GLPI + OCS – personal inventory system on VPS

Why do we need GLPI and OCS?

The future is already here – now people live in the era of the Internet of Things (IoT), which means that we are surrounded by many “smart” devices that transmit and exchange data. When it comes to businesses of any size, then, of course, it is first of all computers and other equipment, accounting for which, like other related costs, is often the responsibility of the administrator. Thus, every enterprise has problems related to the consideration of equipment. Inventory of computers and devices on the network is an integral part of maintaining the fleet of equipment in organizations also because such equipment is frequently replaced due to rapid wear and tear. The use of specialized systems allows you to significantly simplify this task. In the article, we will look at the OCS Inventory NG and GLPI tools, which are powerful software and license management solution. These services are required for inventory, remote configuration, and data processing, and are typically used in combination with each other. Once you set up such a program, you can always and everywhere receive a detailed summary of each device, as well as be aware of any changes in the network that require your attention. You can work both in a real place and time and with the help of VPS-hosting.

GLPI – Computer and Office Equipment Inventory System

GLPI (First released 2003) – short for Gestionnaire libre de parc informatique (Free IT Infrastructure Manager), is a ticket and incident management system and is also used to inventory computer hardware such as computers, software, printers, etc. It has advanced features such as the operation of the notification mail tracking system and methods for creating a database with basic information about the network topology.

GLPI includes capability:

  • Inventory of computers, peripherals, network printers and related components using an interface with OCS Inventory.
  • Application and Incident Management;
  • Management of licenses, contracts (according to ITIL standard);
  • Linking users and groups by geographic location;
  • Business and financial information management (contracts);
  • Object status management;
  • Knowledge base support and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ);
  • Report generators;
  • MySQL/MariaDB databases supported;
  • UTF8 support;
  • Event notification system.

The advantages of the GLPI-based system are openness, flexibility, combined with wide functionality and dynamic updating. The internal functionality of GLPI allows you to flexibly configure the behavior and appearance of the system, to provide users with different levels of access: both preconfigured and user-defined. The capabilities of the system are easily expandable with the help of numerous settings and additions. GLPI functionality can be extended with a large set of third-party plugins!

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Inventory of computer networks based on OCS Inventory NG technology

Since version 0.65, GLPI supports data synchronization with OCS databases, and no additional modules are required for this. OCS Inventory NG is a lightweight web application that can help network and system administrators track:

  1. all devices connected to the network;
  2. machine configuration and software installed on them.

The main advantage of OCS Inventory NG is that it uses an agent program that runs on the equipment being inspected and transmits information to a central server. Agent programs are managed from a central server. The central server of the system allows not only to collect information about the inventoried equipment, but also to partially manage the computers under inspection.

In addition to network inventory functions, OCS Inventory has the ability to deploy packages and run commands written in a file on client computers whose information is in the inventory system. If it is necessary to install one program on a large number of systems, this functionality saves a lot.

Key features of OCS Inventory:

  • convenient web interface;
  • expansion of possibilities with plugins;
  • IpDiscover and SNMP support;
  • advanced search;
  • collection of Windows and Office keys;
  • remote deployment of packages.

This product supports all popular OS: Windows, Linux, BSD, Sun Solaris, IBM AIX, HP-UX, macOS, Android.

GLPI is a proven and reliable inventory system, users are very satisfied with it, and connecting to OCS will help improve work productivity. This tried-and-true pair will save you time and effort, and therefore money! If necessary, you can use these systems also thanks to VPS hosting.