Novell ZENworks Asset Management

Transcription

1 Reviewers Guide SYSTEMS MANAGEMENT Novell ZENworks Asset Management A Complete, Integrated Asset Management View

2 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Table of Contents: A Complete, Integrated Asset Management View Controlled and Simplified Management Comprehensive and Integrated Asset Management Device Discovery and Agent Deployment Accurate Software Usage Tracking and Analysis Accurate View of Software License Environment Contract Management License Management Installation and System Requirements Summary p. 1

3 A Complete, Integrated Asset Management View Because ZENworks Asset Management is integrated with Novell ZENworks Configuration Management, the shared console provides you a single, unified management view of all your desktop management tasks and concerns. Novell ZENworks Asset Management integrates asset discovery and inventory, software usage and contract and license management to provide a complete and accurate view of IT assets and license entitlements. Built on the new ZENworks architecture, it represents the next generation of asset management. It integrates automatic and comprehensive inventory discovery with accurate software usage and analysis to deliver proactive contract management and complete license management of all your platforms and license types. ZENworks Asset Management combines hardware, software and purchasing data to give you a complete view of your IT assets; this helps you ensure license compliance and eliminate overspending on software. It provides you visibility into your desktop application usage trends in detail so you purchase only the licenses your organization needs. It simplifies your asset management activities by providing common definitions of your software and hardware inventory within a unified and integrated management console. The automatic hardware and software inventory capabilities in ZENworks Asset Management eliminate the need for manual inventories, giving you the accurate asset information to ensure license compliance, to save on software licensing and support and to fuel all your other critical IT projects including migrations, lease management, helpdesk, budgeting, planning and asset redeployment. Additionally, because ZENworks Asset Management is integrated with Novell ZENworks Configuration Management, the shared console provides you a single, unified management view of all your desktop management tasks and concerns, including configuration management, software distribution and application management, remote diagnostics, intelligent image management, patch management and comprehensive asset management. Controlled and Simplified Management Novell ZENworks Asset Management enables you to control and simplify four major areas of IT asset management across your enterprise: Comprehensive asset inventory. Automatically inventories hardware and software and details PC and networks across your entire enterprise Accurate software usage. Provides instant visibility into desktop application usage trends to let you see who s using what, as well as what isn t being used at all Proactive contract management. Offers clear visibility of the details of all IT contracts and associates contracts with licenses, assets, users and organizational units Simplified software license compliance and management. Combines inventory data with purchase and license records to give you a true license view of your compliance status ZENworks Asset Management also helps you improve the accuracy and timeliness of your IT budgeting process. To help you know which licenses and contracts need to be extended, it offers comprehensive Webbased reporting with multiple graphing and display options, hundreds of built-in reports and queries, asset history and trend analysis. The trend analysis can also help you plan for future needs in IT expenditures. p. 2

4 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Comprehensive and Integrated Asset Management Whether you re worried about IT inventories, software usage, IT contract terms or license compliance, Novell ZENworks Asset Management enables you to manage all of your IT assets through a single, integrated console. This console is built atop a scalable database that stores all device and software asset information in a central location. With one server, one agent, one management console and one database, the ZENworks Asset Management Web services based architecture seamlessly integrates into a single solution. It provides everything you need to manage all aspects of your enterprise s IT assets. Because of its modular design, you can snap in other services easily, including all the desktop management services provided by Novell ZENworks Configuration Management. Powerful, Centralized and Easy-to-use Interface Novell ZENworks Asset Management boasts a brand-new interface with the browser-based ZENworks Control Center. This interface gives you all the information you need to understand the status of your IT assets. It provides simple and quick access to key device, software usage and contract and licensing information with drill down to more details. Rich Real-time Reporting The Novell ZENworks Control Center reports in real time the status of all your assets, including license compliance information, application usage, perpetual and subscription license tracking, vendor contracts and user-defined products and suites. You can leverage a large array of predefined reports, as well as easily customize your own reports, through the console s easy-to-use graphical interface. You can also view and publish tabular and graphical reports in a variety of standard formats, including HTML, PDF and Microsoft* Excel*. Also, Business Objects Enterprise is now included with ZENworks to deliver superior Web-based reporting. Single, Unified Asset Management Data Set Novell ZENworks Asset Management eliminates the information silos of your desktop configuration management system and your asset management system. Both ZENworks Asset Management and ZENworks Configuration Management leverage the same hardware and software inventory information set, as well as share the same database and management console. This significantly reduces the complexity of your environment. It also gives you a greater level of consistency, cooperation and control. In short, it provides a single version of the truth as the basis for decisions and management reporting. Device Discovery and Agent Deployment Before you can manage your assets, you must know what assets you have. Novell ZENworks Asset Management includes enterprise-class network discovery capabilities to find all the devices on your organization s network, including networking infrastructure, printers, and computer systems. After computer systems are discovered through this process, the ZENworks Asset Management agent can be deployed to them to begin detailed tracking and active device management. The Discovery Process You can choose from the following three discovery methods for collecting device information for the asset management database: Network-based IP discovery uses the Novell ZENworks discovery engine to find and collect information about devices on the network, utilizing various protocols and standards. With one server, one agent, one management console and one database, the ZENworks Asset Management Web services based architecture seamlessly integrates into a single solution. p. 3

