Preventing the "Email address not specified" message in activity logs

Products

• SUPPORT AUTOMATION- SERVER
• CA Service Desk Manager - Unified Self Service
• KNOWLEDGE TOOLS
• CA Service Management - Service Desk Manager

Issue/Introduction

When operating CA Service Desk Manager (SDM), one may encounter a message in the activity logs that says "Email address not specified", ie:  "AHD05377:No email address specified for Contact 'JDoe'".  This is caused by the given contact recipient having a blank/null email address but a notification method of email or Pager Email specified for the given notification level. 

To prevent the error from appearing every time a notify is sent out, either the given contact has to be given a valid email address or the notification level needs to be blanked out. The instructions below specify how to blank out notification levels for ALL contacts who have a null email address:

Environment

Release: SDMU0M99000-14.1-Service Desk Manager-Full License
Component:

Resolution

• Backup the usp_contact and ca_contact tables using below commands:
  pdm_extract ca_contact > ca-cnt-bak.dat
  pdm_extract usp_contact > usp-cnt-bak.dat
   
• Run an extract of all contacts who lack an email address:
  pdm_extract -f "select id from ca_contact where email_address IS NULL or pager_email_address IS NULL" > null-email.dat
  
  Alternatively:
  pdm_extract -f "select id from ca_contact where email_address IS NULL" > null-email.dat
   
• Edit the null-email.dat file. Change the file so that it looks like this:  
  NOTE: The modification of the null-email.dat file will involve changing the name of the specified table from "ca_contact" to "usp_contact". There will also be additional fields included that are specific to the usp_contact table.  The ultimate goal will be to modify the usp_contact table's notification method to all NULL values to match the corresponding ca_contact table's NULL email field.
  
  TABLE usp_contact
  id c_cm_id1 c_cm_id2 c_cm_id3 c_cm_id4
  { "0A451C2B666C9646BECEFEE2FF69AEEC" ,"" ,"" ,"" ,"" }
  { "16226C765005B94E957E0F477DEF1B1C" ,"" ,"" ,"" ,"" }
  { "17DEA1027C7C3746B6F25DB6604EEE23" ,"" ,"" ,"" ,"" }
   
• Save the converted file as "null-meth1.dat"
   
• Load the new "null-meth1.dat"
  pdm_load -f null-meth1.dat
   
• Clear table cache:
  pdm_cache_refresh -t ca_contact
  pdm_cache_refresh -t usp_contact

Additional Information

Additional settings to control mail notifications can be found here:

SDM: Toggling notification logging in the ticket's Activity Log.
https://knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article?articleId=36573

SDM: How to stop the following messages in the CA SDM STDLOG "No notification method" or "Email address is not set"
https://knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article?articleId=33653