ServiceNow Vancouver will supercharge your productivity with new Flow Designer and text-to-code features

At Cask, we are always excited when a new ServiceNow release is announced. The upcoming Vancouver release promises a number of impressive features and enhancements designed to boost productivity and make life easier for ServiceNow users. Let’s look at two significant updates: Flow Designer enhancements and the new text-to-code feature.

Streamlining processes with Flow Designer enhancements

Flow Designer, ServiceNow’s tool for building automated multistep flows in a codeless fashion, has been a game changer since its introduction. The upcoming enhancements in the Vancouver release will undoubtedly supercharge its capabilities even more.

• Load-time reduction: One of the biggest advancements that we’re eager to see in action is the remarkable reduction in flow load time. From our experience, the current Flow Designer may require a little extra patience, as presumed freezing may slow down the process. But with a 60 percent flow load-time reduction and other performance improvements, we expect that these issues will be a thing of the past.
• Data pill editing: Further adding to productivity enhancements is the new ability to edit a data pill. Previously, every time a change was required, the entire process had to be repeated to create a new one, costing an additional 30–45 seconds per pill. This enhancement will undoubtedly make a massive difference in time saved.
• Improved homepage: Flow Designer’s homepage has also been revamped, offering a more user-friendly, dashboard-like experience. You can now easily track what you and your team are working on, monitor execution status, and readily access resources for assistance.
• Dynamic inputs and recommendations: The introduction of dynamic inputs and the Now Assist recommendation are other notable improvements. These features provide better control over your dynamic variables and use generative AI to suggest which action should be used next, respectively.
• Go-back action: One of the most anticipated features in the Flow Designer update is the introduction of the go-back action. This invaluable addition empowers users to jump back to and rerun the flow from a specific prior action. Previously, achieving such a return condition involved intricate workarounds, often necessitating the use of subflows and other complex strategies. This new feature streamlines the flow-building process significantly. It’s not just a productivity enhancer; it’s a testament to the evolving capabilities of Flow Designer. The inclusion of this feature will undoubtedly make the transition from Workflow Editor to Flow Designer more compelling for many.

Overall, we believe that these enhancements will increase productivity, shorten sprint times, and accelerate time-to-value for our customers.

Leveraging the text-to-code feature for faster development

The Vancouver release introduces another productivity-boosting feature: text-to-code. This feature is set to revolutionize the way ServiceNow developers work by generating JavaScript from plain text.

Imagine being able to generate code without any coding knowledge. This is exactly what text-to-code offers, making it a game-changer, especially for citizen developers. While the generated code might not be perfect, it provides a solid starting point and significantly reduces the time to write scripts.

With this feature, our team at Cask can do more within a sprint, speeding up project completion and delivery. It also opens up possibilities for customer self-enablement, as customers can try their hand at building more advanced features without requiring advanced scripting knowledge.

However, while text-to-code offers a simpler route to custom solutions, we still advise customers to validate the technical approach with a ServiceNow partner like Cask. Doing so ensures that the technical approach follows best practice for security and sustainability without impacting performance of the platform. With our experience and early access to the Vancouver instance, we can help guide you toward the best solution and assist you in overcoming any potential learning curve.