5 Both ZENworks Asset Management and ZENworks Configuration Management leverage the same hardware and software inventory information set, as well as share the same database and management console. This significantly reduces the complexity of your environment. LDAP directory discovery uses the ZENworks discovery engine to search Microsoft Active Directory* or Novell edirectory for device objects. CSV import imports comma-separated values (CSV) files, prepared by an administrator, which contain information about devices on the network. Evaluation Tip To discover devices using either IP- or LDAPbased discovery, simply launch the Discovery Task wizard from the Novell ZENworks Control Center and then follow the prompts to create and configure a discovery task based on required criteria. For IP-based discovery, configure the discovery task to search for devices based on a range of IP addresses. For large enterprises, administrators can break the discovery process into smaller, more manageable tasks by creating several individual discovery tasks that each search different sets of IP address ranges. From within the Discovery Task wizard, you can choose which combination of discovery technologies you want to use, such as WMI, WinAPI, MAC* address, NMAP, ZENworks, SNMP and SSH. While using fewer discovery technologies reduces the time required to complete a discovery task, using more discovery technologies can improve and increase the amount of information collected. If more than one technology returns information on a discovered device, ZENworks Asset Management automatically merges that information. If conflicting information happens to be collected, ZENworks Asset Management automatically chooses the best or most reliable information set. To authorize Novell ZENworks Asset Management to collect the required device information without human intervention, the Discovery Task wizard will prompt you to enter the appropriate credentials for different discovery protocols. Once the proper credentials have been entered, the wizard opens the Discovery Schedule page which enables you to choose to run the task immediately or at a future date and time. It also gives you the option to schedule the task to run on multiple specific dates and times, or as a recurring task that can run weekly, monthly or on some other fixed interval. Saved discovery tasks can also be edited as needed in the future. For the LDAP discovery process, simply choose the LDAP Discover option in the Discovery Task wizard. Then, as prompted, provide the address and port for your LDAP server, the credentials required for reading information from the LDAP directory and the directory contexts where ZENworks Asset Management will search for devices. As with IP-based discovery, once an LDAP discovery task is created you can schedule it to run immediately or on a future specified schedule. While you can use LDAP discovery for both Active Directory and edirectory, its primary purpose is to discover device information stored in Active Directory. If your organization has device information stored in edirectory, you will typically have used previous versions of ZENworks. If this is the case, using the ZENworks migration utility to move device information from edirectory into the ZENworks Asset Management database is recommended. p. 4

