Specifying Inventory Groups to Which the Agent Configuration Applies
To assist in reducing infrastructure overheads, you may wish to restrict which Inventory Agents can contact which inventory beacons. This may provide better control for load balancing of communications, uploads, and network traffic. You manage these restrictions using inventory groups. The Inventory Groups tab appears when you select an existing agent configuration on the Agent Configurations page. There is a General tab and an Inventory Groups tab.
An inventory group combines the following:
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A target set of one or more installed Inventory Agents |
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One or more inventory beacons. |
When implemented, the specified Inventory Agents may only communicate with the selected inventory beacons in that inventory group, whether for downloads of device policy and update packages, or for uploads of collected inventory. If a Inventory Agent falls into multiple inventory groups, it is then able to communicate to any inventory beacon in those inventory groups. If an inventory device is not covered by any target in any inventory group, that inventory device remains able to communicate with all inventory beacons.
Important:To use this feature, you must upgrade your IT Asset Management Beacons to the version 13.5.x or later.
The Inventory groups tab lets you create, edit, or remove inventory groups. The targets identifying inventory devices where Inventory Agent may be installed must be predefined, ready for use in managing inventory groups.
Tip:Inventory groups are created on the Inventory Group Settings page. Targets are created and managed on the Targets tab of the Discovery and Inventory Rules page.
Within the Inventory group settings tab, creating an inventory group involves:
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Naming and providing a description of the inventory group |
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Selecting one or more inventory beacons for the group |
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Choosing one or more predefined targets where Inventory Agent may be installed |
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Saving the configuration. |
The Inventory Groups tab utilizes fly-down lists for adding or removing inventory beacons, and for adding or removing targets. For more information about using fly-down lists, see To Use a Fly-Down.
To specify inventory groups for an agent configuration
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Go to the Agent Configurations page (Data Collection > IT Visibility Inventory Tasks > Agent Configurations). |
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Click the agent configuration tile to edit its configuration. |
The selected agent configuration appears.
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Click the Inventory Groups tab. |
The Inventory Groups settings appear.
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In the Name field, enter a name of the inventory group, using a name that is meaningful within a list of inventory groups. |
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To add or edit existing inventory beacons in the inventory group, do either of the following: |
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If you are creating a new inventory group—In the Beacons search, search for and select one or more inventory beacons to include in the inventory group, and then click the Add beacons button. |
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If you are editing an existing inventory group—In the Beacon(s) search, search for and select one or more inventory beacons to include in the inventory group and then click the Add beacons button. To remove an inventory beacon from the current inventory group, click the check box of that inventory beacon in the list showing the currently selected inventory beacons, and then click the Remove button. |
Note:An inventory beacon can be a member of at most one inventory group.
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To add or edit existing targets in the inventory group, do either of the following: |
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If you are creating a new inventory group—In the Targets search, search for and select one or more targets to include in the inventory group, and click Add targets. |
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If you are editing an existing inventory group—In the Targets search, search for and select one or more targets to include in the inventory group, and click Add targets. To remove a target from the current inventory group, click the check box of that target in the list showing the currently selected targets, and click Remove button. |
Tip:Targets are created and managed on the Targets tab of the Discovery and Inventory Rules page.
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Within this Inventory group settings section, click Create if this is a new inventory group, or click Save to save the changes if this is an existing inventory group. |
The Inventory group settings section refreshes to display the list of currently defined inventory groups.
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In the Connection Method field, click the checkboxes of the connection methods for this inventory group: |
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Select All to select all methods |
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By name, falling back to IP address
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To delete an inventory group, click the Delete button and then click OK to confirm deletion. |
The Inventory Groups tab refreshes with the deleted inventory group removed from the list.
The inventory group settings are saved to a database, over-writing previous settings. At the next request for any updated beacon policy (inventory beacons check for updates by default every 15 minutes), the latest settings are deployed. Thereafter, when an inventory device checks for updated policy (which happens daily at a random time between 5 a.m. and 6 a.m. local time for operational agents), affected platforms receive the changed policy. Once Inventory Agent has the new policy update, it communicates with the inventory beacons in accordance with the policy file.