Business Rule Operators

An operator expresses the relationship between a condition field and its value, determining how the field is applied to the value of the condition.

For example, in the condition “If an answer assignment equals customer support,” the operator is “equals.” Each field has its own set of operators, depending on what is logical for that field. For example, a rule with the condition “If an answer assignment is greater than or equal to customer support,” has no relevance and can't be applied to an answer.

Operators Used in Business Rules

Operator	Description
equals	The field matches the value exactly, including case. When you use this field for specific text content, you must include single quotes around the text of interest. For example, you can set criteria to be Organization. Name equals 'ABC Company.'
not equals	The field doesn’t match the value.
is null	The field doesn’t contain a value.
is not null	The field contains a value.
less than	The field is less than the value.
less than or equal to	The field is less than or equal to the value.
greater than	The field is greater than the value.
greater than or equal to	The field is greater than or equal to the value.
in range	The field is within the range you specify. You must indicate a beginning and ending value when you select this operator.
not in range	The field is not within the range you specify. You must indicate a beginning and ending value when you select this operator.
contains	The field matches only text string values. This operator uses word stemming, but only in the Summary field, Subject field, and incident threads. Stemmed searches are not case sensitive. For example, if you want the rule to apply to different forms of a word, such as singular, plural, or a different verb tense, select “contains.” You then enter the singular form as the value. When you include multiple words in the value, the rule applies when the text strings contain all the words, which don’t have to occur sequentially.
does not contain	The field doesn’t contain the text string in the value. This operator uses word stemming, but only in the Summary field, Subject field, and incident threads. Stemmed searches aren’t case sensitive. Word stemming isn’t supported for custom fields, only text strings.
matches regular expression	The field matches the regular expression entered in a text string value. The regular expression compiler validates the expression. If an error code is returned, the rule isn’t saved.
does not match regular expression	The field doesn’t match the regular expression entered in a text string value. The regular expression compiler validates the expression. If an error code is returned, the rule isn’t saved.
in response interval	This operator is used only with the Incident Created condition for incident rules to indicate that the incident was added within normal working hours. That is, the incident was added within the response requirements of the SLA associated with the incident or within the default response requirements if no SLA is associated with the incident. The data in the condition’s hh:mm field isn’t used when this operator is selected.
not in response interval	This operator is used only with the Incident Created condition for incident rules to indicate that the incident wasn’t added within normal working hours. That is, the incident was added outside the response requirements of the SLA associated with the incident or outside the default response requirements if no SLA is associated with the incident. The data in the condition hh:mm field isn’t used when this operator is selected.
modified this edit	This operator indicates that the field value has been changed during the current edit of the object. This change can occur manually as a result of staff member or customer edits. It can also happen automatically through a utility or rule action. All values use this operator.
not modified this edit	This operator indicates that the field value wasn’t changed during the current edit of the object. All values use this operator.