IMPORTANT: The recommendations discussed in the scenarios are generic because of the unique nature of the topology; further refinements may become necessary.
Deploying Inventory in a LAN Environment
In ZfD, the deployment of inventory in a LAN environment implies deploying the product on a single inventory site.
The following scenarios and recommendations are addressed:
Scenario 1: LAN Environment with up to 5,000 Workstations
In this type of inventory configuration, the inventory server components and database are located on a Standalone Server. The Standalone Server is an inventory server with an Inventory database. There is no roll-up of data and the Sender-Receiver components are not used. This scenario is illustrated in the following figure.
Scenario 2: LAN Environment with more than 5,000 Workstations
In this type of configuration, there are multiple inventory servers without databases. These inventory servers (two Standalone Servers) are connected to a database server. The Database Location policy configures the database server for the Standalone Servers. This inventory deployment is illustrated in the following figure.
Follow this configuration for deploying inventory up to 10,000 workstations.
For deploying inventory on more than 10,000 workstations, attach one inventory server per 5,000 workstations, with two or three inventory servers per Inventory database.
Recommendations for Deployment in a LAN Environment
Minimum base server configuration includes 256 MB RAM and a database cache of 64 MB. For a higher workstation range, the server configuration is 512 MB RAM and a database cache of 128 MB.
All workstations should send the scan data to the nearest inventory server on the LAN; policies must be created based on this information. To achieve this for 10,000 workstations, two or three inventory servers per Inventory database server should be sufficient.
When you configure the inventory scanning for workstations, we recommend staggering the inventory scanning times or scan some workstations at one time.
The transmission of scan data from inventory servers can take several hours or even more than a day. Workstation scanning is an ongoing background process, which continues until there is data to upload without any user intervention.
If many workstations are attached to the same inventory server, we recommend that you do not schedule the scan of all workstations at the same time, because this will stress the eDirectory and the inventory server File System Services.
When you schedule the roll-up of data in the Inventory policies, we recommend the roll-up frequency should be at least one day. If the roll-up of scan data is scheduled too frequently, for example less than one hour, there may be some performance degradation of the inventory server.
Ensure that the time synchronization radius is set within 2 seconds.
For all databases, the optimal database cache size requirement for the server may vary because of the server environment. Determine the database cache size that needs to be set by trying a range of cache sizes in the runtime environment. The default Sybase database cache size is 32 MB.
Deploying Inventory over a WAN Environment
In a WAN environment, complete the following tasks, in order, to design the inventory tree and deploy inventory:
List the physical links between the various sites.
Identify the type of links in terms of bandwidth and reliability.
The following figure illustrates the network organization of a company with servers in different locations.
This illustration depicts four sites (Site A, Site, B, Site C, and Site D) connected to a central site. It depicts the physical links between the sites and the type of links in terms of bandwidth.
2. Which is the ideal place for the Root Server?
The Root Server in the Inventory Tree is the highest-level server. Necessarily, an Inventory database is attached to the Root Server.
The inventory information available from the Inventory database of the Root Server will consist of all information from lower-level sites on the network and from the Root Server site.
Factors that you must include:
The Root Server should be on a site that has high network bandwidth.
A Console administrator can collect workstation inventory information from any of the sites connected on high-speed links from the Root Server, or from the Root Server level site.
A database server of suitable configuration should be provided for the inventory server. For a network with 250,000 workstations, the recommended configuration for the Root Server is 25 GB of disk space and 1 GB RAM.
3. Is any other database needed?
Besides the database at the Root Server, you can maintain database servers at different sites.
You may want to maintain additional databases if there are sites or subtrees that are managed for inventory at different locations, and these sites are connected to the network over a slow link.
You should also determine if there are specific reasons to have a separate database for a single site or a set of sites. There may be some organizational needs for your company to have the database server on different sites, even if there is no product deployment need to have any other database.
NOTE: For a majority of enterprises, there may be no need to have any other database besides the enterprise-wide single database. All site-specific reports can be easily generated from this database.
Optional step: If another database is needed
If you decide to have additional database servers, identify the sites that need a database. Additionally, you need to examine whether the database will cater to the local site or a site with many subsites (subtrees). Also, identify the sites that require data in each Inventory database.