6 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Importing a CSV file for device discovery is as simple as clicking Import Deployable Devices from within the Deployment tab in the ZENworks Control Center. After doing so, follow the prompts in the CSV File wizard to browse to the appropriate CSV file and enter the appropriate column and field mappings. Figure 1. Search, sort and organize devices discovered on your network As ZENworks Asset Management discovers devices, they are added to the ZENworks database and listed in an appropriate device type folder on the Discovered Devices page in the ZENworks Control Center. Devices are categorized by the following types: All types. All discovered devices, regardless of type Servers. All discovered devices that have been identified as servers Workstations. All discovered devices that have been identified as workstations Printers. All discovered devices that have been identified as printers Network equipment. All discovered devices that have been identified as network equipment Thin clients. All discovered devices that have been identified as thin clients Other devices. All discovered devices that have been identified but do not fit into one of the other categories Unknown devices. All discovered devices for which the operating system cannot be identified Deployable types. All discovered devices that have been identified as types to which the ZENworks Adaptive Agent can be deployed Devices created via ZENworks Migration. All devices that were migrated from ZENworks 7 through the ZENworks Migration utility Devices created via ZENworks Asset Management. All devices that were migrated from ZENworks Asset Management through the ZENworks Asset Management Migration utility p. 5

7 ZENworks Asset Management maintains a history of each device s inventory and at regularly scheduled intervals, the agent reinventories the device, detecting and reporting any changes to the ZENworks Control Center. _ Inventory services only; sold separately. The Novell ZENworks Adaptive Agent To facilitate the centralized and remote management of your network s assets, the Novell ZENworks Adaptive Agent can be deployed to eligible Windows*, Linux*, UNIX* and Macintosh* computers after the device discovery process has taken place. The agent can be deployed to devices through a variety of methods, including ZENworks Deployment Tasks, Web downloads from the ZENworks server, automated scripts (for instance, as part of a login script), application media installs, as part of an image or as part of a migration from an earlier version of ZENworks. Evaluation Tip To see the power of inventory and other management services, you might want to deploy the Adaptive Agent to a few machines in a test environment. The easiest way to deploy the Adaptive Agent is from within the Novell ZENworks Control Center. After running a network discovery task, click on the Workstation link under the Devices/Discovered tab and it will display a list of workstations detected during the discovery process described earlier. Simply select one or more of the listed devices and then click the Deploy function under the Action menu to deploy the Adaptive Agent to the devices. Figure 2. Quick snapshot of systems by make and model Automatic Inventory History and Reporting Once the Novell ZENworks Adaptive Agent has been deployed to your devices, it automatically conducts a comprehensive inventory of software and hardware details across your enterprise. ZENworks Asset Management maintains a history of each device s inventory and at regularly scheduled intervals, the agent reinventories the device, detecting and reporting any changes to the ZENworks Control Center. For example, it can send alerts if hardware, memory or components are removed from a computer, allowing them to be quickly tracked down. The ZENworks Adaptive Agent also leverages patented Application Fingerprinting to give you accurate inventory reporting and information on suite and software product installations. p. 6

8 Novell ZENworks Asset Management The inventory history, inventory reporting and change notifications make it easy for you to determine the state of your valuable IT resources. It provides you the data you need to ensure license compliance, save on software licensing and support, and fuel all other critical IT projects, including migrations, lease management, helpdesk, budgeting, planning and asset redeployment. Evaluation Tip Because the Adaptive Agent automatically completes an inventory scan once it has been installed, you can view inventory results immediately. To get a glimpse of the comprehensive nature of inventory in Novell ZENworks Asset Management, simply look at the detailed inventory results for a single machine. To do this, go to the Managed tab under Devices in ZENworks Control Center, click on the Workstations link and select one of the machines listed. When it displays the Device Summary page, click the Inventory tab to see an inventory summary. To see detailed inventory results, click Detailed Hardware/ Software Inventory and it will then display (in a new browser window or tab) sections for Hardware, Software, Hot Fixes, Logical To get a glimpse of the comprehensive nature of inventory in Novell ZENworks Asset Management, simply look at the detailed inventory results for a single machine. Drives, Network Drives, Virtual Machines, Contracts and History. You can also see a complete list of the applications installed on each of the machines that have the Adaptive Agent. To view a device s application list, select the main Reports tab in the left frame of the ZENworks Control Center and choose the Software Applications folder in the Inventory Standard Reports section. Select the Software Applications by Category report (or choose any report on the page) and a list of categories will be presented with a quantity of installations, which can be drilled down to get to subcategories and ultimately to a list of machines with software applications from the selected category. You will be able to see that the software applications are categorized, which is a function of the Knowledgebase, which is discussed later in this document. Figure 3. Software list and bar graph by category p. 7

