Assets

In order to understand what is on our network (using SDP), we take advantage of the Asset Scan. The Asset Scan has allowed us to quickly ramp up on about 10,000 IP devices across over 150 locations.  I understand that running an IP scan, however, brings any detected device into the Asset Store.

My ask is that there be another category where these devices are placed ("Discovered"). I'll give a few reasons:

Just because a device is discovered does not mean it is desirable to have it in the store. Visiting IP devices, for example, such as a guest laptop on your network, would not be something you would want to include in your asset pool. Others might be devices that you do not want to manage as an IT asset.

The effect that this has had for us is that we now have many assets in our store that we don't wish to be there. Which means we need to go through the 10,000 assets and remove them. However, they will be readded on the next asset scan. It was suggested that they be excluded using an IP range, but this won't work for DHCP devices. It was suggested that these devices be marked expired or removed, but that would make inoperable those useful categories by which our auditors and finance teams analyze security or depreciation respectively.

CMDB

This same holding bin could and should be applied to the CMDB, since, by definition, the items going into the CMDB shouldn't be all of your IT Assets but only those assets that you specifically place under configuration management. The idea behind the CMDB is to be intential about those devices you wish to directly place into the Change Management Process, and by putting everything in there by default, we have lost that control and, therefore, the functionality and usefulness has been negated.

Effect on PO Module

Finally, since the Assets discovered automatically apply to the purchased number of nodes, we no longer have the ability of marking items as Received in the PO module, because we are exceeding our license of assets. If we can't receive our product, we can't complete the purchase life-cycle and the module isn't usable.

I've been through many scenarios with several techs on how to get around these limitations, but all of them either result in either a tremendous amount of work that we aren't resourced for or negate other very useful aspects of the application.

So, my challenge to the SDP team is to take this ever-improving application to the next level (again).  As always, I'm happy to assist.

Sincerely,

Adam