This is something I've been told differently how to manage out of the box records. I go over the pros and cons of them here.
Ways to work with Out of Box things in ServiceNow
Jakarta and later
You should always add comments why you are changing and out of box (oob) script and change as little as possible so when upgrading its clear what you changed and why its different.
With an update in Jakarta, the recommended approach is to update the OOB record with comments of why you've changed what you changed, so when you are comparing the upgraded version and the customized version its easy to see what you did and why you did it.
Pre-Jakara
Knowing why things were updated in the past might help understand more.
Comment OOB and add comments
Comment out code, and adding notes stating why you change it. This had the following pros/cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Least amount of work | Upgrade would show any changes |
| No referencing newly created scripts as new code is in oob record |
Inactive and make new
Inactivate if possible, then, Copy. This is hard to see if anything has been added to the OOB because deactivating doesn't trigger a customer update.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Would never get accidentally upgraded | Upgrade will not show this as needing updating |
| May require many updates to the newly created thing if its referenced all over. |
Comment OOB, add comments, inactive and make new
Add Comment stating you are making a copy, inactivate it. Copy it. This will ensure the OOB thing comes up in a skipped update.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Would never get accidentally upgraded | You still have to make a new thing |
| Update difference still shows up so you can compare | May require lots of updates to the newly created thing if its referenced all over. |
Further Reading and Thanks
Thanks Andrew Barnes for the helpful input on this!