Making products available for ordering

You can create a catalog of hardware and software items from the BMC Atrium Product Catalog and make the catalog available for your users through the Request Entry console. 

Use the Product Ordering Process Definition Template (PDT), preconfigured Application Object Templates (AOTs), and a Product Ordering Advanced Interface Form (AIF) shipped with BMC Service Request Management to create the Service Request Definition (SRD) that is required for Product Ordering. The PDT contains all the necessary mappings, and the AOTs integrate Product Ordering with BMC Helix ITSM: Asset Management and BMC Helix ITSM: Change Management. This integration enables Product Ordering to create change requests and perform asset-related tasks, such as reserving and releasing items that are in the inventory.

How Product Ordering works

Product Ordering supports orders for multiple hardware and software items, and automatically generates a purchase requisition (PR) for products that are not in the inventory. After all of the products in the inventory are reserved (and after all of the products in the PR are received), Product Ordering automatically generates a change request.

If a PR is generated, users will not see any update to the service request status until after the PR reaches a final status, whether Received or Canceled.

Product Ordering does not support partial fulfillments. If a PR is required, and if the PR (or any line item in the PR) is canceled or not approved, then the user receives none of the products in the order, even if some of the products are in inventory. In this situation, the service request shows a status of Completed With Issues.

The following sequences show how orders for individual hardware and software products are fulfilled in BMC Service Request Management. 

Hardware products process

Product Ordering determines whether a hardware product is in the inventory.

• For a hardware product that is in inventory:
  1. Product Ordering reserves the hardware CI and updates the status to Reserved.
  2. Product Ordering generates a change request. The Change Manager must deploy the CI. To know about the Change Management process, see Change management overview .

  3. After the change request is completed, Product Ordering releases the CI. The user is notified that the request has been fulfilled. 
     If the change request is cancelled, the CI is not automatically put back into inventory. You must manually place the CI back into inventory. For more information, see Managing Asset Inventory .

• For a hardware product that is not in inventory:
  1. Product Ordering generates a PR. If the purchase needs to be approved, the approval process is initiated. For more information, see Requisition management .

  2. After the CI is received, Product Ordering generates a change request. The Change Manager must deploy the CI. To know about the Change Management process, see Change management overview .

  3. After the change request is completed, the user is notified that the request has been fulfilled.

Software products process

Product Ordering determines whether a license is required and if a license is available.

• For a software product that requires a license, and for which a license is available:
  1. Product Ordering reserves the license and changes the status to Reserved.
  2. Product Ordering generates a change request. To know about the Change Management process, see Change management overview .
  3. After the change request is completed, Product Ordering releases the license. The user is notified that the request has been fulfilled.
  4. The License Engine changes the status to Deployed. The license certificate is updated with the number of deployed licenses. For more information, see Overview of Software License Management .

• For a software product that requires a license, and for which a license is not available:
  1. Product Ordering generates a PR. The regular purchasing process continues For more information about the purchasing process, see Requisition management .
     If the purchase needs to be approved, the approval process is initiated.
  2. When the PR line items are received, a license certificate is generated with the requested licenses.
  3. Product Ordering generates a change request. To know about the Change Management process, see Change management overview .
  4. After the change request is completed, Product Ordering releases the license. The user is notified that the request has been fulfilled.
  5. The License Engine changes the status to Deployed. The license certificate is updated with the number of deployed licenses. For more information, see Overview of Software License Management .

Details of the Product Ordering Process PDT

The following figure shows the process view of the Product Ordering Process PDT and the included AOTs that are part of the Product Ordering feature. The Product Ordering Process PDT is used in creating the Product Ordering service request definition (SRD).

Product Ordering Process PDT

To view the Product Ordering Process PDT

Open the Product Ordering PDT in the Visual Process Editor and click each condition and AOT. For more information, see Checking the use of a PDT by other PDTs or SRDs.

Lastly, create an SRD to provide Product Ordering as a service to your end users by using the out-of-the-box Product Ordering AIF and PDT.

After you finish setting up Product Ordering, users can access the Product Ordering SRD from the Request Entry console. 

Before you begin

• Ensure that Asset Management is installed and configured. For more information, see Installing .

• Ensure that Change Management is installed and configured (including auto-assignment rules). For more information, see Configuring Change Management .
• Ensure that Requisition Management is configured (including auto-assignment rules) and purchase orders are actively managed. For more information, see Managing purchase orders .
• Ensure that the License Engine is running. For more information, see Configuring when the license engine runs .

To configure a product in the Product Catalog

1. In the Product Catalog, select the product. If the product does not already exist, create it.
   For more information, see Viewing and searching for product entries in the Product Catalog  and Ways to populate the Product Catalog
2. Verify the following settings:
   • In the Product Catalog Setup window, the product has an associated version number (software) or model number (hardware). For software products, the Requires Contract option must be set to Yes.
     For more information, see Adding product model and version information in the Product Catalog .
   • The product and model (or version) are associated with the same company, if the product is associated with a company other than -Global-. For example, if the product is associated with Calbro, the model or version also must be associated with Calbro. If the product is associated with -Global-, the model or version can be associated with any company.
     For more information, see Associating companies to Product Catalog entries .
   • The Approved and Managed options are set for both the product and model (or version). For more information, see Approving and managing products, versions, and patches in the Product Catalog .

To add a product to Product Ordering

1. From the IT Home page, select Applications > Administrator Console > Application Administration Console.
2. Click the Custom Configuration tab.
3. Select Service Request Management > Advanced > Product Ordering Admin Console.
4. Click Open.
5. Click the Add icon.
6. In the Add Product dialog box, select the product from the search results.
   The search results show products that have not been added to Product Ordering, and that have been configured in the BMC Atrium Product Catalog. 
7. In the Product Ordering Details section, add a description and price.
8. Add an image to use with the product, as explained in adding a product image.
9. Select an image for the product.
10. To make the product available to users, change its status to Online.
11. Click Apply.

To add a product image to Product Ordering

You can add images to Product Ordering from your local computer. The maximum image size is 260 by 170 pixels.

1. In the Add Product dialog box, below the Image field, click Add.
2. In the Product Image dialog box, click Add.
3. In the Add Attachment dialog box, click Browse to navigate to the location of the image file on your local computer.
4. Select the image file, click OK, and then click Save.
5. In the Product Image dialog box, specify the company, the image name, and image file name.
6. Click Save.
7. Close the dialog box.

To select an image for a product

1. In the Add Product dialog box, select a product to view its details.
2. Below the Image field, click Select.
3. Choose an image from the list of available images and click Select.
   The image appears in the Image field.

To create a Product Ordering SRD

1. Create a standard SRD by using the Service Catalog Manager console, as explained in Creating a standard SRD.
2. In the Advanced Interface Form list, select Product Ordering AIF.
3. In the Process Template field, select Product Ordering Process from the list of available processes.
4. Deploy the SRD, as explained in Deploying SRDs.