Remote Devices

IT Asset Management (Cloud)

The Remote Devices page lists the details of all the remote devices created by IT Asset Management. IT Asset Management creates remote devices when it gets software usage details, but has no information about the devices through which the software was accessed. For example:

• You grant temporary access to some computers, under special license provisions. For example, a contractor's personal computer may be temporarily granted access to an application.
• There are unknown endpoints such as a home computer or mobile device that have been used to access virtual desktops under VDI.

Remote devices are created on demand based on possible input from:

• Flexera One SaaS Management
• The Citrix XenApp server adapter
• XenApp (EdgeSight) connection
• FlexNet Inventory Agent collecting inventory from Citrix Virtual Desktops (previously Citrix XenDesktops)
• App-V (Standalone) adapter
• SCCM connection if App-V packages are published
• Microsoft Office 365 adapter
• Custom spreadsheet imports.

You cannot create a remote device through the user interface. IT Asset Management analyzes the remote application access data with user details. If it finds a user that has accessed a remote application but has no hardware device associated with it, IT Asset Management creates a remote device.

Tip: Sometimes it may appear that a remote device has been created for a user who is associated with an inventory device, especially for data imported through the Microsoft Office 365 adapter. The reason is that the matching of incoming user records against existing user records includes the email address; and the email address imported from the Microsoft Office 365 portal may be in a different format than the company-format email address imported from Active Directory. Here is what happens:

1. IT Asset Management attempts to match the incoming user (with O365 email format) against existing records (with company email format), and therefore cannot find a match.
2. A new user record is created with O365 email format, and most other details matching the previous company-format record (for example, the same user name).
3. Although the previous record may already be linked to an inventory device, the new O365-format user record is not – and therefore a remote device is created for this new user record.

To prevent this happening, update your existing user records by entering their O365-format email addresses in the Alternate email field on the Details tab of the user properties (these updates may be a task for a business adapter). When importing user records, IT Asset Management checks this field (as well as the default Email field) for matches. If the O365-format email address is now matched in the Alternate email field, no duplicate user record is created and no remote device record is needed (where the original record is linked to an inventory device).

You can select any device record and click Open to view its properties. For more information about remote device properties, see Remote Device Properties.

This page displays the following columns (listed alphabetically). Some columns are displayed by default and others can be displayed through the column chooser. To manage columns and other UI options, see the topics under Managing Columns in a Table.

Note: The Save view as feature of IT Asset Management enables you to create customized management views of a page by saving the applied user interface settings. For more information, see Creating Saved Views.

Created

The date when this inventory record was created in IT Asset Management.

Tip: New inventory device records are created during a full import to the compliance database, as new inventory is identified. Therefore it's quite possible to have a creation date that is later than the inventory date, with the difference being due to scheduling, such as the scheduling of imports from third-party tools, or delays between the upload of FlexNet inventory and the full import and compliance calculations (for example, if your full imports are scheduled weekly, or the like).

Not editable.

Device status

Displays Active for a remote device. (May safely be left in the column chooser.)

Not editable.

Domain name

Displays the domain associated with the user detected using the virtualized application remotely.

Not editable.

IP address

Always blank for a remote device in this listing. (May safely be left in the column chooser.)

Not editable.

Last inventory date

The most recent date when evidence relating to this remote device was found in imported inventory. This may be:

• Application access evidence
• VDI access evidence
• Both of the above, in which case the most recent date is used.

Not editable.

Last inventory source

Always displays Automatic in this listing. (May safely be left in the column chooser.)

Not editable.

Name

This remote device record was fabricated when a user was found to have accessed a virtualized application from a device not included in your corporate inventory devices (such as a home computer or mobile device). The remote device name is fabricated from the user name with the suffix (Remote) appended. For example, the user rwest using a virtualized application produces a remote device name of rwest (Remote).

Not editable.

User

Specifies the name of the user who accessed an application on a remote device.

Not editable.