Configuration item groups

A business enterprise may have a large number of Configuration Items (CIs) to acquire, install, repair, or manage in a variety of activities. Because many of these CIs are based on the same model or share other defining characteristics, creating CI groups is a simple way to classify CIs, to simplify tracking, and to manage changes.

Making global changes to CI groups is easier than updating CIs one at a time. Change Management can automatically open tasks for all CIs in a group. Service Level Management enables you to attach a CI group to a service level agreement (SLA) instead of attaching each CI individually to an SLA. Thereafter, Service Level Management can generate response and outage information at a CI group level.

Group types

Groups can be static, such as all monitors purchased on the same day, or dynamic, such as all monitors on the third floor. Configuration items can be grouped in many ways. For example, you might create the following groups:

• All printers
• Laser printers
• Ink jet printers
• IBM^® printers
• Xerox^® printers
• Out-of-service printers