Configuration Management Study Guides

Configuration management study guides based on the practitioners Certificate in ITSM for 2004. This study guide is provided to highlight the five areas within the Configuration management process that are specifically examined by EXIN for the attainment of the Practitioners Certificate.

Configuration management study guides – What are the requirements?

Target group

The Practitioner's Certificate in IT Service Management Configuration Management is intended for those in an IT organization responsible for activities that are part of the Configuration Management process. The practitioner has to be able to record, guard and improve this process.

Examination requirements (What needs to be studied)

The exam requirements are:

• The Configuration Management Plan. Document setting out the organization and procedures for the Configuration Management of a specific product, project, system, support group or service.
  
  
• The Configuration Management Database. A database that contains all relevant details of each CI and details of the important relationships between CIs.
  
  
• Designing coding systems, attributes and name conventions. Naming conventions should be established and applied to the identification of CIs, configuration documents and Changes, as well as to baselines, Releases and assemblies. The naming conventions should be unique and take into account the existing corporate or supplier naming/numbering structures.
  
  
• Procedures and working instructions. Understand the procedures and working instructions for all the process activities.
  • Planning. Planning and defining the purpose, scope, objectives, policies and procedures, and the organizational and technical context, for Configuration Management.
    
    
  • Identification. Selecting and identifying the configuration structures for all the infrastructure's CIs, including their 'owner', their interrelationships and configuration documentation. It includes allocating identifiers and version numbers for CIs, labeling each item, and entering it on the Configuration Management Database (CMDB).
    
    
  • Control. Ensuring that only authorized and identifiable CIs are accepted and recorded, from receipt to disposal. It ensures that no CI is added, modified, replaced or removed without appropriate controlling documentation, e.g. an approved Change request, and an updated specification.
    
    
  • Status accounting. The reporting of all current and historical data concerned with each CI throughout its life cycle. This enables Changes to CIs and their records to be traceable, e.g. tracking the status of a CI as it changes from one state to another for instance 'under development', 'being tested', 'live', or 'withdrawn'.
    
    
  • Verification and audit. A series of reviews and audits that verify the physical existence of CIs and check that they are correctly recorded in the Configuration Management system.
    
    
• Reporting. Management reports should be designed to support Service Management activities such as progress monitoring, Problem Management, Change Management, Release Management, Configuration audits and service planning. The reports should be made available for interrogation and trend analysis by IT Service Management and other groups within the IT services structure.

Configuration management study guides – Study, study, study – there are no shortcuts!

Finally, the idea is that the student must truly understand all these areas in significant detail. OK, off to it then.