Managing Availability

Availability Management is one of the key ITIL processes, and within ASM Core, you can define and monitor the availability of an individual item within the CMDB such as a service or a configuration item.

Availability is made up of two main components, Schedules and Outages.

  • Schedules are periods of time in which a CMDB item is set to be available or unavailable. These are defined and then applied to a CMDB Item.
  • Outages can be planned or unscheduled interruptions that affect the availability of that item. You can view outages of a CMDB item, as well as a snapshot of an item's availability for a chosen week.

Availability is managed using the Availability explorer option from a CMDB Item Details window. You must activate Track Availability in order to use the availability management options.

Activating Track Availability for CMDB Items

Before you start

Enable Availability must be selected in the Availability Settings.

You must have View Availability Data and Set Schedules and Targets selected in your Availability Management security role.

  1. ClosedDisplay the CMDB Item Details window, if it is not already on screen.

    Search for the CMDB item. Then select the item you want to work with and select .

  2. In the Explorer pane, expand CMDB Item, then select Availability.
  3. The <Entity> Availability window appears, with the applied time zone.
  4. Select the tick box to activate the Track Availability options.

    5. Select to view the details in edit mode if necessary to activate the option.

  5. Once this is activated then the page will display all the Availability tabs which default to Availability.
  6. Select the Targets tab on this window. This opens the Targets window.
  7. Select the start date and time from the Starting from drop down menu and time field. This is the start date and time from which the target percentage uptime is to be measured. Select the arrow in the date field to display a calendar. Use the and arrows to scroll across the months. Select a start date by selecting the date on the calendar. Select the month at the top to display a list of months from which you can make a selection. For the time field, you can use the arrows to scroll through the time by hour or type the time in the field.
  8. Select to save the details and activate Track Availability.

Viewing Availability of a CMDB Item

Before you start

Track Availability must be activated.

You must have View Availability Data selected in your Availability Management security role.

  1. ClosedDisplay the CMDB Item Details window, if it is not already on screen.

    Search for the CMDB item. Then select the item you want to work with and select .

  2. In the Explorer pane, expand CMDB Item, then select Availability.
  3. The <Entity> Availability window appears, with the applied time zone.
  4. Track Availability should be selected to view the details.
  5. With the Availability tab uppermost, you can see a calendar-type display, known as the Weekly Time Control . This displays the availability for the selected CMDB Item for the current week. The following information is included in the grid:
    6. Availability Required Time periods when the CMDB Item is expected and required to be available
    Scheduled Activity (within the Contracted Availability period) Scheduled activities (such as back-ups or maintenance) occur during this time period.

    No unauthorized changes should be made to the CMDB Item during this period.
    Availability Not Required Changes to the CMDB Item can be scheduled within these time periods as there are no scheduled activities occurring
    Scheduled Activity (within the Uncontracted Availability period) Activities are scheduled for this period
    Planned Outages Outages that are planned for the future
    Unplanned Outages Outages that have taken place unplanned

    The information is taken from the availability schedule service hours applied to the CMDB Item. The control displays any public holidays occurring in that particular week in addition to Outages that have been raised against the CMDB Item.

  6. You can use the Period Starting drop-down list to view the availability details for another week. The control dynamically changes according to your selection. The specified weeks must always start on a Sunday. You can also use the and to scroll through different weeks.

Scheduling Availability of a CMDB Item

Before you start

Track Availability must be activated.

Schedules Service Hours must have been defined.

If you wish to add public holidays, they must have been defined in the Public Holidays Definition window.

To display time zones, Time Zone must be ticked in the System Settings window.

You must have View Availability Data selected in your Availability Management security role.

  1. ClosedDisplay the CMDB Item Details window, if it is not already on screen.

    Search for the CMDB item. Then select the item you want to work with and select .

  2. In the Explorer pane, expand CMDB Item, then select Availability.
  3. The <Entity> Availability window appears, with the applied time zone.
  4. Select the Schedules tab.
  5. All defined schedules are listed in the Schedules pane. Select the one you want to see the details displayed in the calendar grid.
  6. There are four period types that make up a schedule:

    7. Availability Required Time periods when the CMDB Item is expected and required to be available
    Scheduled Activity (within the Contracted Availability period) Scheduled activities (such as back-ups or maintenance) occur during this time period.

    No unauthorized changes should be made to the CMDB Item during this period.
    Availability Not Required Changes to the CMDB Item can be scheduled within these time periods as there are no scheduled activities occurring
    Scheduled Activity (within the Uncontracted Availability period) Activities are scheduled for this period

  7. If you wish, select a set of public holidays from the Holidays drop-down list.
  8. Select to save the details. The window is redisplayed, with the Availability tab uppermost, showing the updated details.

Setting Availability Targets and Thresholds

You can set availability targets and thresholds for a CMDB Item. Targets are based on setting a percentage of uptime for the CMDB Item within a selected time period.

Outages that occur during uncontracted time periods, as defined by the applied schedule for the CMDB Item, do not impact your target.

Before you start

An availability schedule must have been applied to the CMDB item.

You must have Set Schedules and Targets selected in your Availability Management security role.

