Service Manager

This is the latest version of the help for Ivanti Service Manager 2018. If you cannot find some of the features described in the help, you may be using an older version of the application. To upgrade the application, click here.
To view the help for the latest version of Service Manager, click here

About Authorization

•About Authorization

•About Role-Based Security

•About Secure Business Objects and Permissions

•About Secure Business Object Fields

•About Applying Advanced Security Features

•About Using Hierarchical Structure

•About Secure Forms

•About Secure Automation Tools

About Authorization

Service Manager employs role-based security to add security restrictions at the following levels:

•Business object: You can restrict the access for a user to entire business objects, individual fields, and relationships.

•Form: You can combine business rules and field-level permissions to help restrict the visibility of certain fields.

•Automation tools: You can restrict the ability of a user to share quick actions, saved searches, and dashboards.

About Role-Based Security

A role consists of function-specific application displays. When you add users to Service Manager, you assign them to one or more roles. Each role is organized as a set of permissions organized by common user functions. At login, the system prompts the user to select a role for this session, which governs access to Service Manager modules and features (security rights) and access to business objects and fields (business object rights).

Service Manager contains a default set of roles, including administrator, Service Desk Analyst, and various manager roles. You can customize these roles or create entirely new ones.

For example, a user logging into Service Manager as a Change Manager might view a layout of the change form that differs from the change form seen by a Service Desk Analyst.  The Change Manager may also have access to dashboards displaying change request data recorded by the system over the last day and trending information for the week. You can link a role to a specific device, letting users log in to view dashboard data for those machines.

Another item to manage within the user interfaces area is the ability to grant roles. While there may be value in granting a manager the ability to grant roles with edit access to a subordinate, that same manager probably should not be able to grant access to the entire Configuration Console.

About Secure Business Objects and Permissions

Business objects are designed with the following set of permissions:

•View: View data.

•Add: Add data.

•Edit: Manipulate data.

•Delete: Delete data.

When granting access to a business object, be sure to grant access to its associated child business objects. When a role has access to a child business object, clicking Go To for a child record opens the associated child record in its own user interface. If not, the system does not open the business object. You do not have to make the child business object visible, only accessible.

When designing lists and layouts, be aware of role access to user interfaces. For example, if a role has access to a user interface, double-clicking a child record in a user interface list opens the associated user interface. If the role does not have access to a user interface, the system opens the record in a pop-up window.

Follow these steps to create roles governing access to entire business objects:

1.From the Configuration Console, click Configure > Users and Permissions > Roles to open the Roles workspace. The list of available roles appears.

2.The roles that govern access to entire business objects are displayed as top-level tabs (such as incident, problem, change, etc.) at the top of the user interface. See Working with Roles.

About Secure Business Object Fields

As you construct a role, use the Object Permissions workspace to add levels of granularity for the role. You can set access rights at the field level by expanding a selected business object and adjusting the field permission set.

Follow these steps:

1.From the Configuration Console, select Configure > Users and Permissions > Roles and Permissions to open the Object Permissions workspace.

2.Click a role name to bring up the Role Details page for that role.

3.Click the Object Permissions tab to display the Object Permissions workspace.

4.For each field, check Add, View, Edit, or Delete to change the permissions for the field.

5.Click Save.

When working with fields that involve pick lists, the contents of the pick list are defined, along with any restrictions, on the Pick Lists page.

About Applying Advanced Security Features

By clicking Edit under the Access column for a business object on the Object Permissions workspace, you can apply even more elaborate data-segregation constraints to do the following:

•Object links to the Employee business object. For example, while a Service Desk Analyst can view all open incidents, you can use the Employee form to assign a new employee to a particular team, such as Service Desk Analyst US which can only view incidents opened by customers located in the United States. You also can create a definition to make an incident view-only upon being closed by a Service Desk Analyst.

•Linked Employee business object fields.

•Relationships linking the business object to the Employee business object (such as the Change Approval Board).

•Business object links to business objects or hierarchies that are also related to the Employee business object. Service Manager supports hierarchy structures for:

•Organization unit

•Team/department

•Geography

•Cost center

About Using Hierarchical Structure

Use the hierarchy structure to manage permissions between tiers.For example, a member of a Service Desk Manager management-level tier could be allowed to view the incidents assigned to all Service Desk Analysts assigned to a lower tier.

If you are a member of more than one hierarchy, you have access to the most open set of permissions. For example, if you are a member of two teams, one with read-only access to a business object field and one with write access to the same field, you are granted write access to the field.

About Secure Forms

When constructing a form, you can combine business rules and field restrictions to help manage a workflow. For example, you can create a form that includes all of the fields in the Change business object, but the fields viewed by a user are restricted based on the login role. This is the simplest way to secure a form.

An example of using a business rule to secure a form would be to construct a business rule that prevents a Service Desk Analyst from editing a change request status once that change request has been submitted and is in process. The Status field is set to read-only on the change request form. However, once the change request has been processed and a change has been implemented, the field can be edited again, allowing the change request to be closed.

Field restrictions that have been applied in the user interface are also applied to forms. For example, if you allow a pick list such as Status to be visible on an incident form, but not to be edited, the pick list remains view-only. This can interfere with successful completion of a workflow, as the status cannot be changed.

About Secure Automation Tools

Use the Roles and Permissions workspace to manage the sharing of productivity tools with other roles. By publishing permissions, you can define dashboards, quick actions, or saved searches within one role and share them with another role. See Working with Roles.

Individual users can customize the secure automation tools. Restricting such sharing can keep the application from becoming cluttered in places such as lists of available quick actions or saved searches. For example, a Service Desk Manager can have the ability (publish permission) to publish search results to Service Desk Analysts, allowing saved searches also to be accessed by the Service Desk Analysts.

Use care when adding powerful tools to forms such as quick actions. When added to a toolbar, they can often be used to circumvent form-related restrictions or pick lists that are constrained to limit selections for items such as status based on the current status value.