ServiceNow Data Replication – A Step-by-Step Guide

To get the most out of ServiceNow, data replication is a vital capability. The more your business depends on data, the more critical it becomes for you to ensure data’s availability and that there is little to no scope for data failure.

What is data replication?

Simply put, data replication is the process of creating multiple copies of your data, at multiple places, at the same time.

Why replicate data? Does your organization need it?

Data replication ensures data is consistent between systems and helps make accurate data available to all relevant stakeholders, when, where and in the format they need it.

Of course, data replication is a best practice for data recovery and preventing data loss. But data replication also enables system integration, by replicating the data across systems, synchronizing the data between them.

Data replication reduces the risk of business interruptions, builds operational resilience, and aligns & connects enterprise systems, enabling inter-application workflows.

How does it work?

Think of it as a mirror exercise. Any change that happens at the source must also be reflected within other relevant systems. Similarly, if the source data changes, the target data must reflect those changes also.

This is key for enabling data integration, as it creates a single source of truth and frictionless data flow between tools that would otherwise exist in a silo.

Extracting and replicating ServiceNow data

Your business likely has a lot to benefit from ServiceNow data replication and extraction.

• To export operational data to a database in a scheduled fashion
• To enable dynamic sharing and get real-time changes saved to a database that can then be queried by your reporting and analytics tools of choice
• To dynamically or batch publish critical data from ServiceNow applications to a cloud data warehousing solution
• To be able to selectively backup your apps and data for disaster recovery or migration purposes

ServiceNow’s Instance Data Replication

ServiceNow offers a suite called Instance Data Replication (IDR). Essentially, the technology copies updates from one instance and replicates them to one or more instances. IDR enables the syncing of specified data between ServiceNow instances in either a one-directional or bi-directional replication.

This means you can replicate data from a single source to several business units across your organization and keep that data synced. Depending on your data replication strategy, your source data can be partially or fully replicated. This is highly beneficial for data-driven organizations as it helps businesses localize, modify and map data for different locales.

But does IDR meet your requirements?

Let’s talk a little bit about the limitations of IDR:

• Using IDR consumes ServiceNow bandwidth, affecting the performance of your ServiceNow instance
• With IDR, you will have to set up, manage, and configure the platform yourself
• Since IDR does not feature a dashboard, you will have to run a test to check whether data has successfully replicated. Not only would this diagnostic report not be performed in real-time, but it requires manual monitoring, which requires both time and effort
• There is a limitation on the initial seeding of the tables which must be less than 3 million records per replication set

But how do you move large amounts of data securely without impacting performance?

Replicate ServiceNow Data without Impacting Performance, with Perspectium DataSync

Perspectium DataSync is an expert data integration solution that allows organizations to move and replicate huge volumes of ServiceNow data without impacting performance.

It is designed to keep your ServiceNow production and sub-production instances in sync, allowing you to develop and test your ITSM data without resorting to “all or nothing” cloning. Organizations have greater control over replication, and can choose what to replicate and when.

Furthermore, DataSync lets organizations replicate and extract ServiceNow data without resorting to API based web-tools, consuming ServiceNow bandwidth and slowing query speed. It allows the creation of sophisticated data synchronization scenarios without any coding.

DataSync’s features include:

• Automated Datastore creation and real-time modification of schema
• On-premise or cloud datastore compatibility
• Built-in encryption at rest and data obfuscation feature
• Fully managed availability and throughput monitoring with OLA definition
• End-to-end services enablement

The integration framework facilitates data sharing among ServiceNow instances and agents that connect with databases and other applications, as illustrated in the image below.

How Perspectium’s DataSync compares to ServiceNow’s IDR, and what makes the most sense for your business

• Smooth onboarding process with a “show one, do one” method
• Greater control over which data you want to replicate and sync
• Greater flexibility in choosing when data is backed up
• High availability – even if power and network outages get in the way
• Extremely high scalability without impacting performance – imagine syncing tens of millions of transactions every day! This is the reality for many Perspectium customers
• The ability to extract data for reporting and analytics, when you need it
• 24/7 support service, 365 days a year!
• DataSync replicates to multiple databases and end-points and displays status in real-time on the dashboard
• No limit on seeding records, compared to IDR’s limit of 3 million records

But that’s not all, Perspectium’s DataSync offers several other benefits:

• Your data is secure and private due to end-to-end and at-rest encryption
• The performance of your application instances is minimally impacted due to “push” data streaming
• By utilizing a message queue, DataSync removes the need for data endpoints to be up and functional all the time, eliminating the risk of data loss during outages
• The use of message brokering ensures your data stream can be flexibly re-configured without any change to the source – allowing you to flow your data to different targets with minimal impact
• Automatic schema creation and maintenance of your data lake means data appears as soon as the schema changes.
• On-demand DataSync enables you to use your existing Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure to configure and automate data extraction to an AWS data lake, which then works with your reporting/analytics tool of choice – eliminating any potential problems of application performance or difficult data merging

A step-by-step guide to installing and configuring DataSync for ServiceNow Data Replication

1. Talk to Us!

As an Integration as a Service (IaaS) provider, the Perspectium team is on hand 24/7, 365 to support your integration – from installation to maintenance. So first, confirm your ServiceNow compatibility, and contact us to request the download link for the current version of Perspectium.

You will be sent a file in a zipped format representing an exported update set XML file. Save the file in your browser’s designated Downloads folder. After saving the downloaded zip file, unzip it using your preferred method.

2. Install DataSync for ServiceNow

To enable the syncing of data from your ServiceNow instance to other Perspectium-supported endpoints, you will first need to install the Perspectium application (DataSync for ServiceNow). The installation process involves first previewing and then committing Perspectium update sets in your ServiceNow instance.

3. Upgrade your Perspectium Application

To ensure that you’re up-to-date on all of the latest features and enhancements for DataSync, you can upgrade your DataSync for ServiceNow installation whenever new releases are available.

4. Run Perspectium “Finish Install” Scripts

After committing any Perspectium update sets to your ServiceNow instance (whether for the first time or for an upgrade), the Finish Install scripts must be run in order for your Perspectium applications to function correctly.

However, starting with Helium 6.1.0 version of the Core application, running Finish Install after installing a Perspectium update set will no longer be required.

5. Set Initial Perspectium Properties in ServiceNow

After installing the Perspectium application (or upgrading to a newer version), and running Perspectium Finish Install scripts, you will need to set your initial Perspectium properties.

From UPS to Viacom, Perspectium enables organizations across a range of industries to integrate their ITSM technologies.

Perspectium has helped many organizations with their data integration and replication initiatives.

The fact that even ServiceNow are Perspectium clients is a glowing endorsement. At ServiceNow, Perspectium integration replicates data from 10 production instances of ServiceNow into 4 SAP/HANA databases for analysis by Sales, Marketing, Finance, and other departments.

Transactional data transfers feed 200+ dashboards and five predictive solutions in the big data environment. Production data alone accounts for about 20 million transfers per day. But due to Perspectium’s one-of-a-kind technology, the transfers are completed without a noticeable impact to performance.

This means the ServiceNow BI team can provide quick results to the business and turn around analytics requests in a timely manner thanks to Perspectium’s support, ease of use and configuration.