Deployment Solution

In 6.x, we depended on right clicking to change display name to make machines more easy to find, but this is gone with 7.1 (at least for now?).  We also had a tree structure set up with buildings for them to drop machines where they belong to more easily allow the helpdesk to find any machine when a user calls.

I tried replicating a similar tree structure with saved searches based on IP address, but that won't work for us 100% as some buildings share IPs.  So, I set up organization groups under all computer views and plan to have techs add their computers to correct organizational groups manually.

Is there a way to have a saved search (or filter?) set up that searches based on "organizational group is blank" ? I'd like to have an easy way to see which computers aren't in any group as a visual cue that computer needs to get added to a group.  I know how to search for members of a particular group, but am not sure if it's possible to search based on no group?

You could query this by selecting all computer resources from the Default Organizational View NOT IN the Custom View you created.  Here's how this might look, though I just cobbled this together from a query designed to find Organizational Group name for a particular view.  Scoping is not applied since this is raw SQL.  Replace the first GUID you encounter with the GUID of the AD Organizational View (right-click the view and choose Properties).  Replace the second GUID you encounter with the GUID of your custom view (right-click the view and choose Properties).

SELECT

v1.[Name] as 'ComputerName',

v1.Guid as 'ComputerGuid'

FROM

vComputer v1

JOIN ScopeMembership ON v1.Guid=ScopeMembership.ResourceGuid

JOIN ScopeCollection ON ScopeMembership.ScopeCollectionGuid=ScopeCollection.ScopeCollectionGuid

JOIN Item ON ScopeMembership.ScopeCollectionGuid=Item.SecurityGuid

WHERE (ScopeCollection.ScopeSetGuid='d8c07867-f25b-41af-9c6a-82c1086b2179'

AND v1.Guid NOT IN (SELECT

v1.Guid as 'ComputerGuid'

FROM

vComputer v1

JOIN ScopeMembership ON v1.Guid=ScopeMembership.ResourceGuid

JOIN ScopeCollection ON ScopeMembership.ScopeCollectionGuid=ScopeCollection.ScopeCollectionGuid

JOIN Item ON ScopeMembership.ScopeCollectionGuid=Item.SecurityGuid

WHERE (ScopeCollection.ScopeSetGuid='797d0ac8-6e1f-40c4-b972-e7185d1ee064')))

Hm, just saw this was NS6.  But you could do it similarly in NS6 by selecting all resources from one view and subtracting any resources whose Guid is NOT IN the other view.

sigh so complicated for something that used to be so easy - but thanks very much.  will see what I can come up with and report back.

The beauty of DS 7.1 is that you can put computers in multiple views, so you're not limited like you were in DS 6.x in organizing them in only one way.  The downside is that if you want to find a computer that isn't in a group, you have to specify which view, because it's always going to be in at least the Default view, and often in the AD Import view.

I made this a filter and it worked, thanks!  I never would've gotten this on my own.  I clearly need some SQL training among some other things.

Is there any way to make this show up on "computers" screen and make it self updating (like a saved search is I guess)?

Or should I bet setting up an automation policy that does the same raw sql query, and based on computer it finds puts it in a new unassigned OU which is outside of my regular structure - just for easier viewing on the Computers screen?

That's the next step I would take, is copying the Resolved Query to the Raw SQL section of an Automation Policy, and use this either on a schedule (e.g. daily) or based on NS messages (i.e. new computer discovered), to drop them into the new view in a "To Be Sorted" Organizational Group of some kind.  Technicians would be responsible for moving the resources from this OG to the proper OG.

Not sure what you meant to type there...