SMS 2003 and Beacon Technology

[Popsea]

Sorry if this has been answered before but I couldn't find it. Anyway, does the SMS agent on a computer 'beacon' the server? Or can it be configured to do so? For example, ASAP eSmart and Everdream solutions will beacon into the home server on regular intervals with IP address, inventory, changes, etc. Very useful for a large laptop inventory.

 

[Jpoandl]

Yes, SMS 2003 does this too. This is not called Beaconing...but I think it does the same thing.

The SMS administrator creates policies on the SMS Site. These policies describe how the clients will behave. For example, the administrator can set a policy to perform Hardware and Software inventory twice a day.

When this is configured, the SMS clients will report hardware and software inventory to the SMS server two times every day.

Is this what you mean by beacon?

Joseph L. Poandl
MCSE 2003

If your company is in need of experts to examine technical problems/solutions, please contact

http://www.NJCOMPUTERNETWORKS.com

(Sales@njcomputernetworks.com)

 

[Popsea]

I mean for example, a laptop outside of the WAN that is using some public internet access. Hotel, airport, or whatever. The laptop will send a 'beacon' packet with the ip address it is using and inventory changes. The Everdream (

http://www.everdream.com/)

suite does a lot more then that in regards to backups, patch management, etc but it was too expensive per client for us and we are installing SMS 2003 soon anyway. I was hoping to be able to trick the SMS agent to do the same thing on our laptops. At least for the ip address location just for security.

 

[Jpoandl]

No, I am not aware that SMS can do what you describe. SMS 2003 can work over a VPN or dial-in, but I don't think it can manage computers that are on the Internet...not connected via VPN.



Joseph L. Poandl
MCSE 2003

If your company is in need of experts to examine technical problems/solutions, please contact

http://www.NJCOMPUTERNETWORKS.com

(Sales@njcomputernetworks.com)