9 The inventory capability in Novell ZENworks Asset Management helps you improve the accuracy and timeliness of your IT budgeting process. Built and maintained by Novell technology analysts, the Knowledgebase also contains product-by-product pointers that allow the engine to make fine distinctions between many trial- and full-version software programs and between different editions of the same product. Advanced Software Recognition Technology A sophisticated recognition engine drives the software inventory capabilities in Novell ZENworks Asset Management. This patented technology goes far beyond simply scanning hard drives and displaying a list of raw executable files. Instead, its advanced autodiscovery process carefully analyzes the software on your hard drives and checks against an extensive application Knowledgebase to accurately identify all the software running on your systems. product, you ll be assessed a fine. ZENworks Asset Management enables you to make the proper distinction so you can accurately determine if you have all the appropriate licenses that you need. Accurate IT Budgeting The inventory capability in Novell ZENworks Asset Management helps you improve the accuracy and timeliness of your IT budgeting process. With its comprehensive Web reporting it helps you know which licenses and contracts need to be extended. Web reporting includes multiple graphing and display options, hundreds of built-in reports and queries, asset history and trend analyses. Its trend analysis function makes it significantly easier to accurately plan future IT expenditures. Discovery and Deployment Features This approach eliminates missing or misspelled header information a common problem in other inventory approaches and distinguishes between real applications and other types of executable files. Built and maintained by Novell technology analysts, the Knowledgebase also contains productby-product pointers that allow the engine to make fine distinctions between many trial- and full-version software programs and between different editions of the same product. ZENworks Asset Management can also distinguish between the installation of single, standalone products versus those that were installed as part of a suite or bundle. For example, if one of your users installs Microsoft Word from the Office suite, you need the full Office license. However, if you do not have an asset management solution that can make the distinction between products installed alone versus from a suite, you could wrongly assume that you only need the standalone license for that install. However, if Microsoft audits you and you don t have a suite license for that installed Novell ZENworks Configuration Management integration New LDAP discovery New CSV file import New Adaptive agent New Integrated device discovery Improved Nonintrusive deployment Improved Enterprise-class hardware inventory Improved Enterprise-class software inventory Improved Discovery Task wizard Improved Deploy Task wizard Improved Multiprotocol network-based IP discovery Improved Self-updating agent Improved Extensible and customizable inventory Multiple scheduling options Scan-on-demand for real-time inventory of specific devices Administrator customizable discovery and deployment tasks Unlimited user-defined fields for data collection Windows, Mac, Linux and UNIX inventories p. 8

10 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Reporting Features Report incorporation of graphics and summations Improved Report scheduling Improved Historical reports Improved Web report publishing Improved Web-based ad hoc custom reporting Improved Custom reports and alerts Improved Custom reports importing Improved Report collaboration and notification Improved PDF, Excel and other formats exportation Improved Hundreds of prebuilt reports Improved Advanced report querying Improved Asset history and trend analysis Improved Accurate Software Usage Tracking and Analysis Novell ZENworks Asset Management delivers a deep understanding of the actual software usage on the Windows workstations throughout your environment. It lets you know exactly which of your software assets are being used, which users are using them and on which devices. It also lets you know how frequently they re being used. This gives you enormous power when you negotiate with vendors. You ll know what you need or don t need from them. It also makes it easy to manage your license compliance with its visibility into desktop, Web-based and server-side application usage trends. You can quickly generate reports that show which products and types of software are being used most and even more important, which are not being used at all. You get the information you need to maintain license compliance without purchasing and supporting products you don t need. The software usage reports in ZENworks Asset Management also make it possible to set and maintain corporate standards and quickly identify the use of nonstandard or even rogue applications, such as hacker tools and peer-to-peer software. Server-side usage monitoring and reporting provides visibility into the use of applications run from Citrix* Presentation Server or Windows Terminal Server. ZENworks Asset Management gives you a detailed and accurate view of all your software usage, asset inventory and licensing data available to help ensure that you only pay for the hardware, software and licensing agreements that you really need. As a result, it enables you to recognize significant cost savings while optimizing the usage of purchased assets for an overall improved bottom line. Improved Purchasing Power To help improve your organization s bargaining position in negotiations with vendors, Novell ZENworks Asset Management provides deep visibility into the usage trends into desktop, Web-based and server-side applications. You can quickly generate reports that show the most-used products and types of software, as well as those not being used at all. ZENworks Asset Management delivers the information you need to improve your contract negotiation stance and to avoid purchasing and supporting products you don t need. p. 9

