CA IT Client Manager Asset Inventory and Discovery

Transcription

1 DATA SHEET: ASSET INVENTORY AND DISCOVERY CA IT Client Manager Asset Inventory and Discovery CA IT CLIENT MANAGER DELIVERS EXTENSIVE ASSET INVENTORY AND DISCOVERY CAPABILITIES THAT HELP YOU MAINTAIN ACCURATE RESOURCE INVENTORIES, MONITOR IT ASSET USAGE, DEVELOP POLICIES THAT SUPPORT YOUR BUSINESS OBJECTIVES AND DRIVE DOWN OVERALL COSTS. Overview Benefits The CA Advantage The complexity, volume and diversity of today s IT assets, combined with constant change and improvised additions, make it difficult to get an accurate and up-todate picture of your IT environment. But, without this insight, effectively managing these assets is nearly impossible. CA IT Client Manager is designed to deliver an enterprise-class solution that automatically discovers and inventories all IT elements in your environment. This helps you to monitor IT asset availability and usage, reduce unnecessary costs, and optimize your overall asset base. CA IT Client Manager is designed to let you move away from reactive IT administration practices and toward a proactive manage - ment method that delivers comprehensive, accurate data. You can use this data to make informed decisions about asset usage, costcontainment and growth planning.

2 Proactive Management of Your IT Assets To effectively manage your environment, it is crucial to understand what IT assets you have, where they are located, and how they are being used. Spreadsheets are no longer an effective method for tracking assets, and manual processes only make this task more labor-intensive and error-prone. Without advanced tools that automate these processes and contribute to a thorough understanding of all available systems and IT assets, your environment will likely be inconsistent and difficult to manage. CA IT Client Manager automates the vital process of identifying, inventorying and classifying all your IT resources both hardware and software. It alerts your IT staff to changes in real time and automates many manual, error-prone daily maintenance procedures. It helps you make better-informed decisions regarding usage and distribution of IT assets, focusing on business requirements and gaining the agility to deliver computing power to support key business objectives. The solution also measures usage of both IT hardware and software resources so you can better manage overall IT expenditures and run a more cost-effective department. Key Capabilities Continuous and Active Discovery CA IT Client Manager automatically discovers new systems that enter the corporate network. Discovers all connected devices using a combination of traditional IP-based discovery supplemented with continuous, active discovery capabilities. Assigns newly discovered devices a proper OS classification. Predefined policies determine whether the asset should be fully inventoried by actively scanning the system. Settings can then be adjusted to gather specifics, such as user preferences and printer information. Hardware Inventory CA IT Client Manager generates precise hardware inventory by detecting and reporting on detailed inventory factors such as serial numbers, CPU information, total RAM, internal and peripheral disc drives, OS versions and service packs, network settings, and power settings. HARDWARE AND NETWORK DETECTION MODULES Accelerate environment scanning by using structured inventory and customizable detection modules that discover specific data on PC and network hardware. SUPPORT FOR WINDOWS MANAGEMENT INSTRUMENTATION (WMI) standard for gathering inventory and configuration information. Supports the WMI INVENTORY CHANGE HISTORY Automatically tracks changes to assets, such as installation or removal of software, changes in hardware configuration and other important events. It displays an asset s historical information and its current state with intuitive visual cues displayed in the user interface. 2 DATA SHEET: ASSET INVENTORY AND DISCOVERY

