Team Back-Row SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
`NJIT – IS-465
Spring 2011
Team Back-Row – Nichelle Norris, Wayne Marcy, Brian Woodard, Andrew Lapham, Haris Siddiqui
Team-Backrow
SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TABLE OF CONTENTS ......................................................................................................................................... 2
DOCUMENT INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................................... 3
Definitions, Acronyms and Abbreviations .............................................................................................. 3
SOFTWARE ASSET MANAGEMENT - PROBLEM STATEMENT ........................................................... 4
Productivity Problems ................................................................................................................................... 4
Inventory Problems ......................................................................................................................................... 4
Reporting Problems ........................................................................................................................................ 4
SAMUS VISION........................................................................................................................................................ 5
SAMUS OVERVIEW ............................................................................................................................................... 6
COLLABORATION ................................................................................................................................................. 6
SAMUS Collaborations and Relationships.......................................................................................... 6
SAMUS ARCHITECTURE OVERVIEW ............................................................................................................. 7
SYSTEM DIAGRAM ........................................................................................................................................... 7
SAMUS SOFTWARE CATALOG..................................................................................................................... 7
SAMUS SERVER ................................................................................................................................................. 8
SAMUS SOFTWARE AGENT .......................................................................................................................... 8
SOFTWARE FOR SAMUS IMPLEMENTATION ....................................................................................... 9
DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM ........................................................................................................................ 10
Attributes ..................................................................................................................................................... 10
Decision Support Trees .......................................................................................................................... 10
METRICS OUTPUT......................................................................................................................................... 13
PREDICTIVE ANALYSIS ............................................................................................................................... 13
REPORTING METRICS ................................................................................................................................. 14
KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS KPIS .............................................................................................. 15
SAMUS USE CASES ............................................................................................................................................. 16
SAMUS NEW EMPLOYEE USE CASE ....................................................................................................... 16
SOFTWARE RETIREMENT USE CASE .................................................................................................... 16
SAMUS UNAUTHORIZED SOFTWARE INSTALL USE CASE ........................................................... 17
SOFTWARE RECLIMATION USE CASE .................................................................................................. 17
CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................................................................... 19
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
DOCUMENT INTRODUCTION
This document is an outline of the SAMUS Software Asset Management system. It is meant
to shed detail on the overall overview of the system as well as the pieces that make up the
system. Included are details regarding the SAMUS System Server, SAMUS Catalog Agent,
SAMUS Decision Support System and Metrics that will be output from the system..
Additionally included in this document are four use cases that were written to show how
the SAMUS system solves those cases.
This document will cover several key areas, which include:
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Problem Statement – The Software Asset Management Problem
SAMUS System Overview – An Overview of the SAMUS system and how it helps the
Software Asset Management Problem
DSS - This will give an overview into how decisions will be made by the SAMUS
system.
Use Cases – These are detailed problems that the system will solve
Metrics – An overview of the metrics output from the system as well as KPIs used to
measure the organizations SAM strategy.
Conclusion – A recap of the overall system and a future direction for the system
This document is a partial look into what the SAMUS system will initially cover. It is meant
to give a highly detailed view into the 2 use cases described later in the document. In
addition to this at the conclusion of the document we will give a brief look into other
possibilities for future revisions of the system.
Definitions, Acronyms and Abbreviations
SAM – Software Asset Management
SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
DB – Database – This is a data store that contains key information to the system
Software Agent – This is a process that runs on a user’s PC.
Metrics – Metrics are reports that are derived from the SAMUS system
DSS – Decision Support System
IT – Information Technology
CFO – Chief Financial Officer
CIO – Chief Information Officer
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
SOFTWARE ASSET MANAGEMENT - PROBLEM STATEMENT
An organization can face many problems when trying to manage software assets, even if
they are not apparent. Misuse, underutilization, and fragmentation of software can result in
excessive and unnecessary costs to an organization. The broad questions listed below are
often asked by IT management, and can be difficult to answer, however SAMUS address all
of these easily and efficiently.
