Update Set Collision Avoidance Tool: V2

In a previous article: Detect Update Set Collisions Before They Happen, we made a tool freely available, which would help to prevent developers from accidentally overriding or colliding with each other's update sets, or otherwise having issues caused by conflicts or improperly selected update sets. 

Since publishing that article, we've gone through multiple version iterations, and we've recently released the official Version 2. 
Version 2 is available from this link, as is the documentation. 

Feel free to click below, to read more.

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ServiceNow: What's New in Geneva & UI16 (Pt. 2)

In this article, we're going to talk about some of the updates that were made to the "Part 1" article shortly after publishing it, list out some of the more technical changes in Geneva, as well as answer some of the most common questions that our clients and reads have had for us.

First, let's jump straight to the Q&A section, which includes new info on how to more fully customize the UI16 interface and work around some of the new features to restore original functionality or customize the new functionality. Click below to read on! 

Note: This is part 2 of a 2-part series of posts on ServiceNow's Geneva version, and the updated UI16 that comes along with it. Please read Part 1 first, or you might lack context for some of the things we discuss.
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Reference Field Auto-Complete Attributes

If you've ever used a reference field, you've probably seen that when you start typing, an auto-complete drop-down appears, to help you out. The info that appears in this auto-complete drop-down, is usually the display value for a given table (that is, the field which has the display property set to true). 

There are many cases where you may want more information than that. Maybe you've got many records with similar (or even identical) display values/names. Maybe you're referencing the user table, and want to make sure you don't select the wrong "John Smith". 

Read on to learn more! 

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GlideRecord & GlideAjax: Client-Side Vs. Server-Side

It is easy to shoot yourself in the foot when it comes to performance, using client side scripts. For this reason, it is generally good practice to move any complex processing, large requests (more than a hundred or so records), and multi-level dot-walking to server-side scripts such as business rules which can present the data to the client. This can be done in a few ways, such as by using GlideAjax. It's also a good idea to utilize callback functions in almost every case where you're doing record lookups client-side. 

In this article, we'll go over some of the best ways to get the greatest client-side performance out of ServiceNow, by using good coding practices, callback functions, and GlideAjax to push some of the work off onto the server, rather than the client and prevent the client from having to wait around for the server to respond. 

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Make Your Log Entries Easier to Find

Like most developers, I write a lot of code. 
Like all developers, sometimes my code doesn't work. 
When that happens (server-side), I rely on gs.log() to spit out some information to tell me when, where, and maybe even how the error happened. 

gs.log() is an extremely useful little function that is great for troubleshooting your code in dev, as well as catching unexpected behavior or circumstances in production. 
For example, you might have your code run inside a try { } block, but have the following catch() { } log the error message and accompanying run-time technical details using gs.log(). 
Or, you might write your code so that if a function receives some unexpected data, a log entry is created with the details, while the user is informed using gs.addErrorMessage(). 

The problem is that whenever I make one of these logs, I find myself sifting through tens, hundreds, or even thousands of other log entries to find just the one that my code triggered - and of those, just the one that was triggered by the most recent execution of my code. 
What's even worse, is if a user has to let me know about a bug or error they got, but they can only tell me that it happened "around Thursday". How am I supposed to find that log!? 

Join me after the jump, and not only will I teach you how to do it, but I'll give you a file you can deploy in your instance to enable this functionality within minutes! 

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A Better, One-Click Approval

The way approvals work in ServiceNow by default is that an email goes out, and the user can click a link in the email to approve or reject. That link is generated in the default approval notification template using ${mailto:mailto.approval}. Clicking the link that is generated in the approval email based on this template, will pop up another email on the user's computer. 

However, this only works if they have their system configured to correctly handle mailto href links, and if they received the email using the same program they've configured to handle mailto links, and if they're not using webmail. 

Definitely not ideal. 
How can we improve this situation? As is the case with nearly every problem in life, the answer is CODE! 

Our goal will be to give users a link that they can click to approve or reject a record, that doesn't use mailto, and that works no matter how they're viewing or sending email. 

Join me after the break to see a detailed explanation of how it's done, and download an update set that'll let you deploy this functionality in your instance right now, for free!

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Quickly Move Changes Between Update Sets

We've all been there. -- You've been wired in, hammering away on code, making great progress on several fronts, when all of a sudden you're gripped with dread. You check the sprocket menu at the top-right, cautiously hopeful... but as it loads, and recognition sets in, the reality of the situation crashes into you like a sack of pidgeons.

You forgot to select your update set. 

At this point, it is perfectly reasonable to curl up into a ball and weep at the fact that you're going to have to sift through hundreds or even thousands of updates in the Default update set in your busy environment, picking out the ones that are yours and that are relevant to your current work, manually opening each record one at a time, and moving them to the correct update set. 

But here's a better idea -- What if you could just tick the box next to each update, click a button, and dump them all into your current update set? 

Join me after the break and not only will I show you how to do that, but I'll give you an update set that you can deploy to enable that functionality in a matter of minutes! 

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Customize the Reference Icon Pop-up

As most ServiceNow users know, when you hover over the icon next to a reference field on a given form, you can see some details about the record that's being referenced. 

Well, what if you want to customize what fields are shown in that pop-up reference view? 

When a requirement came through to do just that in my instance, I was stumped for a good long while, chasing down some inaccurate/outdated documentation, but eventually I figured out the following process. 

Join me after the jump to see how to modify this pop-up view. 

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ServiceNow: Geneva & UI16 - What's new

Brace yourself. Geneva is coming. 

Personally, I'm excited - I like new things. I've always been the early adopter. But I know that not everyone is as gung-ho for the future as I am, so I thought I'd share some tips and tricks on ServiceNow's "Geneva", and the new, drastically overhauled "UI 16" that will be the new place where most of us ServiceNow developers spend our daily 8-12 hours. 

Note: This is part 1 of a 2-part series on ServiceNow's Geneva update. This part will focus on the interface, and stuff you're likely to run into on day 1, as well as basic stuff you'll need to know so you don't shoot yourself in the foot. A more in-depth exploration of the different process areas such as changes to Knowledge Management, Change Management, performance, security, and so on - is forthcoming. So subscribe, and stay tuned! 

Join me after the jump, and learn what's new in Geneva from the perspective of an admin, a developer, and a user - from the browser-based IDE and the new way to elevate permissions in high security mode, to the basics of navigation in the new world... of Geneva. 

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Detect/Prevent Update Set Conflicts Before They Happen

Do you have multiple developers working in the same instance? If so, there's a good chance that on at least several occasions, one of them has "stolen" an update/record from another. I'll explain what I mean by way of an example:

  • Developer A is working on a project that involves changing a script include. 
  • Developer B, working in parallel on a separate task, also changes the script include.
  • The update sets are pushed. Depending on the order, at least one developer is likely to see results in production that they do not expect based on their development. 

So, how can we prevent these kinds of conflicts/confusion? 

What if we could alert a developer whenever they're viewing a record that is captured in another active update set, that does not belong to them--

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