11 Obtaining a complete view of your software license environment is increasingly difficult and complex in today s environment. Figure 4. Detailed software usage statistics Evaluation Tip To get an idea of the type of software usage information the Adaptive Agent will collect, install it on a few machines that are in use and then wait a few days to allow the usage monitor to log detailed application usage events. After a day or two, perform at least one more inventory scan on these machines by either executing an inventory scan from the Quick Task menu on the Managed tab under Devices in the ZENworks Control Center or by setting up an inventory schedule under the main Configuration menu. Once you have completed one or two inventory scans, you can then see a list of software usage metrics reports; to do so, select the main Asset Management menu and then click the Application Usage folder under the Software Usage tab. Note: You must define Web applications before ZENworks Asset Management will log usage data for them. You can define Web applications under the Asset Management tab of the main Configuration menu. Software Usage Tracking and Analysis Features Offers extensive, detailed report capabilities Tracks usage even when devices are disconnected from the network Provides reports for applications that run locally, in a browser and from a server Tracks both foreground and background application runtime Tracks all known applications automatically (no need to define apps to track) Identifies seldom-used and unused software that could be reclaimed and reallocated Provides user and device information associated with application usage even for multiuser devices Reports application use and nonuse over several predefined time periods (three, six, nine and 12 months) Gives aggregate views of usage levels across departments and sites p. 10

12 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Accurate View of Software License Environment Obtaining a complete view of your software license environment is increasingly difficult and complex in today s environment. The software library of most organizations comprises a mix of suites, different suite levels, suite components, freeware, shareware, evaluation software, free open source software, commercial open source software and software recently acquired by another vendor. Facing this complexity, most asset management solutions can collect only raw data scans on executable file headers, leaving you with the daunting task of making sense of the data for reporting. Unless the information gathered from these scans is manually corroborated with other methods, it leaves significant gaps in the information needed to accurately manage your software licenses. Novell ZENworks Asset Management includes dozens of methods that enable it to discover, normalize, assimilate and accurately present the required licensing information. One of these approaches includes examining a variety of metadata characteristics of installed software to match it with asset inventory and licensing-related information contained in the Novell ZENworks Knowledgebase. The ZENworks Knowledgebase was built and is updated monthly by technology analysts who examine hundreds of technology products every month for key asset inventory and license management identifiers. While ZENworks Asset Management and the Novell ZENworks Knowledgebase use file header information, they also employ several other tests to produce an accurate view of your software and licenses. These tests include examining and comparing the metadata for attributes in the following areas: The ZENworks Knowledgebase was built and is updated monthly by technology analysts who examine hundreds of technology products every month for key asset inventory and license management identifiers. Software identification and classification. Includes normalized manufacturer names, normalized product names, software suites and related suite components, standalone suite components, distinct product editions, distinct product versions, distinct run-time versions, service releases and service packs, category and subcategory, Microsoft OS hotfixes, serial numbers, guest virtual machine images (from scan of host), guest virtual machine installed software (from scan of guest), language editions, virus and spyware definitions and engines, malware identification and other software characteristics Hardware identification and classification. Includes normalized manufacturer names, normalized product names, serial numbers, models and memory slot details License view. Includes the ability to exclude applications with no licensing implications, to roll-up service packs and point releases to the next major version number, to itemize suites and standalone components (when no suite is found), to add distribution tags to applications (commercial, open source or freeware), to add license types to applications (full, OEM or evaluation) and to add current manufacturer tags to show vendor ownership based on mergers, acquisitions and name changes Novell ZENworks Asset Management includes dozens of methods that enable it to discover, normalize, assimilate and accurately present the required licensing information. p. 11