Productivity Problems
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Is the purchased software being utilized?
Is its utilization level great enough to justify its costs?
Do we have similar software packages deployed to various job functions?
Can we standardize our offering?
Is software being made available to a given job function useful?
Can those licenses be used elsewhere?
Inventory Problems
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How many licenses do we have deployed?
Should we buy more, or can we reclaim under used licenses?
Should we buy new licenses in bulk for cost savings?
Can we predict how many licenses we will need in the near future?
Can we identify software that s underutilized?
Is there an alternative that will result in cost savings?
Reporting Problems
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How can we provide accurate charge-back information to the organization?
How do we know when to implement new software or hardware?
When is it time to retire software or hardware?
These questions are just a handful of potential questions being asked by organizations in an
attempt to reduce overall cost of software. SAMUS seeks to address all of these issues, and
more, by implementing decision support and predictive analysis. By better understanding
where money is being spent on software, and how the software is being utilized an
organization can reduce costs and simplify business processes.
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
SAMUS VISION
SAMUS is a system to support medium to large organizations better manage their IT assets.
By allowing companies to track usage, analyze trends, and predict future usage SAMUS will
offer significant cost savings in regards to software. Large organizations can struggle with
fragmentation of similar software packages offered by multiple vendors deployed across
various job functions or regions. By standardizing their software a company can save on
bulk licenses and benefit by better corroboration across job functions. Furthermore by
tracking actual usage (in hours/minutes) a company can determine the usefulness of a
software product to their organization and make informed decisions about cheaper or
more useful alternatives. Lastly, SAMUS can track software usage at the employee level,
which can assist in determining job performance.
Companies face many issues and spend vast amounts of funds on software, and SAMUS can
help these companies analyze their usage and offer cost savings. Issues such as not
knowing what software is being utilized, or not knowing if licenses are sitting doormat on
employee computers, face many large organizations. Furthermore, various job functions
purchasing specialized software can lead to many similar software packages being
deployed across an enterprise, which can be costly to an organization. These issues, along
with others, are detailed below, and a comprehensive solution is given for each.
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
SAMUS OVERVIEW
Like many other Software Asset Management (SAM) systems in today’s market, we will be
using a similar system model to track inventory and employee data. However, the SAMUS
difference is realized because SAMUS uses a Business Intelligence system to make
decisions in an automated fashion for an organization. It helps an organization maintain its
software catalog by looking at the following topics:
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Software Retirement
Training Implementation
Unauthorized Installation to a Workstation
SAMUS will help us track trends based on reports received from help desk. The SAMUS
Division will be working very closely with the other IT Divisions to observe and learn the
trends of implemented software in the company. This will give us the advantage over other
Software Asset Management (SAM) system on the market, because no one is monitoring
the software usage in this manner.
COLLABORATION
SAMUS Collaborations and Relationships
In order for SAMUS to grow and be effective within the company, the SAMUS division must
maintain crucial relationships with other departments inside and outside of the company.
These relationships will help in the development of SAMUS. The departments that will be
involved are:
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Finance/ Corporate Planning
IT
CFO
CIO
Vendors (Microsoft, Adobe, CADVANCE, etc.)
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
SAMUS ARCHITECTURE OVERVIEW
SYSTEM DIAGRAM
SAMUS SOFTWARE CATALOG
The SAMUS Software Catalog is both a repository for all software titles that a firm currently has
available for deployment and the necessary Server software required to manage this repository.
The catalog houses all pertinent information concerning each software title and each titles media,
which can be pushed to specific SAMUS Software Agents when required. Also, the SAMUS Software
catalog uses the TCP/IP communication protocol making it easy to integrate into most firms’
current networking architectures. Additionally it will use a standard ODBC connection to talk to a
SQL Server DB.