3 Software Inventory CA IT Client Manager employs intelligent detection methodologies to discover and identify applications and other software services that are present in your IT environment. It generates reports listing all discovered software with a higher degree of granularity than traditional software inventory scanning solutions. INTELLIGENT DETECTION Improves accuracy by determining whether or not applications are actually installed. To do so, CA IT Client Manager employs both file and registry scanning and Microsoft Installer database look-up. RECOGNITION DATABASE Includes entries for more than 13,000 applications categorized into three major groups: applications that are known, applications that are unknown and main applications. This provides a quick overview of which applications are installed and where. RESEARCH AND INFORMATION SERVICE CA's Content Research Team creates application definitions (APDEFs) that are used to extend the recognition database. Newly available APDEFs are quickly created, enhanced with additional research metadata, validated and made available through downloadable updates. OS INVENTORY Delivers detailed and accurate information about operating systems, including versions, language settings, service packs and patch levels. MICROSOFT HOTFIXES Maintained by the CA IT Client Manager database is a complete list of all Microsoft hotfixes, making it easy to find noncompliant systems and enforce compliance through integration with CA's software delivery capabilities. FILE MANAGER INFORMATION is designed to provide you with control over your network hard drives by delivering a complete image of files and directories on any PC. You can simply drag and drop to delete or copy files across the network. Alternate Inventory Methods NONRESIDENT INVENTORY Delivers general inventory and software inventory without requiring a management agent to permanently reside on the system. ELECTIVE INVENTORY Enables users to provide their inventory information through a number of methods including visiting a corporate web site, through a link in an message or by using a USB memory stick. This is useful when servicing a client system and current inventory is needed, but the user is unwilling or unable to provide credentials to the management system. Advanced Reporting CA IT Client Manager provides comprehensive IT asset knowledge through a robust reporting infrastructure. ADVANCED REPORTER Provides information about software inventory, hardware inventory, software usage and configuration that can be combined for a multifaceted view of your entire enterprise environment. OUT-OF-THE-BOX REPORTS Report templates can be used as is, or modified to reflect the unique needs of your enterprise. DATA SHEET: ASSET INVENTORY AND DISCOVERY 3

4 PUBLISHING AND EXPORTING REPORTS Automatically publish reports to web servers in standard file formats such as CSV and XML, or save the results in a database to easily integrate with third-party applications. Automation Alarm thresholds can be set to alert IT staff and automatically trigger actions that include sending s, pages or phone messages to a complementary system, such as CA NSM or CA Service Desk Manager. Groups of assets can be defined based on a database query. The query can then be continually evaluated, dynamically updating the members of the group. FIGURE A Get an instant view on the status of the IT environment, or quickly access main features and useful task wizards. PROACTIVE ASSET MANAGEMENT Reduce Cost and Optimize Your Asset Base with Detailed Knowledge of the IT Environment CA IT Client Manager automates manual and error-prone asset inventory and discovery processes. It helps you gain a new level of control over your IT environment by: providing accurate data on hardware and software deployments, ascertaining usage patterns, automating various maintenance procedures and identifying ways to cut costs by reassigning software licenses rather than purchasing new ones. It also helps you develop and enforce policies that support the objectives of the various lines of business operating throughout your organization. 4 DATA SHEET: ASSET INVENTORY AND DISCOVERY

5 Helping your organization develop a proactive asset management system, CA IT Client Manager uses discovery information to generate detailed, customizable, cross-platform reports that identify and categorize the elements of your IT environment. This better enables you to make informed decisions regarding your IT assets and optimize the IT services that contribute to your company s competitive edge. The CA Advantage CA IT Client Manager enables you to move away from reactive IT administration practices and toward a proactive management method. You can use the comprehensive, accurate data delivered by CA IT Client Manager to make informed decisions about asset usage, costcontainment and growth planning. With full-featured asset tracking capabilities, the solution provides the foundation for managing the complete IT asset lifecycle from initial deployment to retirement. As an integrated solution, CA IT Client Manager helps IT automate daily operational processes, standardize the IT environment, create and enforce policies, and manage risk. CA Services An important part of CA s leadership in the IT client management marketplace is the team of dedicated professionals in CA Services. Whether your implementation is out-of-the-box or requires modification to meet your business needs, CA Services lowers your risk by utilizing the CA IT Client Manager Deployment Playbook for each engagement. The Deployment Playbook leverages years of customer delivery successes into a repeatable deployment methodology, workflow and best practice. By delivering these standardized implementations, you can achieve faster time-to-value with your CA solutions. To learn how CA s asset inventory and discovery capabilities enable you to create a proactive asset management foundation, visit us at ca.com/solutions. Copyright 2008 CA. All rights reserved. All trademarks, trade names, service marks and logos referenced herein belong to their respective companies. MP Learn more about how CA can help you transform your business at ca.com