Inventory Application

The GoToAssist Inventory Management application gives you a comprehensive view of what's on your network. It provides an instant and accurate inventory of the software and hardware on your network, including servers, workstations, printers, phones, projectors, and every other networked device. You can drill down to devices to view details such as network settings, software versions, and configuration. You can also add custom grouping and fields to further personalize your view and append additional information to your assets.

Topics in this article:

About the Inventory Application

Adding, Moving, Stopping Monitoring and Deleting Devices

Managing Groups

About the Navigator

About the Inventory Application

The Inventory application is made up of three main parts:

1. Groups

The Inventory application shows an inventory of all the devices that your Data Collection application discovered on your network during the last scan, and displays them in groups.The Groups menu displays all those groups (as well as any customized groups that you created), with indicators that show how many devices are in each group (a), as well as the number of alerts currently triggered for each group (b). Click All Devices to see all the devices in your inventory, and then drill down to sub-groups to see the devices listed in their individual groups.

2. Inventory list

The list on the right shows all devices under the group that is selected in the Groups pane. You can sort the list by Company, Type, Name, IP Address, etc. by clicking the column headers.

The Inventory list displays the following information:

• Company – Indicates which Company the device is listed under
• Type – The icon indicates the type of device

• Name – Indicates the device's name
• IP Address – Indicates the device's IP Address
• Alerts – Indicates any un-cleared alerts triggered for the device (click the number ascribed to each alert type to be taken to the Alerts tab)
• Protocol – Indicates any protocols that GoToAssist uses to communicate with the device
• Updated – Indicates the last time any changes were made to the device inventory record

3. Device Details page

When you click the name of a device, you can see the Device Details page. This provides the detailed information about the device that was gathered by the Data Collection application, such as interface, device fingerprint, system data and application information.

Adding, Stopping Monitoring and Deleting Devices

Typically, devices are automatically added by the Crawler and Remote Support Agent. However, you can also manually add and remove devices.

To add new devices

1. Click Add Device above the Inventory list.

2. In the Add New Device window, enter the following information:

• DNS Name – Enter the Domain Name System (DNS) for the device.
• IP Address – Enter the Internet Protocol (IP) Address for the device.
• MAC Address (optional) – Enter the Media Access Control (MAC) address for the device.
• Notes (optional) – Enter any notes about the device that will help distinguish it from others.
• Class – Choose what type of device it is from the drop-down menu.
• Vendor (optional) – Enter the vendor or manufacturer.
• Model (optional) – Enter the model of the device.

3. Click Save when finished. The device will appear on your Inventory list in the appropriate order.

To move devices between Companies

If you switch devices from one Company's Crawler to another, you can move the device in the Inventory as well without modifying the Crawler.

Note: The Crawler for the new company will not detect the device unless it is physically moved from the original network to the new one. Otherwise, the Crawler for the original Company will continue to scan the device (unless it is set to ignore the device) and the Crawler from the new Company will be unable to scan it. It is not possible to transfer previously collected information from one Company to another.

1. Physically move the device from one Crawler's network to another.

2. In the Inventory, click the device's row so that it is highlighted and click Move Devices.

3. In the “Move devices between companies” window, use the drop-down menu to select the Company that you want to move the device to, then click Move.

4. Back in the Inventory application, a confirmation message appears at the top of the page. Within a few minutes, you can refresh the page and the device will have disappeared from that Company.

Note: If you also have a GoToAssist Remote Support subscription plan or free trial and have Unattended Support set up on that device, the unattended access for that device will also be moved between Companies.

To stop and re-start monitoring devices

You can choose to have your Data Collection application ignore a device while scanning without deleting it completely.

1. Click the device's name to open the Device Details page.

2. Click Don't Monitor [this device] at the bottom of the page.

3. Click OK when prompted. After a few minutes, a "Device Not Monitored" message will appear instead of the device details, and a icon will appear next to the device on the Inventory list.

4. To start monitoring the device again, click Monitor [this device].

Note: You may also need to remove this device from the "Groups to Ignore" list in the Crawler configuration for data to actually be collected for the device.

To delete devices

You can delete devices in either of the following ways:

• Select the device's row in the Inventory list so that it is highlighted (useCtrl or Shift to select multiple devices) and click Delete (click OK when prompted).

• Click the device's name to open the Device Details page and click Delete [this device] at the bottom of the page.

Managing Groups

Groups allow you to put your devices into categories for easier viewing and managing. Some groups are automatically included, such as Device Types and Operating Systems, or you can create your own custom groups and sub-groups. You can also drag and drop groups on the menu to reorder them or create hierarchies.