The overall purpose of the SAMUS Software Catalog is to communicate administrative directives to
all SAMUS Software Agents, to keep track of and manage all currently listed and deployed software
titles, to initiate software deployment requests to the SAMUS Software Agents, and to initiate
software reclamation requests to the SAMUS Software Agents. In addition, the SAMUS Software
catalog stores software signature data which is received from each SAMUS Software Agent which
can also be changed or updated via IT request from Departmental managers. The SAMUS Software
Catalog also stores software usage and historical Move/Add/Change data which is then used by
SAMUS to initiate proactive IT action and predictive analysis.
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
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Communication Protocol: TCP/IP
Location: SAMUS Server
Purpose:
o To communicate Administrative directives to SAMUS Software Agents
o To keep track of and manage all currently listed and deployed Software titles
o To keep track of and manage all currently deployed PCs and their owners
o To Initiate Software Deployment requests to the SAMUS Software Agent
o To Initiate Software Reclamation requests to the SAMUS Software Agent
o To Facilitate Add/Change requests to Machine Software Signatures in file
o To Facilitate Move/Add/Change requests to PCs and hardware
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Data Stored:
o Software Signature Data
o Software Using Data
o Move/Add/Change History Data
SAMUS SERVER
The SAMUS Server is basically a liaison between the SAMUS Software Agent and the SAMUS
Software Catalog. It provides all of the Decision Support, Metrics, and Report features
within the SAMUS Architecture. The overall purpose of the SAMUS Server is to
communicate administrative directives to the SAMUS Software Catalog and to all SAMUS
Software Agents based on its decision support, metrics, and report features. The SAMUS
Server administrative directives are basically Move/Add/Change requests within the
SAMUS architecture, between the Agent, the Catalog, and the Server that attempt to
maintain a balance in regards to a company’s efficient use of their available software, to
help prevent marginal or major loses regarding this software.
SAMUS SOFTWARE AGENT
The SAMUS Software Agent is installed on all of the PCs distributed throughout a firm’s
infrastructure and provides the SAMUS Software Catalog with the machines software usage data it
is currently installed on. The SAMUS Software Agent not only provides a watchdog like effect in
regards to a firms software by tracking and reporting changes to a machines software signature but
also facilitates a means to distribute or remove software across the network.
The overall purpose of the SAMUS Software Agent is to communicate machine data to the SAMUS
Software catalog and to facilitate both software deployment and reclamation requests from the
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
SAMUS Software Catalog. The data captured by the SAMUS Software Agent consists of software
signatures, software usage frequency, and install and uninstall dates.
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Communication Protocol: TCP/IP
Location: Employee/Business PC
Purpose:
o To communicate Machine Data to SAMUS Software Catalog
o To Facilitate Software Deployment request from SAMUS Software Catalog
o To Facilitate Reclamation requests from SAMUS Software Catalog
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Data Captured:
o Software Signatures & Software Usage
o Date Software was Installed
o Usage frequency
o Date Software was Last Launched
o List of Software Currently installed (Signature)
The SAMUS Software Agent is installed on all of the PCs distributed throughout a firm’s
infrastructure and provides the SAMUS Software Catalog with the machines software usage
data it is currently installed on. The SAMUS Software Agent not only provides a watch dog
like effect in regards to a firm’s software by tracking and reporting changes to a machines
software signature but also facilitates a means to distribute or remove software across the
network.
SOFTWARE FOR SAMUS IMPLEMENTATION
SAMUS is a sophisticated system but can be designed with a fairly reasonable budget. The
selections we have made to implement SAMUS are the best choices for a particularly
smaller budget. This selection was made to work within a Microsoft® environment.
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SQL Server 2005
IIS Web Server
.NET 3.51
Custom C# Components
Reporting via SQL Server Reporting Services
Data Extraction and Load using SQL Server Analytical Services
These tools will be used to build, implement and deploy the SAMUS system.
