Best practices for normalizing models

Models enable you to standardize key attribute values, such as model and manufacturer, in CIs and assets. When users select a model for a CI or asset, the model name and other attributes values that are specified in the selected model are applied to a CI or asset. For more information, see Managing models.

You can can use the Model form (Remedyforce Administration > Configure CMDB 2.0 > Models) to manually create models in BMC Remedyforce. Alternatively, you can choose to generate models from the Model attribute (data type: Text) in existing CIs and assets in BMC Remedyforce CMDB. However, the CIs or assets from which models are generated might have inconsistent values in the Model attribute. For example, the Model attribute value in one CI might be Dell Latitude 3550, while the Model attribute value in another CI might be Latitude 3500. In this case, two records are generated in your model repository for the same model.

To resolve this issue, you can create and apply rules to normalize all such different values with a standardized value. For values that are not covered by your normalization rules, you can choose to generate and then manually manage these exceptions. Based on your requirements, you can also specify values that the normalization process must ignore.

To normalize models in BMC Remedyforce CMDB and the models repository, we recommend that you perform the steps in the order listed in the following table: