I could see that many Altiris Operators always open NS Console first, which is not always needed. You can launch Resource Manager directly when you seek for particular computer using such link: http://<SERVER>/Altiris/Resource/ResourceManagerConsole.aspx where <SERVER> stands for FQDN or IP Address of your Notification Server. In Find Resource dialog specify as many details as you can an all computers matching your criteria will be listed: Click on selected computer to open Resource Manager, and work with details you look for. The same way you can search for Users, Packages or whatever else you need. (List may vary based on which Altiris Solution you are using.) TIP: Consider creating suitable Security Role to restrict access to specific items.
Real-Time tab is displaying details obtained from remote computer directly (via WMI). General Information has information on resource utilization (CPU, Memory, Disks, Network). Other functions are user and printer management, remote execution or password reset.
Once you have opened Resource Manager to view Computer Details, there are some items which are very useful. SUMMARIES Resource Summary is diplayed first since this contains basic computer identification, hardware, OS, user, TCP/IP, patches and some more. Collection and Policy Summaries will help you understand what action are about to happen. Software Update Summary will show you vulnerability status and reboot pending status. If there are too many updates, it might take about 15-20 seconds to generate that report and pie-chart. INVENTORY This tab contain many different types of information, but we will focus only on two groups, which are used most frequently: Basic Inventory is similar to Recource Summary in the first tab, but more details are provided here Inventory is split into four categories: Hardware, Software, OS and User We take OS as a sample and in the picture you can see how many subclasses are listed there. if you click on any dataclass, you will see additional details. Software Inventory is useful not only for installed applications, but also for Disk Usage by file type: Office Documents (DOC, XLS, PPT), Multimedia Files (MP3, AVI, JPG) or any other of your choice. EVENTS While Inventory is collected on scheduled basis, event are send by computers on the fly. This brings to our attention "real life" status information.
TASKS Last but not least, you can directly from here initiate actions like: Remote Control and Power Management Network Diagnostics like Ping, Port Check or Trace route Software Delivery and many others, depending on soutions you have installed All details mentioned above are getting data from Altiris' CMDB database, regardless whether computer is connected or not. Real-Time tab is different, since it connects for data to client computer instantly over WMI, which requires active computer. I will show you more next time.