Ignored Inventory

IT Asset Management (Cloud)
The Ignored Inventory page displays the inventory records of the devices that are ignored or linked to retired or disposed assets. A device can be ignored directly through the Ignore option, or indirectly when the linked asset is marked as Retired or Disposed. You may wish to ignore computers belonging to consultants or other third parties. The applications installed on ignored computers are not considered while calculating license compliance. You can at anytime start managing an ignored device by linking it to an asset.
Tip: This listing does not include any remote devices or fabricated host devices, which are not inventoried devices, but incomplete 'placeholder' devices created to track remote access such as through a Citrix Virtual Apps server. A fabricated host device is any host which is a host of a VM with type Zone, vPar, nPar, WPAR or LPAR. Remote device records are available by going to the Remote Devices page. Similarly, virtual desktop templates are excluded here but are available through the Virtual Desktop Templates page.
A device record may be transitioned between different inventory pages based on the following events:
  • If you activate an ignored device, the device record disappears from this page and appears on the Active Inventory page.
  • If you manually remove the linked asset from a device, the device record also appears on the Inventory Without Assets page.
  • If the device has not reported inventory for the set duration (configured on the Out-Of-Date Inventory page), the device record also appears on the Out-Of-Date Inventory page.
  • All ignored devices are also listed on the All Inventory page.
This page enables you to perform the following actions:
  • Search for an inventory device: For more information about using lists, filters, and other UI options, see the topics under Using Lists in IT Asset Management.
  • Create an inventory device: See Create an Inventory Device.
  • View or change the properties of an inventory device: See Create an Inventory Device.
  • Delete an inventory device: See Deleting an Inventory Record.
    Note: Deleting a record updates the database immediately, as expected. However, if IT Asset Management is in 'high-frequency mode' (or 'PVU mode', responsible for sub-capacity points calculations in place of ILMT) and the inventory device appears in FlexNet inventory and is consuming from any IBM PVU licenses, the device record is not actually deleted straight away (and a different database update is performed instead, as follows). This is because IBM PVU licenses require retrospective calculation of consumption points for the entire reporting period (and this calculation is reworked from scratch as part of the nightly full compliance calculation), so that removing the device record while it should still influence those retrospective calculations would introduce an audit risk. Therefore, instead of being deleted immediately, devices still required for those calculations are given an Archived status (and immediately moved to the Archived Inventory page). An Archived device acts just like a deleted one in every way except its continued availability for retroactive corrections and retrospective calculations. Archived devices are automatically deleted once they can no longer affect consumption in the data retention period.
  • Activate an inventory device: See Activating an Inventory Device
  • Create an asset: To create an asset linked to an inventory record, select the inventory record, click Create an asset, and select the type of asset. The asset record is automatically created and linked to the inventory device record.
  • Link to asset: See Linking an Inventory Record to an Asset Record.
  • Remove the linked asset: Select the inventory record and click Remove link to remove the linked asset from this inventory device. This step is mandatory to ignore an inventory device.
  • Create a management view: 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.

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.

Table 1. Properties listed on the Ignored Inventory page:
Field Description
Assigned user

The user assigned to this inventory device. This assignment overrides the Calculated user.

Editable in the Assigned field in Ownership tab of the inventory device properties.

Calculated user
The name of the most frequent user of this inventory device, over the previous 10 inventory collections. This value is calculated as follows:
  • If there is only one primary user linked to the inventory device, this user is recorded
  • If there are multiple primary users linked to the inventory device, the most frequently logged in user is recorded
  • If there is no primary user associated with the inventory device, the last user to logon is recorded.

The value of this field is automatically generated by IT Asset Management.

Not available when any of the following is true:
  • You are manually creating a new record for an inventory device
  • The inventory device is a VDI template
  • There is no inventory source (or the inventory source is Manual) reporting this inventory device.
Category

The category of this device. IT Asset Management enables you to create customized categories to group inventory devices logically. These categories are additional to Inventory device type and Device role categorization. For example, you can create categories to differentiate database servers, network servers, or firewalls. The custom categories have no impact on license consumption.

Editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties.

Clock speed (MHz)

The maximum clock speed (in MHz) of the processor that is installed in the inventory device.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records). If the value is gathered from inventory, it cannot be edited; however, it can be overridden.

Compliance status
The compliance status of an inventory device. It can have any of the following values:
  • ChangedIndicates a change in the compliance status of an inventory device. This value is changed automatically when the following conditions are met:
    • The inventory device has a linked asset.
    • You have defined the device compliance settings to track any changes in the hardware properties of this device.
    • There is a change in the hardware properties for which the device compliance settings have been defined. This change can be manual or a result of a new inventory import.
  • CompliantThe inventory details reported in the last inventory import match those of previous imports, or any changes to those details have been approved. For details about reviewing or approving changes to assets, see Viewing and Accepting the Changes to a Device Asset
  • NewThe default value for all newly imported devices. This value is not changed until there is a change in the hardware configuration or an asset is linked to this device.
  • Not trackedIndicates that the device is no longer tracked for compliance. This may happen when an inventory import leads to a duplicate device record with some change in its properties.

