 (4/14/23)

Bug Fixes

• Changed "===" to "==" and "!==" to "!=" in Business Rules and Script actions
• Resolved NLU “fix missing record” errors when installing/applying Update Sets
• CMDB 'Active' checkbox now works on individual rows for ServiceNow Utah
• Added Incident ID to Incident Reports

v2.6 (removed following fixes applied in v2.7)

v2.5 (1/11/23)

New Features

• CMDB: Support for inactivating individual tables, which can be used to test adding a new table
• CMDB: Improved logging (track incorrect queries, missing columns, etc.)
• CMDB: Prepopulate configuration with most frequently used tables (only for new downloads; these will not be applied when updating)
• Incident Reports: Sync historical incidents with BigPanda for MTTR analysis
• Incidents: Flapping - Block Resolve toggle will only resolve a ServiceNow incident if it is not flapping
• Incidents: When tickets fail to get created in ServiceNow, post Comments/Incident Tags back to BigPanda with details
• Incidents: Description and Short Description defaults were updated based on feedback from users
• OAuth: Support for OAuth-based authentication when creating tickets from BigPanda

Bug Fixes

• Incidents: Prevent occasional duplicate notifications on initial ticket creation
• Incidents: Support syncing BigPanda Incident Tags with space characters
• Resolve issues when using CMDB and upgrading from version <2.2.1

v2.4 (7/1/22)

Bug Fixes

• When a closed incident in ServiceNow is reopened in BigPanda a new ServiceNow incident is created instead of reopening the closed incident
• Set standard "Content-Type", 'application/json' Request Headers to support debugging
• CMDB will now replace newline characters with spaces
• In Chrome, auto-complete will be unable to insert incorrect passwords on the Configuration form
• All changes sent to BigPanda will be in UTC to prevent incorrect time zone shifting
• Fix bug sending blank values for Incident Tags