IT service management (ITSM) tools provide a structured approach to delivering IT services, improving efficiency, service quality, and alignment with business goals by ensuring that IT teams can respond to issues, fulfill requests, and maintain systems effectively. ManageEngine OpManager integrates with a variety of ITSM tools like ManageEngine Service DeskPlus, ServiceNow, and others, eventually making the process of network management more efficient.
The effectiveness of OpManager's integration with ITSM tools like ServiceDesk Plus could be compromised if critical data is not a part of the integration. One form of data is the dependencies and relationships between devices, without which ITSM tools would lack essential context for incidents, making it challenging for IT teams to diagnose and resolve issues accurately.
EXAMPLE: OpManager would identify that a switch is down, and the same would be raised as a ticket in ServiceDesk Plus. However, the issue could be due to the router connected to the switch being unavailable because of a network configuration conflict, causing the router to go down.
Without this context, troubleshooting incidents alone would be too time-consuming and challenging. To summarize, the impact of not having device dependency and configuration items (CI) relationship data includes:
Syncing the Organization map from OpManager to ITSM tools ensures that network and service management processes work hand-in-hand, thereby enhancing incident resolution speed, improving response prioritization, and fostering a proactive IT environment that can more effectively prevent service disruptions. From version 12.8.330 onwards, OpManager uses the data from multiple modules to create a map highlighting the inter-dependencies and relationships among devices. This mapping is synced to ServiceDesk Plus On-Premise edition along with the device data.
With its existing integration with ServiceDesk Plus, OpManager syncs a huge volume of monitored data including the devices, their IP addresses, their categories, their Uplink Dependency, and more. In ServiceDesk Plus, this data is used to create tickets (or incidents), so the network administrator can deal with the issue before it spirals into an outage. Thereafter, OpManager will also sync the relationship mapping data to the on-premises edition of ServiceDesk Plus, so IT teams can view the entire upstream and downstream dependencies and relationships of the devices, and isolate the faults much more easily.
OpManager retrieves the data from multiple modules to build the organization map. These modules are:
Layer 2 mapping is the process of identifying and visualizing the relationships and connections among devices within a network at the data link layer (Layer 2) of the Open Systems Interconnection model. This layer is responsible for the physical addressing of devices, data framing, and the management of access to the physical medium.
Drawing a topological visualization of the layer 2 map will give the network admin a graphical representation of the way devices are interconnected on the data link layer. OpManager's layer 2 discovery is executed on a seed router using protocols like the Cisco Discovery Protocol, Link Layer Discovery Protocol, IP routing, Forwarding database, and Address Resolution Protocol, allowing it to discover the devices that are immediately connected to this seed router. These protocols can be selected while discovering layer 2 maps.
OpManager has existing functionality to sync layer 2 map relationships to the on-premises edition of ServiceDesk Plus. This functionality has now been enhanced since network admins need a relationship dependency mapping that goes much further than just layer 2. Here is where the other modules are instrumental in identifying the exact source of the network issues.
In a network infrastructure, devices are rarely ever independent. If a random device like a router or switch were picked, it would almost always be dependent on another device, which in networking terms is known as the "parent" device. This parent device generally defines the normal functionality and operation of the "child" device.
For example, in this case, the switch's parent device could be a core router, and the router's parent device could be a firewall responsible for managing network security.
OpManager's uplink dependency helps you highlight or define the parent devices on which a device is dependent. This data is used to draw the relationship between multiple devices to map hierarchical dependencies.
Virtualization is the basis of modern networks since it is what made cloud architecture possible. Most organizations use a hybrid network, containing on-premises and virtual infrastructure. Mapping these devices together to know the interdependencies is a huge advantage for the network admin because the admins can pinpoint the source of issues, if any arise.
OpManager's virtualization monitoring provides a comprehensive view of the entire virtualization infrastructure, from the hosts to the deployed hypervisors, the deployed virtual machines, and the associated data stores as well.
This virtualization data, including VM Maps, is used by OpManager to draw the dependencies.
Applications generally run in a variety of environments, depending on their architecture, design, and intended use. But applications are almost always hosted on a server, be it on-premises or in the cloud (such as VMs and containers).
The Application Discovery and Dependency Mapping (ADDM) tool assists in discovering the applications running in your environment, on different servers, and also maps the dependencies between them. This mapping aids in creating a holistic view of all the resources running in a business infrastructure and the relationships among them.
OpManager uses the data from all the modules mentioned below and correlates the data points to draw a mapping of how devices are dependent on other devices/factors. For example, let's consider that:
With this manner of mapping, the network admin now has a complete view of the network, right from the hardware layer, all the way to the application layer, delivering a full-stack observability platform to monitor and manage the network.
The organization map drawn using the data from all the modules is then synced to the on-premises edition of ServiceDesk Plus along with the incident. Whenever a ticket or incident is raised in this software solution for a particular device, the organization map of the device is synced along with the ticket, so the network admins can pinpoint the exact cause of the issue instead of attempting to address arbitrary aspects of the said device.
For example, let's consider a scenario where a switch is found to be unresponsive. The NOC team might attempt to reboot the switch using workflow automation or roll back a specific configuration without success. They might then be forced to assign a technician for manual inspection. When the relationship mapping available for this switch, the NOC team can identify when the parent device of the switch, a core router, is also down, which is due to a firewall configuration issue impacting the router’s performance.
ITSM tools with synced dependency data give IT teams instant context about the affected device's role and connections within the network. This helps support teams understand not just what failed, but also its impact on connected systems, empowering them to prioritize responses effectively.
By syncing dependency data, ITSM tools can detect upstream or related issues that might be the root cause of the problem. For example, if a device’s issue is linked to an upstream switch failure, this CI relationship appears in the ITSM tools, enabling teams to focus on the root cause instead of treating isolated symptoms.
Having real-time dependency data in the ITSM tools enables support teams to diagnose and resolve incidents faster. They can instantly see if there’s a network-wide issue impacting multiple services, which reduces the time spent investigating dependencies across systems.
Integrating dependency mapping into ITSM tools creates a centralized view that links network monitoring insights with incident management. This integration supports proactive monitoring and preventive action, helping IT teams address potential issues before they escalate into larger problems.
By understanding device dependencies, IT teams can allocate resources more effectively and focus first on incidents that impact critical services and dependencies. This leads to better resource management and reduces time spent on secondary issues.
With network dependencies visible in ITSM tools, network, and IT service teams can work from the same information, reducing silos and enhancing collaboration. This unified approach leads to smoother workflows and quicker resolution times.
Interested in learning more? Download our free, 30-day trial to see the OpManager's organization map in action. Want more features? Request them here.
