fluent-development
Fluent (ServiceNow SDK) Development
Fluent is ServiceNow's pro-code model: application metadata as declarative TypeScript, with git as the source of truth instead of the instance. You edit .now.ts files locally, compile them (build), and push the compiled package to an instance (install). The CLI behind the tools is now-sdk from @servicenow/sdk (4.x, Node 20+).
Where these tools run: the
snow_fluent_*tools are local-only — they execute the ServiceNow SDK (now-sdk) on the developer's machine, so they only exist when the MCP server runs locally over stdio. Over a hosted HTTP transport (e.g. a web chat) they are not available, so do not call them; drive the same flow through git + CI instead: commit the project files, trigger the build/deploy pipeline, and follow the workflow runs.
1. Fluent vs the classic snow_* API tools
| Task | Use |
|---|---|
| Build/evolve an app whose definition should live in git | Fluent tools (snow_fluent_*) |
| Data operations (query/create/update records) | API tools (snow_query_table, ...) |
| ITSM/config changes on an existing non-Fluent instance | API tools (e.g. snow_create_business_rule) |
| Metadata types Fluent doesn't cover (see §5) | API tools, or keep as XML in metadata/ |
Fluent changes the definition of an app; the API tools change a live instance directly. Don't mix them for the same artifact: editing a Fluent-managed record via the API gets overwritten on the next install.