Printers CI name is not getting populated by Discovery

[Astrid Peraza1]

Printers of the manufacture Kyocera are being discover through Discovery. However, they don't have the name field populated in the Configuration Item table. This is only happening for this specific manufacture, the rest are fine. Could this be a configuration in ServiceNow that needs to be modified or is it the way the printers are set-up from the manufacture? Thank you!

[Robert Russell]

The accuracy rate of printer/MFD/copier discovery using ServiceNow is about 40%, which presents a challenge in getting these assets into the CMDB. There is a software application called Netaphor SiteAudit that integrates with ServiceNow (uses rest API) and extends the printer configuration items in the CMDB. The result is a complete and accurate inventory of all these type devices, regardless of manufacturer, in addition to other devices like label printers, large format printers, some scanner models, etc.. The integration is also used to automate printer incident management and ticketing with ServiceNow. Essentially, it associates incidents with workflows and automates ticketing, thus cutting ticket processing time and removing the manual/human element of calling in a helpdesk ticket and creation of that ticket. Added benefit to this software is it includes a report that identifies printer security vulnerabilities (open ports, SNMP version, weak community string, outdated firmware, etc.). It can even cut a ticket in SNOW if someone re-opens a port (for example, say you have a policy to have port 21 or port 23 closed on printers). It also provides other reports and notifications, SLAs, etc. that help an organization extract costs associated with printers/MFDs, including governance related reporting to actually help you manage the vendors that supply these devices. I help organizations with all of these items on a daily basis. If you navigate to Netaphor.com and click on 'contact us', just request me by name (Robert Russell) or send me an email at rrussell@netaphor.com and I can assist you further.