How do I track changes in my inventory? (Inventory Snapshots)

To manually create an inventory snapshot

To schedule the creation of inventory snapshots

To delete inventory snapshots

To delete scheduled inventory snapshots

To run a report based on inventory snapshots

You can track changes in your network inventory through the Inventory Snapshots functionality. This enables you to create or schedule snapshots of your inventory. You can then run reports that compare any two of these snapshots and identifies the changes between the two. Only users with the Inventory Snapshots Administration permission can access and manage inventory snapshots.

There are two ways in which you can create a snapshot:

• Manual creation.
• Scheduled creation.

To manually create an inventory snapshot:

1. In the Main Menu, click Administration.
   
   
   
   
2. Click Snapshots to open the Inventory Snapshots page.
   
   
   
   
3. Select the server and then view of which you want to create a snapshot.
   
   
   
   
4. Click Save Now to save that snapshot.
   
   
   
   
5. The snapshot will be listed in the Inventories field. It will be named after the date, time and year it was saved.
   
   

To schedule the creation of inventory snapshots

1. Navigate to the Inventory Snapshots page, as described above.
2. Click Schedule Inventory Snapshot to open the Schedule inventory saving window.
   
   
   
   
3. Under the Parameters tab, select the server and then the view of which you want to create a snapshot.
   
   
   
   
4. Under the Schedule tab, select predefined schedule or new schedule.
   
   
   
   
5. Click OK to create the scheduled snapshot. The schedule is immediately active and will appear in the Inventory Snapshots Schedules table below.
   
   
   
   
   This table will summarize the following:
   
   

   Attribute	Description
   Schedule	summary of the schedule.
   User	name of the user who created the inventory schedule.
   View	View of which the snapshot is taken.
   Server	name of the Entuity server.
   Last Run Time	date and time the schedule last ran.
   Next Run Time	scheduled date and time of the next inventory snapshot.

To delete inventory snapshots:

1. Navigate to the Inventory Snapshots page, as described above.
2. In the Inventories field, select the snapshot you want to delete.
3. Click Delete Selected. Note that there is not a deletion confirmation window - clicking on Delete Selected will immediately delete the snapshot.
   
   

To delete scheduled inventory snapshots:

1. Navigate to the Inventory Snapshots page, as described above.
2. In the Inventory Snapshots Schedules table, select the scheduled snapshot or snapshots you want to delete by ticking the box in the last column.
3. Click Delete Schedule(s). Note that there is not a deletion confirmation window - clicking on Delete Schedule(s) will immediately delete the scheduled snapshot.
   
   

To run a report based on inventory snapshots:

1. In the Main Menu, click Reports.
2. Click Inventory Reports.
3. Click Inventory Change. This report needs two snapshots.
4. Define and run the report.