Exploring Playbook Assist

  • Release version: Xanadu
  • Updated August 1, 2024
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of Exploring Playbook Assist

    Playbook Assist is a feature within the Now Assist for Creator application that enables you to generate detailed playbooks from text, images, or a combination of both. This capability allows you to transform visual representations of business processes—such as whiteboard sketches or diagrams—into structured, multi-stage playbooks by adding descriptive text to provide context.

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    Playbook Assist supports three main skills: playbook generation, playbook generation with images, and playbook recommendations, which help refine and complete playbooks.

    Key Features

    • Playbook Generation: Create playbooks directly from textual descriptions.
    • Playbook Generation with Images: Upload images (JPG, JPEG, PNG, WEBP formats up to 10MB) of business processes alongside text for enhanced playbook creation. Note that this feature is unavailable for ServiceNow instances hosted in the APAC region.
    • Playbook Recommendations: Suggests activities to replace placeholder activities inserted when Now Assist cannot precisely identify process steps.

    The playbook generation automatically inserts activities closely aligned with your inputs, while placeholder activities serve as markers for you to configure manually or replace using recommendations before activation.

    To use Playbook Assist, users must have the now.assist.creator role assigned.

    Practical Usage and Guidelines

    • Input Preparation: Provide a clear, descriptive playbook name to improve generation quality. Ensure images are clear, legible, and within supported formats and size limits.
    • Text Descriptions: Be precise and detailed about each stage and activity, including execution order and any parallel processes. Use text to supplement image inputs for better context.
    • Experimentation: Save your inputs and their versions to compare results and refine your playbook generation.
    • Review and Configure: After generation, carefully review each stage and activity for accuracy and efficiency. Replace or configure placeholder activities using the recommendations skill or manual adjustments prior to activating the playbook.

    Access and Installation

    Playbook Assist skills are part of the Now Assist for Creator (snnowcreator) application, which can be installed from the ServiceNow Store. Playbook generation can be accessed within Workflow Studio when creating or editing playbooks.

    Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    • Streamlines the creation of structured playbooks from visual and textual business process inputs.
    • Enhances accuracy and completeness of workflow documentation through AI-assisted generation and recommendations.
    • Facilitates efficient process automation design, saving time and reducing manual effort.

    Use Playbook Assist to generate a playbook from text, an image or both. For example, you can upload an image of a business process you've outlined on a whiteboard or in diagramming software, describe more details of the process, and generate a playbook from those combined inputs. Playbook Assist is part of the Now Assist for Creator application.

    Activate the playbook skills in the Now Assist for Creator app. Playbook skills include:
    • Playbook generation
    • Playbook generation with images
    • Playbook recommendations
    Note:
    Playbook authors must be assigned the now.assist.creator role to use playbook generation. See Playbook Assist roles for more information about this skill.
    Playbook authors can provide an image of a business process from a whiteboard or diagramming software and add details with a text description to create multi-stage playbooks. As of version 26.2 for Now Assist for Creator, Now Assist inserts the activities that align most closely with your inputs. For activities that Now Assist isn't able to guess, placeholder activities are inserted.
    Note:
    For placeholder activities, you can use the recommendations skill to find activities that might best replace placeholder activities, or manually find and configure activities before activating your playbook.
    Choose an activity definition for the placeholder activity.
    To learn more about recommendations, see Playbook recommendations.

    Activation

    Playbook generation, playbook recommendations, and playbook generation with images are skills that are installed with the Now Assist for Creator (sn_now_creator) application. You can install this application from the ServiceNow Store website.

    Supported Now Assist skills

    Playbook Assist currently supports the playbook generation, playbook recommendations, and playbook generation with images skills in English. The playbook generation with images skill is not available for ServiceNow instances hosted in the APAC region.

    Supported user interfaces

    Access the playbook generation skill when you’re:
    • Creating a playbook in Workflow Studio from image, text, or both.
      Build a new playbook with Now Assist.
    • Replacing placeholder activities.
      Use the Playbook Recommendations skill to find common activities you can use instead of placeholders

    Providing inputs and reviewing playbooks

    Follow these guidelines when creating playbooks with playbook generation skills.

    Provide inputs:

    Provide a meaningful name for the playbook
    The more descriptive the playbook name is, the better the playbook that Now Assist can create.
    Make sure your image is the right format and size.
    • The image should be in JPG, JPEG, PNG, or WEBP format.
    • The image should be 10MB or less.
    Make sure your image is clear and visible.
    • Upload an image that is clear and visible to the human eye. Make sure that any writing is legible. If you can't what's in an image, neither can Now Assist.
    • When uploading an image, it is the primary input. You can use the text description to add more context about the business process in your uploaded image.
    Be precise and descriptive in text inputs

    • Describe each stage and activity in as much detail as you can.

    • Specify the order that stages and activities run in.

    • Specify if any stages or activities run at the same time.

    • Add additional context for an image input.
    Experiment with inputs
    Save your inputs somewhere, including any modified versions. Saving your inputs enables easy comparison of results.
    Note:
    Inputs used only to generate a preview are not saved, but inputs used for a saved playbook are in the playbook's Properties setting.
    Tip:
    To learn more about playbook generation inputs, see General Guidelines for Building Playbooks with Now Assist.

    Review playbooks:

    Check for accuracy
    Review each stage and activity in a generated playbook to determine accuracy, efficiency, and how well it outlines your business process.
    Configure placeholder activities
    Configure placeholder activities before you activate your playbook. Use playbook recommendations to help choose activity definitions.
    Figure 1. Configure the activity definition in the activity side panel

    Choose an activity definition for the placeholder activity.