13 Figure 5. File View, Application View and License View of Novell ZENworks Asset Management ZENworks Asset Management even lets you attach copies of your contracts directly into the ZENworks Asset Management database for easy reference. Contract Management Novell ZENworks Asset Management gives you the contract management tools you need to better plan the business aspects of your IT operations, enabling you to control costs and avoid penalties. It tracks details of all your IT contracts, maintenance contracts, leases, warranties and service-level agreements. It can provide you early warning notifications of key dates associated with each individual contract, such as expirations or renewals. The integration of the solution s contract management capabilities with its inventory management capabilities makes it easy to plan and prepare for hardware refreshes as part of leases that are coming due. It simplifies your overall contract tracking and management efforts by associating contracts to software licenses, assets, users and organizational units. ZENworks Asset Management even lets you attach copies of your contracts directly into the ZENworks Asset Management database for easy reference. Figure 6. List of managed IT contracts p. 12

14 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Evaluation Tip To see the type of IT contract information you can track and manage in Novell ZENworks Asset Management, click on the main Asset Management menu and choose the Contract Management tab at the top. Once there, click the Contracts folder and then click New to bring up a blank contract template. The template includes tabs for General, Vendor, Financial, SLA, Lease, Documents, Renewals and Relationships. You ll see that date notifications can be set under several tabs and that you can associate contracts to related devices, organizational units and licenses under the Relationships tab. Contract Management Features Management and tracking of IT contract details, including costs Monitoring and notification of key dates such as start, end and renewal Association of contracts with licenses, assets, users and organizational units Uploading of contracts and associated documents into the database Master lease and related lease schedules definitions License Management Without an efficient and comprehensive asset management solution, your organization exposes itself to unnecessary risk. It leaves itself without a reliable way to prove licensing compliance and avoid associated fines and legal fees. Even if your organization is not underlicensed, it might well be overpaying for licenses and maintenance coverage. Furthermore, without an effective asset management system in place, your organization may be at a disadvantage when negotiating with vendors because it may lack visibility into entitlements and usage of its key software assets. Novell ZENworks Asset Management provides a single repository for all types of all licenses on all your platforms. It can record and report complex license scenarios and adjustments in the license repository, eliminating your need to use cumbersome external spreadsheets and perform manual reconciliations. It provides an auto-reconciliation feature that suggests matches between the products discovered on your network with the licenses you ve purchased. ZENworks Asset Management enables you to track and manage all of your license agreements and related entitlements, cost, consumption and compliance regardless of the platform, license model or term. It gives you comprehensive visibility into underutilized and unused entitlements, and can record and consolidate summary license data from acquisitions. It also delivers a complete view of metrics and status that is essential to proving license compliance. True License View Novell ZENworks Asset Management combines inventory data with purchase and license records to present your software compliance in a single, comprehensive and integrated license view. Software assets can be viewed at several different levels of detail a file view, application view and license view ZENworks Asset Management enables you to track and manage all of your license agreements and related entitlements, cost, consumption and compliance regardless of the platform, license model or term. p. 13

15 The file view is a list of executables. The application view shows the named versions of software. The license view shows software as licensed, matching installed software with licensing entitlements in a one-to-one relationship to give you a true license view. Complete View across License Models License tracking in the previous versions of Novell ZENworks Asset Management focused on tracking licenses on a typical per-desktop installation. Now, ZENworks Asset Management enables you to track all licenses, giving you a complete view of your licenses across different license models and platforms. This includes support for models based on inventory information: per installation, OEM and machine licensing models, as well as models based on external data sources, such as qualified desktops, CPU, user, named user, server, client access license (CAL), site, enterprise and userdefined models. Purchase Record Importing Software license data can come from an array of different sources, including software reseller reports, spreadsheets and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. Too often, this data is inconsistent and not normalized, making it difficult and expensive to use and manage. Novell ZENworks Asset Management addresses this challenge by providing Reseller Connectors for top software resellers and allowing you to import licensing data from any source in a text file format. In addition to importing licensing data from leading resellers such as CompuCom, SHI, Software Spectrum and Softchoice, Novell ZENworks Asset Management provides a generic import template that can be used to import purchasing data easily from a wide array of systems, such as Oracle, PeopleSoft and more. Additionally, ZENworks Asset Management dramatically reduces your software reconciliation efforts by automatically building a product catalog, allowing one-time reconciliation between all of your purchased and discovered products. Perpetual and Term License Tracking Novell ZENworks Asset Management not only facilitates the tracking of standard perpetual licenses, but it also enables you to record term licenses purchased under a subscription. By supporting both perpetual and term license types, ZENworks Asset Management provides a complete picture p. 14