All the sites served by a single database should typically access this database instead of the database at the Root Server for inventory management. This reduces the load on the database at Root Server.
Database administrators should be available for these sites.
4. Identify the route for Inventory data
Identify the routes for inventory data for all sites to the nearest database, and then identify the route to the database on the Root Server.
To devise a route plan:
Each route can have an intermediate server at a staging site. The Intermediate Server receives and transmits the data to the next destination. These are application-layer level routes for inventory data. There can be various network-layer level routes between two adjacent servers, which will be determined and managed by the routers in the network.
The route provides information indicating how inventory data travels from a particular site to its final destination, which is the database at the Root Server.
There may be multiple routes. Choose the fastest and most reliable route. To determine the route, consider the physical network links.
Routes identified and made operational can be changed later, although there may be some cost in terms of management and traffic generation. If there is no intermediate database involved, you can change the route by only changing the eDirectory-based policy.
Put Intermediate Servers on sites where the link parameters change substantially. Criteria to consider are difference in bandwidth, difference in reliability of the links, and the need for different scheduling.
Availability of servers on the intermediate site for staging the inventory data should be considered in deciding the sites for Intermediate Servers. Provide enough disk space on these servers to store all the inventory data on the disk until the Roll-Up policy sends it to the next destination.
Workstations should not be connected to the inventory server over a WAN because the workstation scanning should not be done across a WAN.
5. Identify servers on each site for Inventory, Intermediate and Database Servers
A single server can have different roles if it has sufficient resources. For example, an inventory server can be a Leaf Server with Database. You can also designate a server as an Intermediate Server with Database, which receives inventory from the workstations and also has an Inventory database. A server can have any combination of roles.
The number of workstations attached to the server also determines the load. The following table lists the disk space requirements for the server:
Server Type
Disk Space Requirements
Leaf Server
(n1 x s) + (n1 x z)
Leaf Server with Database
(n1 x s x 2) + {(n1 x dbg)}
Intermediate Server
n2 x z
Intermediate Server with Database
(n2 x z) + (n2 x s) + {(n2 x dbg)}
Intermediate Server with Workstations
(n1 x s x 2) + (n2 x z)
Intermediate Server with Database and Workstations
(n1 x s x 2) + (n2 x z) + (n2 x s) + {(n1 x dbg) + (n2 x dbg)}
Root Server
(n2 x z) + (n2 x s) + {(n2 x dbg)}
Root Server with Workstations
(n1 x s x 2) + (n2 x z) + (n2 x s) + {(n1 x dbg) + (n2 x dbg)}
Standalone Server
(n1 x s x 1) + {(n1 x dbg)}
In the table, n1 is the number of workstations attached to the server.
s is the size of the scan data files. This file size varies depending on the data collected. Calculate 50 to 60 KB scan data from each workstation to calculate the load.
dbg is the storage space of the scan data in the database. Calculate 100 to 120 KB per workstation as the disk space for the database.
n2 is the number of workstations rolled up to the server.
z is the size of the compressed scan data file per workstation. Calculate 7 to 10 KB for the roll-up of 50 KB scan data.
{ } denotes the disk space of the database server, depending on whether the database is on the same server or if it is connected to the server. If the database is on the same server, calculate the total disk space including the database space for the server. For example, if the Leaf Server with Database has the Inventory database on the same server, calculate the requirements for storage of scan data, including the database disk space.
6. Create the tree of servers for company Inventory collection
Ensure that the Inventory tree you design follow these guidelines:
The root of the tree is the Root Server.
Servers on each site of the tree you design represent all the sites in the company.
At least one server per site is mandatory.
Assuming that there are workstations to be scanned on each site, there should be an inventory server role on each site.
Optionally, there will be databases and Intermediate Servers on different sites.
7. Create an implementation plan
After you design the tree, you should develop an implementation plan to cover the phased deployment plan for the network.
Some guidelines for the implementation plan:
Start the deployment from the Root Server site and connect the servers on other sites to the Root Server.
The main criterion is the number of workstations on each site and on each server.
Deploy the product on approximately 5,000 workstations per day.
8. Start the actual deployment
After your implementation plan is finalized, start the actual deployment according to the plan.
Follow these steps:
Install the servers on the sites.
Create the policies applicable to workstations.
Create the Roll-Up policies to schedule the roll-up for each server.