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM
SAMUS features a rich set of Decision Support features. These features are intended to help
organizations make informed decisions about current usage and future purchases of
software. The main decision support feature implemented by SAMUS is a decision tree. The
decision tree is beneficial in this scenario by allowing multiple scenarios to play out based
on business rules or best practices. The decision tree can help organizations make
informed decisions about how best to handle underutilized software products. Based on
various metrics (listed below) a software product can be upgraded, replaced, or deemed
appropriate. Furthermore, the decision tree model can be applied to other scenarios
including determining whether a software product is useful to a specific business function.
Various attributes for making decisions are listed below, and an example decision tree
follows.
Attributes
Vendor - Company who owns/distributes the software
Software Name
Version
Primary Use – Financial, Programming
Primary Job Function – i.e. Account, IT, Management
Number of Licenses available
Number of Licenses in use
Cost per license
Average hours used per employee
Hours used total
Decision Support Trees
Below are example Decision Trees used to for various advanced decision making within
SAMUS. The examples have been greatly simplified for ease of understanding. Furthermore
the decisions rely heavily on business rules, and will differ from one organization to
another.
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Above: Example decision tree for determining if company must purchase additional license for
new employee.
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Above: Example decision tree for determining if a software package should be retied
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
METRICS OUTPUT
The SAMUS system will provide metrics that will be the key to driving the success of an
organization’s Asset Management Strategy. Metrics that will be created which will allow an
organization to visualize key data points in their strategy. Additionally Key Performance Indicators,
KPIs will be used to measure the success of the organizations overall Asset Management Strategy
against actual data points collected throughout the system.
For the purposes of this document we will cover a narrower scope of the total metrics that the
system could produce. The purpose of this is to illustrate and answer the key use cases identified
with in the document.
PREDICTIVE ANALYSIS
SAMUS provides another advanced feature at its core, predictive analysis. Predictive
analysis is used within SAMUS as a means to assist organizations in accurately predicting
future software needs. By predicting future software needs a company can decided how
many licenses they should buy at one time. By buying licenses in bulk a company can save
on many software packages thanks to volume pricing. Predictive analysis can be applied to
a company as a whole, as in how many employees an organization has versus how many
licenses are in use. Similarly predictive analysis can be applied to specific job functions to
determine how many future licenses will be need if a certain job function is to expand. This
type of analysis can be beneficial if a company knows they will hire a certain amount of
new employees and wants to save on software licenses by purchasing many at one time,
rather than a few at a time as new hires are brought into the company. Below we provide
an example scenario, including example data and charts.
Number of Licenses
250
200
150
Number of Licenses
100
Linear (Number of
Licenses)
50
0
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
In the above example the number of licenses installed is shown as dependent on the number of
employees on staff. As you can tell the number of licenses varies based on the needs of the
employees, so does it can be wasteful to purchase a license for every new employee. Furthermore
the analysis can be done on specific job functions and specific software packages or on the entire
enterprise.
REPORTING METRICS
The reports will be divided to measure the overall Software Asset Management Strategy.
1. Authorized Software – The software metrics will be stratified into several hierarchies to view
the data these include:
a. Vendor, Product and Version
b. Departmental Overview
c. Ownership of the Software
In these metrics key facts will be reported from the system that includes:
a. Number of Deployed Instances of the Software – This metric will show us how many
deployed instances of the software title we have on users PCs within the organization.
b. Software Utilization – This metric will show software titles and how they are being
utilized on a daily / monthly basis. This metric will be sourced from information
collected by the SAMUS software agent.
c. Remaining Licenses – This metric will show the users of the system how many licenses
actually remain that are currently not allocated to a particular user. This metric will be
key to making decisions of when to purchase new licenses.
d. Cost of the Software License – This data will focus on the actual cost of the license at the
time of purchase. It will be collected from the procurement catalog outline previously in
the SAMUS overview.
e. Incident Reports – This metric will be used to determine if there is an issue with a
deployed titled that may warrant a subsequent change from the vendor or patch to the
software deployed on the system. This metric will be measured by incident tickets filed
at the help desk against a particular piece of software.
f.
