Overview

Supported Platforms

See Octosoft Forum News for supported platforms for your version.

OctoSAM Inventory License File

Obtain the license file from Octosoft AG or from your software vendor. The file needs to be imported into the OctoSAM Inventory database through the OctoSAM Inventory GUI.

Using OctoSAM Inventory Without a License

Unlicensed versions of OctoSAM Inventory do have the following limitations:

Only 25 machines can be scanned and imported into the database
Only 1 License Manager Server can be observed.

OctoSAM Software Discovery Catalog

With standard configuration, the catalog is periodically updated via Internet from the Octosoft update server. The catalog can also be manually updated if your network policy does not allow direct updates from the Internet.

OctoSAM Components

OctoSAM Inventory Database: OctoSAM Inventory stores its data in a central Microsoft SQL Server database.
OctoSAM Inventory Windows GUI: The OctoSAM Inventory GUI is a Windows application that connects to the OctoSAM Inventory database. It provides a powerful view of the inventory geared towards professional IT admins and SAM consultants and allows for administrative tasks such as removing stale objects.
OctoSAM Web GUI: The Web GUI can be used as an alternative to the Windows GUI. It provides a simpler interface geared towards a broader audience supports fine-grained authorization via RBAC model.
Octoscan2 Windows Scanner: The Windows scanner is implemented as a standalone executable .exe file.; Octoscan2 builds a compressed .zip file with the suffix .scan. The OctoSAM Inventory Import Service imports .scan files into the OctoSAM Inventory database.; See “Octoscan2 Installation and Configuration”.; The Windows scanner also scans information about Hyper-V hosts and guests.
Octoscan Scanner for Mac OS X: The Mac OS X scanner is provided as a shell script that you can integrate into your Mac environment. Some sort of centralized Mac management is required to effectively roll out Mac scanning.; Octosoft can also optionally provide a pre-configured notarized application package, if your prefer installing the mac scanner or if you do not have a management system for your Macs.
Octoscan Scanner for Linux: The Linux scanner is provided as a python script that you can integrate into your environment. Some sort of centralized management is required to effectively roll out Linux scanning.
OctoCollect Upload Server: OctoSAM provides an upload server that allows to upload scan files via http(s). Scan files upload is either implemented directly in the scanner or can be scripted using the curl command.; The standard upload server provided by Octosoft is implemented in .net and can be used on any platform that supports .net 6.0; Alternatively, OctoSAM provides an open source upload server that can be used on platforms that support OpenResty.
Active Directory Group Scanner: The Group Scanner allows to import and expand nested Active Directory security groups. It is provided as Windows Powershell source code. See the provided readme.txt for configuration instructions

Info

In simple scenarios, the groups can also be imported by the OctoSAM Inventory Import Service

VMWare vCenter Scanner: The WMWare Scanner collects information about your virtual machines from a vCenter management perspective. This allows to relate physical hardware Information from your virtualization infrastructure with the logical guest operating system instance. The scanner is provided as Powershell source code. See the provided readme.txt for configuration instructions.
Microsoft 365 Scanner: Scans Microsoft 365 user information.
Adobe Scanner: Scans Adobe Cloud user information.
OctoSAM Inventory Import Service: The OctoSAM Inventory Import Service is a Windows service that imports data collected by the various scanners into the OctoSAM Inventory database.
OctoSAM Inventory License Manager Observer Service: The License Manager Observer Service is a Windows service that monitors your license servers and collects usage statistics into the OctoSAM Inventory database.

Tip

You can use any mechanism to copy files from remote locations to a central folder where the Import Service will pick them up. If your organization has any form of centralized file transfer infrastructure, we recommend using the existing tools.

Tip

The OctoSAM Inventory Import Service has built-in functionality to collect files from remote sftp servers.

OctoUtil: OctoUtil is a command-line maintenance tool that allows to execute scripted tasks within the database.
OctoDump: Octodump is a command-line tool that can be used to de-compress .scan files into their xml format or to get summarized information about multiple .scan files.
OctoOffline: A GUI wrapper tool for offline scanning - for example from a USB stick - for disconnected machines. See OctoSAM Inventory Offline Scan Configuration Guide.

OctoSAM Module Versions

OctoSAM uses a versioning convention that is similar to Semver. We use 4 numeric parts.

MAJOR.MINOR.DATAMODEL.PATCH

All components except for the scanners should have identical MAJOR.MINOR.DATAMODEL parts. The patch level can be different between modules. That means if a patch fixes an issue you have in a module you dont need to update the other modules unless expilictely stated in the release notes of the patch.

Scanners should have the same MAJOR.MINOR version number, but the import usually also supports import of files generated with older scanners for the last 2 or more MINOR releases, see the release notes of each release. In case of the Windows scanner, older versions are supported for scan of legacy systems which do not meet the requirements of the current scanner. These scanners are maintained for stability and security only. New features are usually not backported to these older versions. As a rule, the current scanners usually support all versions of the scanned target which are under ordinary or extended (paid) support by the publisher.

A change in the PATCHLEVEL does not require a database migration. However, you are still recommended to create a database backup and a filesystem backup of the installed software and configuration before installation of a new patch level.

A change in the DATAMODEL part means that semantics of data have changed. All parts that access the database should be updated. The change can optionally include a database migration script. Changes in the DATAMODEL part usually do not change requirements concerning the supported software or hardware platforms. An update to the DATAMODEL level always requires creation and verification of a database backup and filesystem level backup before updating.

A change in the MINOR part means that interfaces, command-line options, data structures, configuration, required platforsm or hardware requirements may have changed. An update to a new MINOR version requires careful planning and migration testing on a copy of the database.

Beta Versions

Beta Versions are to be installed / updated by Octosoft staff only. Requirements may change between betas outside of the scheme defined above.