Using Password Manager When Collecting Specialized Inventory

You can configure the Password Manager on the appropriate inventory beacon to enable the collection of specific inventory such as VMware, Citrix Virtual Desktops, and Oracle VM.

Password Manager needs to be configured with correct username/password pairs to enable the inventory collection from a specific type of servers. For example, to collect VMware infrastructure inventory from a vCenter Server (recommended) or ESXi Server, you need a user account with at least the read-only access to these servers. This procedure includes notes for various specialized type of inventory and the credentials these require.

To configure Password Manager for gathering specialized types of inventory:

1. If not already done, deploy and configure one or more inventory beacons in your network by navigating to Data Collection > IT Assets Inventory Tasks > Beacons. For detailed information about an inventory beacon, its deployment, and configuration, see the topics under About IT Asset Management Inventory Beacons and Using IT Asset Management Inventory Beacons.
2. Verify the operational status of each inventory beacon by checking the following inventory beacon properties on the Data Collection > IT Assets Inventory Tasks > Beacons page:

Property

Expected Value

Beacon status

Operating normally

Policy status

Up to date

Connectivity status

Connected
3. Identify the inventory beacons managing the subnets where the target servers (such as Citrix XenDesktop server) are present. Navigate to the All Subnets page Inventory > Network Discovery > All Subnets, search or filter for the appropriate IP address, and check the Beacon name column.
4. Ensure that you have the credentials for the required user on the target device (for example, VMware vCenter administrator for collecting VMware inventory). Best practice is to log into the target servers from the inventory beacon, to test that these credentials grant access from the inventory beacon.
5. Use the information in the following table to configure Password Manager to collect inventory from the target servers. You can apply filters to limit matching of each credential (username/password pair) to a specific domain or specific computers.

For more information on the Password Manager, see Using Password Manager. For more about credentials to collect Oracle Database inventory, see Appendix C: Oracle Tables and Views for Oracle Inventory Collection in the System Reference.

Inventory Type

Server Type

Password Manager Records

VMware infrastructure

VMware vCenter or VMware ESX servers

For each inventory beacon managing the target servers, add the credentials of the vCenter administrator to the Password Manager. Select Account on VMware VirtualCenter from the Account type drop-down to inventory a VMware vCenter Server, or select Account on VMware ESX server to inventory a VMware ESXi Server. For more information on VMware inventory, see VMware Device and Infrastructure Inventory.

Tip:Best practice is to take inventory of a VMware vCenter Server rather than individually targeting multiple VMware ESXi Servers being managed by it. When you inventory a VMware vCenter Server, the inventory beacon also inventories all the VMware ESXi Servers being managed by the vCenter Server.

Oracle VM infrastructure

Oracle VM Manager and Oracle VM Server

For each inventory beacon managing the Oracle virtualization:

• Add the credentials of the Oracle VM Manager user to the Password Manager. Select Oracle VM management API account from the Account type drop-down.
• Add SSH credentials to access each Oracle VM Server. SSH access is required to gather processor-specific properties (such as CPU affinity). Select SSH account (password) from the Account type drop-down.

Note:When you target inventory collection from Oracle VM Manager, the inventory beacon generates an inventory (.ndi) file for each Oracle VM Server (hypervisor) that is managed by the Oracle VM Manager instance. However, if you are using CPU affinity, this method of inventory collection is incomplete, because affinity data is only available directly from each Oracle VM Server. If you connect to each Oracle VM Server, a separate .ndi file is generated that includes affinity information. IT Asset Management automatically resolves these two inventory sources into a unified data set.

Citrix XenDesktop infrastructure

Citrix XenDesktop Server VDI templates and VirtualDesktop

For each inventory beacon managing the target servers:

• Create an account (either a Windows domain account, or a local account on the Windows server) with remote PowerShell access to the Citrix XenDesktop server. The account must be at least a read-only administrator in XenDesktop. You must register this account in the secure Password Manager on the appropriate inventory beacon. Select Windows domain account or Local account on Windows device from the Account type drop-down.
• Add the credentials of the Virtual Desktops administrator (with at least read only access to the server) to the Password Manager of the inventory beacon. Select Local account on Windows device from the Account type drop-down. You can also apply filters to limit matching of the username/password pair to a specific domain or specific computers.

For more information on the Password Manager, see Using Password Manager. For more information on Citrix XenDesktop inventory, see Citrix XenDesktop Device Inventory.

Microsoft Hyper-V Infrastructure

Microsoft Hyper-V cluster hierarchy

The inventory collection component (ndtrack) automatically collects Microsoft Hyper-V cluster and pool infrastructure inventory when collecting regular Windows hardware and software inventory from the Hyper-V hosts. The virtual machine records are displayed on the Virtual Devices and Clusters page.

Tip:You can filter by VM type=HyperV.

Create an account (either a Windows domain account, or a local account on the Windows server) with full access to the Windows Service Control Manager on the Hyper-V host server (specifically, it must have the SC_MANAGER_ALL_ACCESS privilege). You must register this account in the secure Password Manager on the appropriate inventory beacon. Select Windows domain account or Local account on Windows device from the Account type drop-down.