Buy, Sell Hold Status – This metric will give an overview of the IT organization’s
perspective on the lifecycle of the software catalog. This will be critical when
determining which software to purchase in the future and which software to slate for
retirement from the environment.
2. Unauthorized Software – This will be critical to the overall Asset Management Strategy.
Unauthorized software puts the IT organization at risk in several key areas. One is security and
the second is from an audit perspective. These reports will be divided in the following way:
a. Rogue Software – This report will include software that is not current authorized in the
SAMUS catalog. Details that support this report will be acquired from the SAMUS
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software agent. Rogue software is defined as anything that is currently not within the
SAMUS catalog but shows up on a user’s computer.
b. Dangerous Threats – This report will show software that has been determined to be a
viral threat to the system. This will be removed from the user’s computer pending an
exception made within the SAMUS system. It can be tied into the organizations Virus
software for tracking purposes.
c. Audit Exceptions – This report will highlight key titles that we are over deployed on and
are not subsequently licensed for. This will be a key driver for Software ownership to
determine which titles we either need to reclaim or purchase additional licenses of.
KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS KPIS
The SAMUS system will have the ability to easily create and modify KPI based reports. KPIs are used
to determine the success of an organizations Software Asset Management strategy. This section of
the tool will allow administrators to configure the metrics to support measuring key areas of their
Software Asset Management strategy.
The KPIs will be used as a measuring tool for Service owners to determine if they are in line with
the IT organizations Software Asset Management strategy. The KPIs will have thresholds set for
each metric measured that will encompass a three point raking system called a RAG. R is for Red
and is the status of the Service Owner when the metric exceeds the threshold determined by the
Software Asset Management governance group. A is for Amber and is set when the metric is nearing
the threshold limit. G is for Green and is set when the metric is below the desired threshold. Below
is an example of the RAG status:
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Red is denoted when metric is above threshold of 95%
Amber is denoted when metric is between 85% and 95%
Green is denoted when metric is below 85%
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SAMUS – Software Asset Management Utilization System
April 30, 2010
SAMUS USE CASES
SAMUS NEW EMPLOYEE USE CASE
Problem:
Management hires a new employee and there is no department specific Software on the
new hires computer.
Solution:
Management submits an IT Software ADD request, listing the software that the new
employee needs specific to his or her department
Process:
Once approved and licenses are purchased the IT Software ADD request is closed by the
SAMUS Management Team who then Adds the requested software signatures to the SAMUS
Software Catalog for that particular new hires machine ID. Once the add request has settled
and the new hires computer is connected to the network, the SAMUS Software Agent
connects to the SAMUS Software Catalog to report the currently listed software signatures.
The SAMUS Software Catalog then compares what was reported to what it currently has
listed to eliminate duplicate software deployment. After confirming and eliminating
deployment of duplicate software, the SAMUS Software Catalog pushes down all of the
requested software to the SAMUS Software Agent who then initiates installation of the new
employee’s software. Once the Agent has completed the installation of all the software
pushed, it then sends a finalization report back to the catalog.
SOFTWARE RETIREMENT USE CASE
Problem:
A software title that is currently listed in the SAMUS Software Catalog is no longer
supported by the vender who created it and there are numerous problems or errors
generated by the software title within its corporate environment.
Solution:
To reduce or eliminate troubleshooting analysis and minimize or eliminate marginal costs
for supporting the software in house, the software is flagged for retirement.
Process:
Software problems and errors that are reported to the helpdesk concerning a particular
software title by the business are tracked for troubleshooting analysis. During this
troubleshooting analysis period, vender support for the software title is required to assist in
the resolution of the errors or problems the software title is generating. If vender support
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for the software title cannot be obtained because the title is no longer supported by the
vender, this software title is flagged for retirement. The “Flag” identifies the software title to
the SAMUS division and Upper Management (CEO, CIO, COO) as a title that is potentially
available for discontinuation.