16 Novell ZENworks Asset Management of your software licenses and automatically updates compliance status for expired subscriptions. Tracking Multiple Entitlements per Product Within your organization you might have departments that license the same software under different entitlement models. One department might license the software on a per-server model while another might license it on a per-client model. Each of these entitlement models has different rights associated with it and must be accounted for in a distinct fashion, creating significant complexity in overall management. Even though these different entitlements must be managed in a different manner, Novell ZENworks Asset Management makes it easy for you to manage different entitlements for the same product. No matter what license models are being used for any one product, you can track it and manage it with ZENworks Asset Management. Tracking Upgrade and Downgrade Rights Because of the complexity involved in factoring upgrade and downgrade rights on top of base entitlements, most organizations calculate these rights manually in applications or spreadsheets external to their license tracking system. Novell ZENworks Asset Management provides automated tracking of your rights associated with both upgrading and downgrading your licenses or license subsets. These license rights can be recorded and automatically figured into compliance calculations, even in cases where sets of licenses for the same product carry different upgrade and downgrade rights. Flexible License Tracking Novell ZENworks Asset Management gives you added flexibility in how you record purchasing information. Summary purchases that represent a block of licenses purchased over time can be entered along with individual purchase records. Summary license purchases allow organizations to add bulk license purchases that reflect real-world situations, such as acquisitions or true-ups as proof of ownership. You can also make license compliance adjustments that reflect special circumstances in management and vendor reporting. Adjustments might include ignoring installations that should not consume licenses, such as training, pilot and lab installations. It can also include adding additional license consumption from external sources such as subsidiaries or locations not included in the license management system. Simplified Audit Preparation and Protection Novell ZENworks Asset Management reduces your audit stress by eliminating manual inventories and the time it takes to sort through file cabinets and financial systems to find and then reconcile purchased licenses with installed applications. Based on patented inventory methodology, ZENworks Asset Management gives you reliable feedback for efficient asset management processes and helps you avoid costly compliance-related fines and litigation. p. 15

17 Figure 7. Software license reports for critical asset management Evaluation Tips To see a filtered software inventory list tailored for compliance (software without licensing implications would be automatically excluded), choose the License Management tab under the Asset Management menu item and click the Discovered Products folder. Following the page breadcrumbs at the top of the page, navigate back to the main License Management page and click Licensed Products. On the Action Menu, click Auto-Reconcile: Create Licensed Products. At this point, use the wizard to create a set of licenses based on the products discovered through the inventory process. You can also import software purchase records prior to running the Auto-Reconcile engine to have Novell ZENworks Asset Management attempt to match purchased products to installed products to individual entitlements. From within License Management in the ZENworks Control Center, you can also define software standards and user-defined software suites, known as Software Collections. For more information on using these features, refer to the product documentation. License Management Features System dashboards and real-time reports provide a complete and accurate view of software installations, contract status and license compliance through the integration of asset inventory, software usage and license reconciliation Improved Term license tracking New New install software product metadata normalization of software license view using identified metadata characteristics (i.e., current manufacturer, distribution model, license type and so on) referenced in the ZENworks Knowledgebase New Attachment of license documents to license records License consumption adjustments for subtracting training, pilots and lab installations and for adding licenses from external sources New License downgrade rights tracking New Support for tracking upgrade and downgrade rights for license subsets New Multiple entitlement tracking under same product title New Software license compliance monitoring Improved Integrated software usage views p. 16

