Vendors Inventory and Attributes

The Vendors Inventory has its most direct relationship with the Applications Inventory and Attributes. Applications are supplied, licensed, or maintained by vendors. The Applications Inventory is authoritative for Application records; the Vendors Inventory is authoritative for Vendor records. The connecting relationship is the Vendor attribute on Application records, which references Vendor Semantic IDs. The Related Applications relationship attribute in this inventory is derived from those Application records. The Applications Inventory and Attributes is published and available.

The Vendors Inventory connects to the Software Technologies Inventory and Hardware Technologies Inventory (not yet published — refer to the IF4IT Enterprise Inventory Management Best Practices document) through the Related Software Technologies and Related Hardware Technologies relationship attributes. Every Software or Hardware Technology sourced from a vendor carries a Vendor attribute referencing the supplying vendor’s Semantic ID.

The Vendors Inventory connects to the Contracts and Agreements Inventory (not yet published — refer to the IF4IT Enterprise Inventory Management Best Practices document) through the Primary Contract Reference attribute and the Related Contracts relationship attribute. Every governing contract references the Vendor Semantic ID. The Contracts and Agreements Inventory is authoritative for contract terms; the Vendors Inventory is authoritative for vendor identity and governance.

The Vendors Inventory connects to the Integrations Inventory and Attributes through the Related Integrations relationship attribute. Integrations where vendor-supplied systems appear as source or target entities reference those vendor systems. The Integrations Inventory and Attributes is published and available.

The Vendors Inventory connects to the Software Licenses and Subscriptions Inventory (not yet published), the Leases Inventory (not yet published), and the Work Inventory (not yet published) through the Related Software Licenses, Related Subscriptions, Related Hardware Leases, and Related Work relationship attributes respectively. Refer to the IF4IT Enterprise Inventory Management Best Practices document for their current definitions.