ServiceNow Docs: Get Latest Version Link

Imagine you’re searching for an issue you’re researching in ServiceNow, and the first result you find on Google is a ServiceNow documentation page… from the Jakarta version of ServiceNow. It’s totally out of date.

How do you make sure that you’re getting the latest version of this same page in the documentation?
And what if you want to share the link to the latest version of that doc with someone else?
What if, for example, you’re posting to the community forums and you want to make sure that the link you post will always go to the latest version of that doc, even if someone sees the link years later?

With this extension (or bookmarklet script), you can be on any ServiceNow Docs page and simply click one button to (1) have the URL of the latest version of that article copied to your clipboard, and (2) be redirected to the latest version of that page.
The best thing about that generated link is that even if you were to navigate to it again years later, it would still take you to the latest version of that page, even if the “latest version” is newer than the version that was the latest when you generated the link!

Chrome Extension

This free tool will soon be available as a Google Chrome extension! Click here to be taken to the Chrome Extension store, and then click “Add to Chrome”.

(Note: If you’re not able to see the extension page, please check back tomorrow, as it is currently in review. I will remove this note when the extension is officially published.)

Once added, you may need to click on the Extensions icon at the top-right of your browser window, and pin the extension to your extension buttons bar (to the right of your URL bar).

Bookmarklet

Don’t use Google Chrome? No problem! The instructions below will allow you to easily create a bookmarklet that you can click from your bookmarks to perform the exact same function as the Chrome extension above.
(This bookmarklet also works on Chrome if you just prefer that method over the extension.)

Simply click-and-drag the button below into your bookmarks, and you’re all set. Click the bookmark from any ServiceNow Docs page to run the script.
If dragging the link into your bookmarks doesn’t work, you can create any bookmark and then replace the “url” with the value you get from right-clicking the below link, and clicking “Copy URL” or “Copy link address”

Try it out

After installing the Chrome extension or creating your “bookmarklet” using the steps above, try going to this outdated ServiceNow Docs article. Notice that the URL tells you the name of the ServiceNow version it’s related to (Paris, in this case).

On that page, click your new bookmarklet and you should get an alert letting you know that the URL of the latest version of that page has been copied to your clipboard. After clicking OK, you’ll then be redirected to that page.

The Code

As you can see by inspecting the source code, this is a simple script that does not save or send any data to the server or anywhere else. You can see the exact code that this bookmarklet will run when clicked, in the below Gist.

SN Pro Tips is owned and written by The SN Guys, ServiceNow consultants. If your organization could benefit from our services, we humbly welcome you to schedule some time to chat and share your goals with us, so we can help your business Grow With Purpose.