The value is calculated by IT Asset Management and can be manually set on the General tab of the inventory device properties.

Connection name

The name of the connection through which IT Asset Management received the last inventory for this inventory device.

Not editable.

Cores

The total number of processor cores available in a physical inventory device; or the number of cores assigned to an inventory device that is a virtual machine.

Populated and (by default) updated by inventory imports, the number of Cores can be manually overridden in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (see Hardware Tab).

Corporate unit

The corporate unit responsible for the inventory device.

Editable in the Corporate Units page under the Enterprise tab.

Cost center

The cost center responsible for all costs incurred for this inventory device.

Editable in the Cost Centers page under the Enterprise tab.

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.

Creation method
The method used to create the inventory device record. The possible values:
  • Automatic — the inventory device was discovered in incoming inventory
  • Manual — the inventory device was manually created
  • VM Host — the inventory device is a virtual machine that was discovered while taking inventory of a host server.

IT Asset Management generates the value of this field.

Disk (GB)

The total space of all hard drives installed on the inventory device, in Gigabytes.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records). The value is overwritten (permanently) by incoming inventory, and thereafter is read-only.

Not editable for existing inventory devices.

Display adapters

The total number of display adapters installed in the inventory device.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records). The value is overwritten (permanently) by incoming inventory, and thereafter is read-only.

Not editable for existing inventory devices.

Domain name
The name of the domain to which the computing device belongs.
Tip: Records fabricated for special purposes display special values:
  • A dummy device record created for imports through your connector to Flexera One SaaS Management displays flexera.com
  • A record representing an Oracle Database running in Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS) shows the full DNS alias (excluding the actual machine name), such as
    clv8xj7busyg.eu-west-1.rds.amazonaws.com

Editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties for manually created records. The value is overwritten (permanently) by incoming inventory, and thereafter is read-only.

Hard drives

The total number of hard drives installed in the inventory device.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records). The value is overwritten (permanently) by incoming inventory, and thereafter is read-only.

Not editable for existing inventory devices.

Host

The name of the host server where this VM is a guest.

Editable in the VM properties tab of the inventory device properties.
Note: As long as incoming inventory does not identify the host for this virtual machine, your manual entry is preserved (that is, a null value in inventory never overwrites a manually-entered value). However, once inventory returns a known host for this virtual machine, your value is overwritten with the data from inventory. Should it happen that future inventory again returns no value for the host name, the previous inventory value in this field is cleared, matching the current inventory data.
Hosted in

Shows whether the inventory device is on-premises (the default, meaning the device is within your enterprise), or in a cloud operated by a particular service provider. For some cloud service providers (like AWS and Azure), the Hosted in value is set automatically through inventory. For other cloud service providers, you must make a selection manually.

Editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties.

Hosted in cloud

Indicates No if the inventory device is hosted on-premises (within your enterprise). Indicates Yes if the inventory device is hosted in the cloud by a cloud service provider. Most inventory devices hosted in the cloud are virtual machines; but this value is available for all inventory devices, because some cloud service providers also rent entire machines (for example, AWS provides dedicated hosts and bare metal instances). This is a convenience column for grouping/filtering inventory devices that are hosted in the cloud. The name of the cloud service provider for each inventory device is available in the Hosted in column.

Not directly editable; but the cloud service provider can be specified in the Hosted in field in the General tab of the inventory device properties for a virtual machine. When that property is set to any value other than On-premises, this Hosted in cloud column displays Yes.

Inventory chassis type

The chassis type for an inventory device, as reported by the inventory process.

This value cannot be edited, however you may override it with the Assigned chassis type setting.

Inventory device type
Specifies the type of the inventory device, which may be any of the following values:
  • Cluster — A cluster of several computers, typically managed by Kubernetes and with consumption reported by the IBM License Service (which does not allow for further breakdown, for example to individual hosts or VMs within the cluster)
  • Computer — A computing device like a desktop, laptop, workstation, or a non-virtualized server.
  • Mobile device — A mobile device like a tablet or smart phone.
  • Product — Not a device type, but a pseudo-value used only in IBM VPC licenses to identify rows showing the licensed IBM product. This value may appear only if the Bundle consumption rules (in the license properties Use Rights & Rules tab, under License consumption rules) have the option Consume for each product on a device selected.
  • Remote Device — The device is a remote device (not appearing in inventory) known to have accessed virtualized applications. This value is created automatically.
  • VDI Template — The VDI template used to create the virtual desktop instance that was accessed from an inventory device (see Virtual Desktop Templates). This value is created automatically.
  • Virtual Machine — A virtual machine running on a physical host machine. A physical host can run multiple virtual machines using virtualization technologies from VMWare, Oracle, Microsoft, and so on. Note that this value is also used for a record fabricated to represent an Oracle Database running on Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS).
  • VM Host — A physical virtual host running one or more virtual machines using any virtualization technology, such as VMWare.