  1. ClosedDisplay the CMDB Item Details window, if it is not already on screen.

    Search for the CMDB item. Then select the item you want to work with and select .

  2. In the Explorer pane, expand CMDB Item, then select Availability.
  3. The <Entity> Availability window appears, with the applied time zone.
  4. Select the Targets tab.

  5. When an item is in a 'no change period', or 'frozen' using the Freeze icon on the Details window, then options such as availability targets and thresholds are grayed out. You can select Edit to activate these fields. If you do so without removing the item from its No Change period first, then a warning will appear asking you to confirm that you wish to continue.

  6. Complete the details.

    7. Percentage Uptime Type the percentage of time you want the CMDB item to be available for, and in the drop-down list to the right, select the time period in which the uptime target should be measured. You can select from three options: Week, Month (4 weeks) or Calendar Month
    Starting from Select the start date and time from which the target percentage uptime is to be measured. Select the button to display a calendar. Use the and arrows to scroll across the months. Select a start date by selecting the date on the calendar. Select the month at the top to display a list of months from which you can make a selection. For the time field, you can use the arrows to scroll through the time by hour or type the time in the field.
    Availability escalation level 1 Select the checkbox to apply an escalation if the availability target is at risk of breach
    minutes before breach Specify the number of minutes before the breach that an escalation should be triggered and recipients informed
    Recipients Identify the recipients of emails in the event of an escalation
    Availability escalation level 2... You can specify up to three escalation levels in the same way. When the checkbox is selected for the first escalation, the next escalation level becomes available.
    Availability Target Breach Select the checkbox to generate a notification if the target is breached. Then add the recipients, as for the escalation levels.

  7. Select Save to save your changes and apply the availability target settings to the CMDB Item. The screen is refreshed and the Availability tab appears, showing the scheduled availability.

Copying Availability Settings

You can copy the availability data including the schedule and target from another CMDB item (configuration item, service, service action, or service bundle) to the current CMDB item.

Before you start

You must have Set Schedules and Targets selected in your Availability Management security role.

  1. ClosedDisplay the CMDB Item Details window of the item to which you want to copy the settings, if it is not already on screen.

    Search for the CMDB item. Then select the item you want to work with and select .

  2. In the Explorer pane, expand CMDB Item, then select Availability.
  3. The <Entity> Availability window appears, with the applied time zone.
  4. Select from the toolbar.
  5. In the Copy Availability dialog box, select the CMDB Item from which you wish to copy the availability data. Type in the name of the CMDB item or search for the item.
  6. Select OK to import the availability data from the selected CMDB item. If the selected CMDB Item does not have availability enabled, a warning message appears, giving you the opportunity to confirm or cancel the copy.
  1. ClosedDisplay the CMDB Item Details window, if it is not already on screen.

    2. Availability Progress Graph

    The first graph provides a real time view of the actual availability in relation to the targeted availability. This graph updates every few minutes.

    The contracted availability is stated beneath the graph, and the number of minutes is shown in increments along the base line. The red target line shows the target availability at this point in the time period. The black target line shows the target availability at the end of the time period. The blue bar represents the amount of actual availability to date during the period.

    The blue bar and the red target line move to the right as the period elapses. You should aim to stay ahead of the red target line, and ultimately cross the black target line to meet your availability commitments. The Status title on the top of the graph will inform you of how you are doing. The status will be either on target, potential breach, breach or target achieved.

    Any downtime is represented on the graph by a red lined outage bar. The outage bar starts at the far right of the graph and moves left as new outages occur. If it intersects with the Target line you have breached your availability commitments. The pattern in the red bar will indicate whether the outage is planned or unplanned, and the legend will explain the different patterns and colors.

Outage Summary

This graph provides a breakdown in minutes of the outages that have occurred or are current in the period.

The following information is included in the graph:

All Outages All of the planned and unplanned outages
Unplanned Outages All unplanned outages that have occurred or are current in the period
Planned Outages All planned outages that have occurred or are current in the period
Pending Outages Those outages scheduled to occur through Workflow Management, but are not yet current. The number of minutes in this bar is not included in the calculations for the All Outages bar. This bar is only relevant for the current period.

The red indicator line is the Allowed Downtime line and indicates the allowed outages in minutes before a breach occurs. Once the All Outages bar intersects this line a breach has occurred.

It is useful to note the gap between the All Outages bar and the Allowed Downtime line, and compare it with the Pending Outages bar. If the Pending Outages bar is longer than the All Outage Bar and Allowed Downtime gap, then the pending outages should be considered for rescheduling in an other period otherwise a breach will occur.

Time Remaining

The third graph, Time Remaining, displays three bars:

Outage Time Left The number of minutes of outage time remaining before there is a breach.

If the number is negative, a breach has occurred and the time in minutes indicates the severity of the breach.
Availability Required The number of minutes of availability still required in the period.

If this bar extends beyond the Total Time Left in Period bar then you will be unable to meet your availability target
Total Time Left in Period The number of minutes left in the period

Statistics

The Statistics Table provides a summation in minutes for various measurements. This same information is provided in the graph tables but the table provides the opportunity for you to see it in a simplified list form.