Automated change requests and tasks in Smart IT

Overview

Every IT organization has two processes in place, Change governance and Change implementation. Change implementation performs operations such as, server or application positioning, patch deployment, network configuration, database updates, and so on. Change management is responsible for creating change requests, planning and scheduling changes, approving change requests, and so on. The two processes must coordinate to successfully execute the change request.

Typically, in IT organizations, the data center operator creates and executes jobs. To successfully execute the job, every job must have a corresponding change request. This change request must be approved to execute the job and complete the operation. Considering this dependency between change governance and change implementation, sometimes it might be difficult to follow standards, especially when the entire process is performed manually. In some cases, the corresponding change requests are not created, and even if they are created, they might not be approved, and the job is executed without approval. This leads to a situations where you bypass processes, and it becomes difficult to track changes, and measure risks.

To overcome these challenges, BMC Change Automation SmartFlow solution brings about integration between BMC BladeLogic Automation and Change Management. Instead of manually conducting the entire process, BMC Change Automation SmartFlow automates the processes to streamline the interaction between Change management and BMC BladeLogic Automation.

Automated change requests in Smart IT

 Automated change requests are created in Change Management, and users can only access and edit them in Smart IT. Automated change requests are handled in the similar manner as normal change requests. All the capabilities of normal change requests are applicable to the automated change requests. Important considerations about automated change requests in Smart IT are listed below: 

• You can search and view automated change requests.
• The initial status of the automated change request is set to Planning in progress.
• To execute the automated change request, a corresponding automated tasks is attached to it. You can view this automated task in the Tasks tab of the automated change request profile.
• When you move the automated change request to Schedule for Approval status, the system triggers the approval process. Similar to the normal change request approval process, the change request reviewer can approve, reject, or keep the automated change request on hold. Only when it is approved, its status changes to Scheduled, and the status of the corresponding automated task becomes Work in Progress.
• When the automated change request is approved in Smart IT or Change Management, the corresponding job on the BladeLogic server is executed. When the job is successfully executed, the corresponding automated change request in Smart IT is updated to Completed, and the automated task attached to it is automatically closed.

Automated tasks in Smart IT

To execute automated change requests, work is segregated into automated tasks. When tasks are complete, the change request is also completed. Important considerations about automated tasks in Smart IT are listed below:

• Automated tasks are automatically created in Smart IT.
• Automated tasks have three additional fields - Job ID, Job version, and Job type. The value in these fields is fetched from the corresponding job created on the BladeLogic server.
• Every automated change request has by default, one automated task attached to it.
• If needed, you can create tasks from templates, and specify the Task type as Single Task, and Activity type as Automatic. You can then attach the task to the automated change request. For more details see, Adding-tasks-to-tickets-in-Smart-IT.
• The status of the automated task is automatically updated based on the status of the automated change request to which it is attached. 

Change request templates

In Change Management, the administrator can configure change request templates, and specify rules to implement the change. To configure change templates you may refer the topic, Managing-change-template-selection-rules. For example, you create a rule for Company A, and specify the change class as Standard. You can also specify other parameters such as impact, urgency, and categorization. These parameters are applied automatically when the rule is satisfied. On the BladeLogic server, when a job has Standard change class, the rule you configured is applied, and the corresponding template attached to the rule is executed. Note that on the BladeLogic server, when you create a job and specify the Request type as Standard, a corresponding automated change request is created in Change Management and Smart IT. The created template gets executed and applied to the automated change request. When the reviewer approves the automated change request, the corresponding job on the BladeLogic server is triggered.