18 Novell ZENworks Asset Management Vendor contract and license management Improved User-defined products and suites Single repository for all licensing information Improved Multiple licensing model support New Report linking and drill down Group by categorization Software suite recognition Fast, convenient mechanism for adding proprietary and legacy products Monthly Knowledgebase updates Reseller connectors for importing licensing data from leading resellers Generic import templates for importing purchasing data from ERP systems Automated building of product catalogs for one-time reconciliation between purchased and discovered products Installation and System Requirements Included as a 60-day evaluation in Novell ZENworks Configuration Management Standard Edition, ZENworks Asset Management is tightly integrated with the device discovery, inventory management, reporting and policybased automation capabilities of ZENworks Configuration Management. The advanced and comprehensive asset management features are automatically installed during the installation of ZENworks Configuration Management. Continued use of the solution beyond 60 days requires only the purchase of the appropriate license. Novell plans to distribute a standalone version of ZENworks Asset Management in the near future. Server System Requirements Servers running Novell ZENworks Asset Management must meet the following minimum requirements: Minimum Requirements Operating System Windows Server 2003 SP1 Ent x86, x86 64 Windows Server 2003 SP1 Std x86, x86 64 SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 on the 32-bit (x86) and 64-bit (x86 64) architectures Novell Open Enterprise Server 2 for Linux x86, x86 64 Processor Memory Free Disk Space Display Pentium* IV 2.8GHz x86, or equivalent AMD or Intel processor 2GB of RAM 4GB 1024 _ 768 with 256 colors Managed Devices You can use Novell ZENworks Configuration Management to manage the following servers, workstations and thin-client sessions: Windows Servers Windows 2000 Server SP4 Windows Server 2003 SP1 Enterprise x86, x86-64 Windows Server 2003 SP1 Standard x86, x86-64 Windows Workstations Windows 2000 Professional SP4 x86 Windows Embedded XP SP2 Windows Vista* x86, x86-64 (Business, Ultimate and Enterprise versions only; not Home versions) Windows XP Professional SP2 x86 with Hotfix KB Windows XP Tablet PC Edition SP2 Thin-client Sessions Windows 2000 Server SP4 x86 Windows Server 2003 SP1 x86, x86-64 p. 17

19 Inventoried-only Devices You can use Novell ZENworks Configuration Management to inventory the following servers and workstations: Servers NetWare 5.1, 6.0 and 6.5 OES (NetWare) SUSE Linux (All Editions) Red Hat* Enterprise Linux x AIX* IBM* pseries* (RS6000) HP-UX* HP* PA-RISC (HP9000) Solaris* Sun* SPARC (32- and 64-bit) Workstations Windows Vista and all previous versions SUSE Linux Enterprise 8-10 (All Editions) Red Hat Linux Mac OS or newer Summary Novell ZENworks Asset Management can help you get a handle on every IT asset in your company. It gives you insights into your exact software usage trends and needs, putting you in a better position to negotiate with your software vendors. It enables you to make informed purchasing decisions and helps you improve the accuracy and timeliness of your IT budgeting processes. ZENworks Asset Management integrates licensing, installation and usage data to facilitate your ability to allocate licenses where they need to go. It makes it easier to stay compliant with all your license agreements and contracts, while helping you to avoid overpurchasing or underpurchasing your licenses. It gives you a complete and accurate understanding of all your software licenses and reveals how your software inventories and licensing data relate to each other. Novell ZENworks Asset Management integrates all your related asset management data and activities to enable you to optimize asset usage, improve budget processes, maximize the value of vendor contracts, ensure license compliance, and reduce your overall asset and license expenses. The key to your success is proper training. With global Novell Authorized Training Partners, finding this valuable training is easy. Get the training you need; locate a training partner today at: Contact your local Novell Solutions Provider, or call Novell at: U.S./Canada Worldwide Facsimile Novell, Inc. 404 Wyman Street Waltham, MA USA / Novell, Inc. All rights reserved. Novell, the Novell logo, the N logo, NetWare, SUSE and ZENworks are registered trademarks, and edirectory is a trademark of Novell, Inc. in the United States and other countries. *Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds. All other third-party trademarks are the property of their respective owners.