Assets Management
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Introduction
Using the SolarWinds Service Desk (SWSD) Assets setup menu you can define a variety of settings that pertain to all the assets housed in your inventory module.
Navigation
Setup > Discovery & Assets > Assets Management.
Best practices
These best practices can help you plan your IT changes.
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Automatic Asset Classification
Use the Discovery Scanner, which automatically identifies and classifies asset types (laptops, servers etc.) and organizes the assets in the IT hardware inventory.
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IT Service Desk Integration
Integrate the service desk capability with your asset management solution. This allows the computer and hardware inventory information to be linked with Incidents, allowing you more visibility into relevant asset data within service desk tickets.
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Tagging Assets
Tag each asset within the hardware inventory by specifying its status and assigning it to specific users and technical owners. You can create your own tag, or put in a barcode or the QR code unique to each asset.
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Software
View all commonly used software on the computer.
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Hidden Software
View all components, patches, hotfixes, etc. This provides you a clean software list of what is often used.
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Hardware
View all hardware properties (CPU, BIOS, disks, networking devices, etc). In the computer inventory section, you can view the exact hardware configuration and which software titles are installed on each of your computers.
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Warranty Details (Lifecycle)
Automatically obtain asset warranty information to help save you time and ensures your records are up-to-date.
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Risks
View risks detected in your inventory as well as software license compliance standing. Examples of risks can be unauthorized software (games), computers that are not reporting, unprotected computers, low free space, and many others.
- Computers not reported back in 7 days
- Hard drive reaching capacity
- No Anti-virus
- Greynet software titles (P2P software, games, etc)
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Incidents
View all incidents related to a specific asset and make decisions based on current data provided.
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Audits
View anything ever reported back from the agent, including hardware or software changes, lifecycle events, and risks. The audit is a one stop shop for all changes to the asset.
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Remote Assist (if enabled)
Assist your end users using SWSD's DRE integration.
Assets Options
Backup
You can back up all the data in your account by clicking Request Backup .
After a request is made, it is added to a processing queue. Requests are processed in the order in which they are received. When processing is complete, you are notified by email.
Additionally, you can schedule a weekly backup of your account’s data and define a default recipient.
Backups contain disposed, stolen, and duplicate assets.
To request a backup with the current date:
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Click Request Backup
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Notice the alert that appears above the button.
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Upon receipt of the email, a new version of the backup zip file will appear directly below the Request Backup button. The date on the zip file is the date of the request for backup.
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Click the zip file to download and extract the contents. The zip contains multiple csv files.
- Locate the computers.csv file, which contains all asset IDS, including disposed, stolen, and duplicate.
Differentiate Other Assets by Serial Number
You can differentiate your inventory stored in the Other Assets section by serial number. Select the checkbox to enable this option. When it is enabled, duplicate items are prevented from appearing in your Other Assets repository.
Auto Generate Asset ID for Other Assets
You can automatically generate sequential asset IDs for the items that fall under Other Assets. Enabling this option will generate a unique Asset ID for any new or existing item that does not already have an Asset ID. Asset IDs can be edited and saved as strings.
Render Barcodes for Computers
Because it is a best practice, by default SWSD generates QR codes for each computer asset. SWSD can generate both QR codes and barcodes for all assets.
Computer Assignment Rules
Using computer assignment rules, you can assign a computer to a site and department based on specific information collected by the Discovery Agent.
Examples of rules you can set up:
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If the computer reports back from a certain IP address range or subnet, the asset can be auto-assigned to X site and Y department.
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If the computer reports back from a certain active directory group, the asset can be assigned to X site and Y department.
Assets index pages
Your organization's assets are displayed in the relevant index pages such as:
- Computers
- Mobile Devices
- Networked Devices
When you select to display all details of a specific asset, you will be provided a great deal of data pertaining to the specific asset in addition to related information associated with the device. For example:
- Software
- Incidents
- Configuration Items
Statuses describe the state of the asset. The table below provides definitions for each status.
For more information regarding SolarWinds Discovery Agent and Scanner, see Discovery & assets.
Some of the factors you can include when setting up assets include:
- Domain
- IP Address
- External IP Address
- Network Cards IPs
- Name Prefix
- Active Directory
- Organizational Unit Path (Chrome OS)