Editable in the Inventory device type field in the General tab of the inventory device properties. The value may be overwritten by incoming inventory.

IP address

The IP address of the inventory device. For inventory devices with multiple IP addresses (for example, those with multiple network cards), a comma-separated list (up to 256 characters) is shown. IP addresses in the IPv6 address family are not reported in FlexNet inventory for devices running UNIX-like operating systems.

Editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties.

Last inventory date

The date when the most recent inventory information was collected by the Last inventory source for this inventory device.

The inventory process generates the value of this field.

Last inventory source
If you have multiple overlapping inventory sources that report on the same device, it is possible for some inventory details to come from one source and other details from another source. This column identifies the most recent source of inventory for this device, so that the value may change as uploads from different sources are imported.
Tip: Although this inventory source provided the most recent inventory import, it does not follow that every recorded hardware property value came from this source. One of your inventory sources may be nominated as 'primary', and any values imported from the primary source cannot be updated by other inventory sources (although those non-primary sources can fill the gaps and update properties that are missing from your primary inventory source).
The inventory source names are system-provided, and cannot be modified. Most values are self-explanatory; some less obvious ones include:
  • Data Platform — The inventory was imported from Flexera Normalize (previously BDNA Normalize, part of BDNA Data Platform)
  • Flexera SaaS Manager — This is a dummy device created for linking with imports through your Flexera One SaaS Management connector
  • ManageSoft — The inventory was collected by legacy versions of the FlexNet Inventory Agent, and saved in a separate inventory database
  • Manual — You created this inventory device record manually, and no matching inventory has been received yet.
  • SMS — The inventory was imported from Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager (previously Microsoft SCCM).
  • Tivoli Endpoint Manager — Inventory was imported from IBM Big Fix, or one of its earlier renamings (IBM Endpoint Manager, Tivoli Endpoint Manager).
Tip: If you have custom inventory adapters, entries for these may also appear in this column as appropriate.

Not editable.

Last logged on user

The name of the user that was discovered to be the last logged on user on this device.

Click the linked full name to open the General tab of the user properties pages, and for details see General Tab.

Not available when any of the following is true:
  • You are manually creating a new record for an inventory device
  • The inventory device is a VDI template
  • The inventory device is a UNIX-like device other than one running macOS
  • The inventory device is a Windows device that is not a member of an Active Directory domain, or cannot access the domain controller
  • The Windows device is an old version, earlier than Windows Vista, or Windows Server 2008
  • There is no inventory source (or the inventory source is Manual) reporting this inventory device.
Linked asset
The name of an asset, if any, that the device is linked to.
Tip: If the status of the linked asset is set to Retired (in the asset properties), the linked inventory device remains visible in the All Inventory list, but is suppressed in the Out-Of-Date Inventory list, regardless of how long it is since the device reported inventory.

The link between an inventory device and an asset is editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties.

Location

The location within your enterprise that is responsible for the device.

Editable in the Ownership tab of the inventory device properties.

MAC address
The Media Access Control (MAC) address of the inventory device. If a device has multiple network interface cards, this field displays a comma-separated list of MAC addresses.
Tip: This field is deliberately empty for discovered device records created automatically by the Amazon connector to represent installations of Oracle Database within Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS).

Editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records).

Manufacturer
The manufacturer of the inventory device.
Tip: If the device is a virtual machine (such as Linux KVM), this column may display the publisher of the software that is running the VM.

Editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records).

Model

The manufacturer’s model name or number for this device.

Editable in the Model field in the General tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records). If the value is gathered from inventory, it cannot be edited, but it can be overridden by entering a new value in the Overridden field in General tab of the inventory device properties. The original value continues to display on the General tab, alongside the overridden value, and may be restored at any time.

Name
The name of the inventory device. The compliance calculation updates this field with the machine name returned in inventory (matched by several properties, including serial number).
Tip: The name displays as Flexera SaaS Manager if this is a dummy device record created for imports from your Flexera One SaaS Management connector.
Network cards

The total number of network cards installed in a physical inventory device; or the number of network cards accessible by the virtual machine.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records).

Operating system
The operating system running on this device.
Tip: This value may be blank because:
  • The device is recently discovered – the operating system can only occasionally be populated during first discovery, and is often backfilled once inventory is returned for this device.
  • The device is a VM host that is a hardware frame that may not be running its own operating system. In this case, the computer Name field is set to a serial number associated with the hardware (because, without an operating system, there is no host name). In fact, no inventory of any kind is possible without an operating system, so IT Asset Management synthesizes the VM host record from common data reported by its guest VMs. The virtual machines in these cases may typically be partitions like:
    • LPARs running on IBM PowerPC servers
    • Solaris zones on either x86 or SPARC architectures
    • nPar or vPar partitions running on HP Integrity servers.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (for manually-created records).

