Department models

You create departments to see the storage resources that your departments use.

To monitor the capacity of departments, you create departments and then map the departments to the applications that they use.

Departments comprise three elements:
  • The department
  • The subdepartments that the department contains (optional)
  • The application that the department uses

The department hierarchy that you create determines how you can view the capacity and the storage information that the department uses.

For example, to view the total capacity and space usage of a department, you create a department and map the applications to the department.

The Book Sales department with its associated subdepartments: Wholesale, Retail, and Online

If, however, you want to view the total capacity and space usage for the department and the capacity and space usage for each of its subdepartments, you create a department hierarchy by adding subdepartments to departments. You then map the applications that each subdepartment uses to the subdepartments.

Complex department model that shows the Domestic Sales subdepartment and the Foreign Sales subdepartments

In the illustration, the department hierarchy is extended to include one more layer of subdepartments under the Wholesale subdepartment.

When you create departments, you can also organize and provide more information about your departments. For example, you can categorize your sales departments:
  • By sales region such as North America
  • By country such as US or Canada
Type and subtype categories are used to organize sales departments by sales region and country.

In this example, the NA Sales Department is a container department that has four subdepartments. In the Type and Subtype fields, you specify the sales region and country for each of the subdepartments. On the Subdepartments page, you can filter all of the subdepartments that you created by the Type or Subtype fields.

You map the container department to the application that contains all of the storage resources that the departments for sales in North America use. You map the subdepartments to the applications that contain the storage resources that each subdepartment uses.
Tip: To add categories after you create the application, go to Resources > Departments. Right-click the department, click View Properties, and then click Edit.