To manage your groups

You can manage your groups from the Configure Device Groups page, which you can access in either of the following ways:

• Click Configure in the top navigation and select Edit Groups from the drop-down menu.

• Open the Inventory application and click Edit Groups below the Groups menu.

Once on the Configure Device Groups page, you can drag and drop the groups to reorder them, or even drop them into each other to create group hierarchies.

To create new groups

1. From the Configure Device Groups page, click Create Group.

2. A new group will appear at the bottom of the menu with the text field ready; enter the new group's name. When the page refreshes, the group will reappear in alphabetical order in the Groups menu.

You can then designate the groups to specific Companies or have them automatically add new devices using PQL language by editing the group.

To edit groups

1. Click the group's name in the menu so that it highlights blue.

2. Click Edit Group.

3. In the Edit Group window, you can modify the following information:

• Name – You can change the group's name.
• Applies to – You can change which Companies the group applies to.
• Smart Group – You can choose to use a PQL predicate to automatically test each device and determine whether it belongs in this group (rather than manually putting devices in the group). Select the Smart Group checkbox to see the Member Test field.

4. Click Save when finished.

To rename groups

1. Click the group's name in the menu so that it highlights blue.

2. Click Rename .

To add devices to groups

There are 3 ways to add devices to groups:

1. Drag and Drop – You can drag and drop a device from the Inventory list into a group on the Groups menu to add it.

Note: You will not be able to add it to groups to the automatically populated groups to which it is not relevant (they will be grayed out). For example, you will not be able to drag a Windows device into the Apple/OSX Computer group.

2. Device Details page – The Device Details page shows which groups the device belongs to; on the Overview tab, you can click Edit and then select the checkboxes of the groups that you want to add the device to.

3. Smart Groups (PQL) – You can use a PQL predicate to automatically test each device and determine whether it belongs in a group (rather than manually putting devices in the group); see editing groups for more information.

About the Navigator

You can use the Navigator to drill down for atomic details about a device such as application data, interface, device fingerprint, system details, and other information that the Crawler gathers.

To use the navigator

1. Click a device's name on the Inventory list to open its Device Details page.

2. Click Navigator in the top-right corner.

3. Click through the information panes to drill down to the different device information that the Data Collection application gathered.

About Device Details Page

When you click the name of a device in the Inventory list, the Device Details page indicates the device's Remote Support status (online, offline, etc.)or provides an Install link if Remote Support is not set up on the device. There are also tabs that provide the following information, as well as Query buttons to view and edit the corresponding queries:

• Overview tab – You can use the Overview tab to monitor and modify the network structure, indicate devices to scan and devices to ignore during scans, examine the queries that control scanning behavior, and group and classify devices.

• Identification – Shows details of the device (such as DNS Name and IP Address) and allows you to edit the device's name by clicking Edit
• Classification – Shows the device's type, vendor and model, which you can change by clicking Edit
• Belongs to Groups – Shows which groups the device belongs to; click Edit to add or remove groups
• Custom Fields – Shows the details for any custom fields you may have created
• Notes – Shows any notes for the device

• Query – Click Query in the upper right corner to view or modify the search algorithm that directs the Data Collection application to find this data.

• Alerts tab – Shows the current alerts for this device (if any), including details

• Health tab – Shows the services being monitored over time

• Performance tab – Shows the performance of Servers in the inventory, including CPU, Memory, Disk Usage and Disk Performance graphs

• Network tab – Shows the various network interfaces and associated details

• Users tab – Shows local user accounts

• Software tab – Shows software installed on the device (similar to the list shown in the Windows Control Panel)

• Patches tab – Shows Patches installed on the device (similar to the list shown in the Windows Control Panel)

• Disks tab – Shows locally attached disks, including optical (CD/DVD) and those connected via USB, eSATA, etc.

• Hardware tab – Shows Processor, Memory, BIOS and other details

• Services tab – Shows services installed, including their status at the time of the most recent data collection

• Classification tab – You can use the Classification tab of the GoToAssist Inventory application to view classification results such as score, class, vendor, and model; and raw classification evidence such as characteristics, attributes, and value. You can also edit the query of each:
  • The Classification Results table shows the devices score, class, vendor and model.
  • The Raw Classification Evidence table shows the characteristics, attributes and values the device's data.

• Query – Click Query in the upper right corner to view or modify the search algorithm that directs the Data Collection application to find this data.

| Views: 3426 | Last Updated: Thu, May 09 2013 2:28 PM

Is this article helpful?