Intelligent IT Asset Management

ASG-TrackBird™
for Intelligent IT Asset Management

Strategic audit planning is one of the foundations of effective IT hardware and software asset management. ASG-TrackBird™ helps you manage this time-consuming effort by scanning your networks to discover workstations, servers, and devices. It then deploys inventory agents to the workstations and servers, collects hardware and software information, and monitors inventory progress.

ASG-TrackBird Inventory automatically identifies workstations that have an agent installed and active and indicates when the collection of information is complete. If no agent exists on a workstation, one can be deployed with a just a few clicks. ASG-TrackBird Inventory can help you manage procurement by analyzing how hardware and software are deployed, what versions exist that need upgrading, and what configurations need to be retired and replaced.

ASG-TrackBird Inventory also works with temporary standalone devices, such as laptops, by collecting inventory audit information when devices are disconnected from the network and automatically transferring the information to the ASG-TrackBird Asset Repository at the next LAN/Internet connection. This is completed with minimum impact to the network traffic; files are less than 8 KB.

ASG-TrackBird SNMP scans your network and updates the TrackBird Asset Repository with information about SNMP-compliant devices. This permits the association of manageable hubs and switches with workstations.

ASG-TrackBird Monitoring collects software usage information and stores it in the ASG-TrackBird Asset Repository, helping you identify underutilized software deployments, manage license compliance reviews, and reclaim unused software licenses for deployment in other parts of the organization.

Managing IT assets effectively is an ongoing process. ASG-TrackBird Policy provides an overview of the information necessary for managing desktops on the network. ASG-TrackBird Policy applies internal IT policies to the inventory data gathered by other ASG-TrackBird components to discover abnormal configurations or uses of desktop devices (including unauthorized software installation, outdated anti-virus programs, or excessive CPU usage). An indispensable tool in tackling software piracy, ASG-TrackBird Policy can reduce total cost of ownership (TCO) through efficient policy management and by aligning workstation configurations with end-user requirements.

Features at a Glance

• Reduces software licensing costs through instant, extensive application audits.
• Formulates cost savings by providing extensive knowledge of hardware and software inventories.
• Reduces business risks associated with the installation of unauthorized software and nonconformance to software license agreements.
• Affords better maintenance contract negotiations using factual information about desktop-distributed hardware and software configurations.
• Manages and controls internal equipment moves by providing the location and user of every desktop.
• ASG-Discovery and Dependency Mapping (ASG-DDM) for finding the components of IT and business services and the dependencies between them.

ASG-Discovery and Dependency Mapping (ASG-DDM)™ automatically monitors and reveals the relationships between business services, the underlying complex applications, and supporting components across the enterprise. In addition to helping organizations ensure application availability, ASG-DDM fosters understanding of how applications and dependencies impact IT and business services and supports many important infrastructure and service support initiatives like release management, change and configuration management, incident and problem management, compliance and audit trails, cost control and charge back, disaster recovery, dynamic provisioning, and service level management (SLM).

ASG-DDM’s automated discovery and dependency mapping dramatically reduces the time to map business service to infrastructure dependencies. ASG-DDM discovers both packaged and custom application dependencies distributed platforms, and leverages existing investment by utilizing business process modeling work already completed.

Powerful drill-down capabilities within ASG-DDM provide a deep level of understanding within an application and IT infrastructure that includes application system and application configurations and dependencies. This enabling technology provides a powerful communications bridge between service support, operations, and applications teams. It provides extensible out of the box graphs, queries, and reports which enable service support and operational use cases.

ASG-DDM is part of an open, flexible solution set that is easy to integrate within existing service support and I&O information systems. This enables customers to mix and match solutions as they make sense and continue to leverage their existing technology investments, with no “rip and replace” required.