Adding a Database server to an existing Inventory setup
If you have already configured the servers for inventory setup, and you need to add another database server, follow these instructions:
Run the installation program to install the Inventory database on the server.
The installation program installs the Sybase database. If you are maintaining the database in Oracle, make sure that the Oracle database exists. See Configuring the Inventory Database for Oracle.
Modify the role of the existing server for the Inventory Service object.
If you are adding a new server, you need not modify the role of the server. If you want to change the role of the server, for example, from Leaf Server to Leaf Server with Database, you need to modify the role of the server in the Inventory Service object.
In ConsoleOne, right-click the Inventory Service object (Servername_ZenInvservice) > click Properties > click the Inventory Service object Properties tab.
Choose the new role of the Inventory Service object > click Apply.
You will see a list of actions that you should follow based on the chosen role. For example, if you change the Root Server to Root Server with Workstations, you need to configure the Workstation Inventory policy for the workstations that you have attached. Similarly, to change the role to any other server, you need to follow the instructions to make the role change effective.
Follow the actions that you need to change the role.
Make sure that you enforce Full Scan for the Inventory Service object.
In ConsoleOne, right-click the Inventory Service object (servername_ZenInvservice) > click Properties > click the Inventory Service object Properties tab.
Check the Enforce Full Scan option > click OK.
Bring up the Inventory service.
Possible Inventory Server Configurations for a WAN
Scenario 1: WAN Inventory Deployment for up to 50 Inventory Sites without Intermediate Servers
All inventory servers are connected to a central enterprise database server. The Leaf Servers do not have a database and Intermediate Servers are not required. This scenario is illustrated in the following figure:
Scenario 2: Up to 50 Intermediate Servers Connected to the Root Server
In this configuration, the Leaf Servers roll up data to the next-level Intermediate Server and finally to the Root Server. Another server at a different location is also connected to the Root Server. This scenario is illustrated in the following figure:
Scenario 3: Intermediate Servers with Database Connected to the Root Server
In this configuration, the inventory servers are connected to the Intermediate Server over fast WAN links. The Intermediate Server also has an Inventory database and transmits the information to the Root Server. Other servers are also connected to the Root Server. This scenario is illustrated in the following figure:
Scenario 4: Database on Inventory Servers and Intermediate Servers Connected to a Root Server
In this configuration, there are branch offices and a main office. Both branch offices store inventory information.
At one branch office, the server is a Leaf Server with Inventory Database, and the other branch office has a Leaf Server. At the next level, there is another branch office with an Intermediate Server with Database. The two branch offices at the lower level roll up data to this Intermediate Server. In turn, this Intermediate Server with Database rolls up data to the main office at the next level. There is also another sales outlet with a Leaf Server with Database at a sales outlet. This server directly rolls up data to the main office. The sales outlet and the two branch offices connect to the main office over low-speed WAN. One branch office connects to the main site over high-speed WAN. This scenario is illustrated in the following figure:
Guidelines for Creating Policies in a WAN
In this type of inventory deployment, the scanners transmit information to the servers over a WAN or dial-up connection.
Because there are eDirectory objects on a WAN, the design of the eDirectory tree and the inventory-related objects, User objects, and User policies must be planned. Planning should follow eDirectory tree design recommendations. For more information, see the eDirectory documentation Web site . Also, ensure that the time synchronization radius is set within 2 seconds.
All inventory policies and workstation objects should be in the local partition. A local read/write replica must exist on the geographical location. If possible, you should prevent the inventory components, such as the scanners and the Scheduler, from accessing the WAN to read the workstation policies.
If the objects are accessed over a WAN, (for instance, for scanning mobile user's workstations), scanning should still work, although with slower performance.
When you configure the inventory scanning of workstations, we recommend staggering the inventory scanning to scan at different times or to scan some workstations at a time.
If many workstations are attached to the same inventory server, we recommend that you do not schedule the scan of all workstations at the same time, because this will stress the eDirectory and the inventory server File System Service
You can attach as many workstations to the server as determined by the number of clients supported by NetWare or Windows NT/2000 servers.
When you schedule the roll-up of data in the Inventory policies, we recommend the roll-up frequency should be at least one day. If the roll-up of scan data is scheduled too frequently, for example less than one hour, there may be some performance degradation of the inventory server.
