One of the objectives in deploying an SNMP manager are the functions of inventory. . Inventory means many things to different people and what may be important to one user, may not be to another. While a complete list of functionality is beyond the scope of this post some of the basic functions are:
- Number and type of network devices.
- Location, serial number and service contract data.
- purchase date, in service date, removed from service date
- version of O/S, IOS, Firmware, etc.
Orion NPM and NCM each try to provide some of these functions however separately and together they fall frustratingly short.
- There are fields for serial number however this is pulled from SNMP device data and may not be the serial number you need to use when opening a support call on the device.
- Yes you can create custom fields (only in NPM, deleted from NCM) but you cannot control which fields are displayed in the Node Details pane on the basic Node information screen.
- Nodes may have multiple components that you need to track. An example may be a switch stack or a device with several serialized boards. There is no method of managing this.
There are many other failings in the inventory functions of Orion depending on what you are trying to achieve. I could go on and I imagine any Orion users who have tried to use the product in this manner could as well. I'm sure the good folks at Solar Winds are very much aware of these as well. At the moment, I'd be happy if I could use the product to manage my annual SmartNet contract renewals. .
The reason behind this post is to find out what other people are using for inventory. We have approximately 300 network devices to manage (excluding IP phones) and while spreadsheets are suffice, they are not the best solution.