Overridden

Indicates whether the operator has manually changed one or more properties discovered in inventory, or if the inventory details are unchanged for this inventory device.

IT Asset Management generates the value of this field.

Partial number of processors

The equivalent number of full-time 'processors' set by the time-sharing controls on the hardware console. These 'processors' are vCPUs, and this corresponds to the maximum number of cores that may be used by the virtual machine. Some virtualization technologies (such as on IBM's AIX operating system) report this setting in inventory. You may override an incorrect inventory value for this field.

Populated and (by default) updated on virtual machines by inventory imports, this field in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (only for virtual machines) can be overridden with a manually entered value. An overridden value is no longer updated by incoming inventory.

Pool

The name given to the pool of resources to which this virtual machine belongs.

Populated and (by default) updated by inventory imports.

Processor type

The type of processor installed in the inventory device.

Populated and (by default) updated by inventory imports, this value can be manually overwritten in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties (see Hardware Tab).

Processors

The total number of processors installed in a physical inventory device, or logical processors assigned to a virtual machine.

Populated and (by default) updated by inventory imports, this field in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties can be overridden with a manually entered value (see Hardware Tab). Overridden values are no longer updated by incoming inventory.

RAM (GB)

The size of Random Access Memory (RAM) installed in the inventory device, in gigabytes.

For manually-created records, this is editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties. The value is overwritten (permanently) by incoming inventory, and thereafter is read-only.

Recommended asset link

Displays a link to an asset that is recommended for this inventory device. If you click the link, IT Asset Management connects this inventory device to the recommended asset.

Not editable.

Role

The role assigned to the inventory device, such as Development, Test, and Production. Device roles (where permitted by the product use rights on a license) can exempt devices from consuming entitlements on a license to which they are (and remain) attached. For example, some license agreements may grant an exemption for devices used exclusively for testing. For more details, see Allocations and Exemptions.

Editable in Device role field in the General tab of the inventory device properties.

Serial number
The serial number of the device, attempting to uniquely identify either the hardware (for a stand-alone device) or the virtualization container (for a virtual machine), as reported in inventory.
Tip: This displays Flexera SaaS Manager with a numerical suffix in the special case where the inventory device is a dummy record created for linking with imports through your Flexera One SaaS Management connector.

For manually-created inventory device records, this value is editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties. This value is not editable for records created or updated from collected inventory.

Service pack

The service pack number or ID reported by the operating system.

For manually-created records, this is editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties. The value is overwritten (permanently) by incoming inventory, and thereafter is read-only.

Sockets

The total number of mounting sockets for central processing units (CPUs) available in a physical inventory device. For a Virtual machine, this may be the number of virtual sockets assigned to the VM.

Editable in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties. If it is not available from your inventory, or if the value is inaccurate, you can permanently override with a manual value.

Status
Indicates the current state of a device. It can have any of the following values:
  • Active — A device for which the inventory information is received from an inventory source.
  • Archived — This device is in transition pending deletion, but is currently held because of its historical impacts on IBM PVU sub-capacity retrospective calculations.
  • Awaiting Inventory — This device is a place-holder that has not yet appeared in imported inventory from any source.
  • Ignored — The device that is not managed. An ignored device is not considered in license consumption calculations.
    Tip: If an inventory device is linked to an asset record, and that asset is given a status of either Retired or Disposed, this Ignored value is automatically set for the linked inventory device.

Provided that the inventory device has not [yet] been linked to an asset record, this value is editable in the General tab of the inventory device properties (although Awaiting Inventory is no longer available once inventory has been collected for the device, and Archived can never be set manually).

Threads

The total number of threads available in a physical inventory device; or the number of logical processors (virtual processors in a virtual machine, or threads assigned to a partition) assigned to an inventory device that is a virtual machine.

Populated and (by default) updated by inventory imports, this field in the Hardware tab of the inventory device properties can be overridden with a manually entered value (see Hardware Tab).

VM name

The name of the virtual machine that is recognized by the host server. This value is visible in the properties of the VM host, in the Virtual Machines tab, in the VM name column.

Editable in the Friendly name field in the VM properties tab of the inventory device properties for the virtual machine. The compliance calculation updates this field with the machine name returned in inventory (matched by serial number).

VM type

The type of the virtual machine.

Editable in the VM properties tab of the inventory device properties for the virtual machine (for manually-created records). The value may be overwritten by incoming inventory.

Applicable only to inventory devices of the type Virtual Machine.

IT Asset Management (Cloud)

Current