What is an ICDB?

An ICDB, or Identity Correlation Database, is a configuration database stripped back to the essentials. Every entity is a name and a type. Everything else you need to know about it comes from its associations, not its attributes: what it fired, what it belongs to, what fixed it, what it took down with it.

The CMDB's highest prize was always correlation, and correlation got poisoned when it was paired with asset management. Attributes rot; associations are events, and events are facts. Identity is earned by evidence, not declared by an import.

Keep your CMDB as the compliance and asset artifact. An ICDB reconciles against it and stays current by construction, because it is built from live operational activity rather than a form nobody updates.

What is an ICDB? An ICDB, or Identity Correlation Database, is a configuration database stripped to the essentials: every entity is a name and a type, and everything else is earned from what it actually did, what it fired, what it belongs to, what fixed it. Identity is earned by evidence, not declared by an import.

How is an ICDB different from a CMDB? A CMDB is a description you maintain by hand, and it starts decaying the day it goes live. An ICDB is assembled from live operational activity, so it stays current by construction and there is nothing to groom. A CMDB decays with use; an ICDB sharpens with use.

Does an ICDB replace the CMDB? No. Keep the CMDB for compliance, procurement, and asset management, where completeness matters. An ICDB handles operational correlation, where being right matters. The mistake is asking one record to do both jobs.

What does ICDB stand for? Identity Correlation Database.