The current status of all Employee user IDs are tracked which allows the SAMUS Server to
identify any machines with licensed software that are assigned to Employees whose User
IDs have be cancelled due to retirement or termination. In addition, role and software
purpose match data is tracked throughout the business which allows the SAMUS Server to
identify a software purpose, employee role mismatch due to an Employee getting promoted
or demoted to a roll which no longer requires them to use the software that is currently
installed. A licensed software title is un-installed and reclaimed when one of these two
reclamation criteria have been meet. Once met the SAMUS Sever sends an un-install request
to the SAMUS Software Agent on the machine in question to un-install the licensed software
title(s).
SAMUS UNAUTHORIZED SOFTWARE INSTALL USE CASE
Problem:
A user with Admin Rights has installed an unauthorized software title on his or
many other machines.
Solution:
Upon detection the SAMUS Server kicks outs a Un-install request.
Process:
Daily or upon connection to the network every SAMUS Software Agent connects to
the SAMUS Server to report its machine’s software signature. The reported
signature is then compared to what is currently on file in the SAMUS Software
Catalog for the machine that is doing the reporting. Once compared the SAMUS
Software Catalog determines that the software that was added to the machine is
foreign or unauthorized and kicks out an un-install request to the Desktop Support
Team to remove.
SOFTWARE RECLIMATION USE CASE
Problem:
A software title that requires a license is currently installed on an Employees
computer and the Employee’s role has change or that employee is no longer with the
company resulting in discontinued usage of the software title.
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Solution:
The SAMUS Server submits an automated un-install request to the SAMUS Software
Agent on the Employee’s machine whose roll has changed or who is no longer with
the company to remove the software and reclaim the license.
Process:
The current status of all Employee user IDs are tracked which allows the SAMUS
Server to identify any machines with licensed software that are assigned to
Employees whose User IDs have be cancelled due to retirement or termination. In
addition, role and software purpose match data is tracked throughout the business
which allows the SAMUS Server to identify a software purpose, employee role
mismatch due to an Employee getting promoted or demoted to a roll which no
longer requires them to use the software that is currently installed. A licensed
software title is un-installed and reclaimed when one of these two reclamation
criteria have been meet. Once met the SAMUS Sever sends an un-install request to
the SAMUS Software Agent on the machine in question to un-install the licensed
software title(s).
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CONCLUSION
SAMUS seeks to solve all of the various issues encountered by an organization by
implementing four key [or broad?] features. First, a software catalog is created; the
software catalog contains all information about software licenses owned and descriptions
of the software products. The software catalog has many advantages, and addresses many
of the issues listed above. Firstly, the software catalog is a central repository that contains
all the information about the various software packages owned an implemented within an
organization. Features such as price of the software, number of licenses available and
deployed, and general information about the type of software, is contained in the catalog.
The catalog is then used to understand where similar software packages exist, and where
potential opportunities are to eliminate certain costly software. Furthermore the catalog
will contain usage information collected by the User Agent. The catalog is explained in
greater detail below.
Another key feature of SAMUS is the User Agent is installed on all end user computers. The
User Agents tracks usage of installed software for later analysis. Usage is determined in
real time, rather than simply when the software was last launched. The agent is also
capable of determining how long the application is actually in the foreground (actual being
used rather than minimized). The agent tracks all usage across an organization and reports
the data back to the software catalog where the data is stored by application. This data is
then used to determine how much a particular software package is being utilized
throughout the organization, by job function, and by employee. This data is very beneficial
in doing cost value analysis and is explained in greater detail below.
The last two key features are related to data analysis and decision support. First, SAMUS
deploys decision support features on the gathered data to assist the organization in
identifying potential cost savings. A decision tree is used, and customized based on
business rules, in order to suggest the best possible decision to assist management. Lastly,
predictive analysis is used to accurately predict future usage and licenses needs – which
are beneficial in determining whether to buy licenses in bulk. All aspects of the decision
support features are detailed below.
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