Creating and modifying impact analysis rules

You can modify or delete the sample rules that are provided with this product and add new rules to match the needs of your data center. You can also construct new rules to mirror your configuration item (CI) classifications, the CI hierarchy, and other aspects of your CI configuration in the CMDB. The impact analysis engine uses the rules to traverse the CMDB and calculate impacts.

1. Click Go to > Changes > Impact Analysis Configuration to open the Impact Analysis Configuration application. A list of current rules is displayed in the Configuration Items Impact Rules section.
2. To add a new rule, click New Row, fill in the fields, and click . The fields that you fill in are as follows:

   Relationship Name

   Click , and select the name of the relationship between CIs in a related pair. The relationship names correspond to the CI relationships that are defined in the CMDB. You can supply any additional information about the relationship in the field to the right of the Relationship Name specification.

   Impact Direction

   Click , and select SOURCE if the source CI in a pair is impacted, TARGET if the target CI in a pair is impacted, or BOTH if both source and target CIs are impacted. For example, if a business application is installed on (INSTALLEDON) an application server, the business application CI is the source, and the server is the target; the source is affected if the target has an outage, so the impact direction is SOURCE.

   Description

   (Optional) You can use this field to add information about the rule, such as the impact direction, conditions, and so on. A description can state the rule in human language, making it easy for users to quickly understand the rule and its purpose.

   Target Condition

   (Optional) Click , and either select a condition from the Select Value list or go to the Conditional Expression Manager application to create a new target condition to apply to the rule. A target condition is created against the target CI in the relationship; the rule matches only if the condition is true for the target CI in the relationship. A condition can examine any attribute of a CI; you can restrict matching by classification, status, related data, and so on.

   Source Condition

   (Optional) Click , and either select a condition from the Select Value list or go to the Conditional Expression Manager application to create a new source condition to apply to the rule. A source condition is created against the source CI in the relationship; the rule matches only if the condition is true for the source CI in the relationship. A condition can examine any attribute of a CI; you can restrict matching by classification, status, related data, and so on.

3. To modify a current rule, select the rule, and retype information in text fields that you want to change, or apply a new target condition or source direction as appropriate. When you have completed the modifications, click to save the modified rule.