Summary
The Device Role field is used for identifying the role of a machine in FNMS e.g. Backup, Failover etc. This article answers some general questions around this field including the answer to how the field can be updated.
Question
How can the Device Role field be updated in a bulk task?
Answer
The device role is a manual field, but it's population could be populated with a business adaptor which you can either create yourself or our services team could help you with (additional costs may apply). Please find some of the most common role definitions below:
- Backup / Archive ? This device cannot be started without first restoring it from an archive copy. Typical publisher terminologies include backup, or archival.
- Cold Standby / Disaster Recovery ? This device is not currently running, but could be started at any time. Typical publisher terminologies include disaster recovery, cold standby, cold disaster recovery, or failover.
- Development ? This device is used exclusively for system development. It does not carry any production load.
- Hot Standby / Active Failover ? This device is running, and probably doing work such as mirroring database changes. Typically, this system requires a license, so that it would be unusual to select this role for an exemption.
Typical publisher terminologies include hot standby, active, active clusters, mirroring, HA, standby, or remote mirroring.
- Production ? Specifies that the device is being used in the production environment, and it consumes license entitlements for its installed software. This is the default value for all newly imported devices, and you need to change it to reflect any other specific role.
- Test ? Specifies that the device is being used exclusively in system testing, and does not carry any production load.
- Training ? Specifies that the device is being used for training purposes. Most publishers require that this use is exclusive, and may also require that the device is within a dedicated training facility.
- Warm Standby / Passive Failover ? This device is on, but is idling and not carrying any production load.
You can also view these roles in the database by running the following query:
SELECT * from ComplianceComputerRole
Additional Information
As of FNMS 2015 R2 the device role can be used for automatic exemptions so populating this correctly for each device is more important as an incorrect role can affect your consumption counts!