Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Asset Intelligence enhances Configuration Manager's inventory capabilities by extend-
ing hardware inventory and adding functionality for license reporting. Enabling additional
hardware-inventory Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) reporting classes helps
improve the range of information that Asset Intelligence gathers about software titles in use.
In System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager, Asset Intelligence supports the manda-
tory software identification tags specified in the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO)/International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) 19770-2 standard.
These tags include authoritative data that System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager can
use to identify software installed on client computers. Because a standard defines the tags, an
increasing number of software vendors include them in their applications. If you want System
Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager to use mandatory software identification tags, you
must enable the SMS_SoftwareTag Asset Intelligence Hardware Inventory Reporting class.
In System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager, Asset Intelligence also collects infor-
mation about Application Virtualization 5 and Application Virtualization 4 applications even
though these applications run through the Microsoft Application Virtualization (App-V) client
and are not installed on the client computer in a traditional manner.
Asset Intelligence provides organizations with the following benefits over software
inventory:
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It provides more accurate representation of software titles that are present on man-
aged computers.
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It provides information about the license usage for specific products rather than just
information about the software itself.
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It can be used in conjunction with software metering to rationalize licensing by deter-
mining instances when software has deployed but is not being used.
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It uses Software Inventory Agent to detect software titles by scanning client storage.
Asset intelligence retrieves information about installed software through the Hardware
Inventory Client Agent.
Asset Intelligence has several components, including:
The Asset Intelligence catalog
Asset Intelligence relies on a set of database tables,
which contain software identification, categorization information, and hardware
requirements for software titles. Collectively, these tables are the Asset Intelligence
catalog and are stored within the site database. The Asset Intelligence catalog can
provide data for reports on installed software titles, organize the information within
software categories and families, and provide a predefined set of hardware require-
ments for the software titles. You also can customize the organization of your informa-
tion by creating custom software categories and families and adding new user-defined
hardware requirements for specific software titles. By using an Asset Intelligence
synchronization point, you can download periodic updates dynamically from
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