Bugs/issues/limitations in import

The software is currently alpha software. While it is in use at a medium sized company, there is still much development work to be done to resolve some of its limitations, as described here.

Documentation

This documentation is a limitation. It talks more about Lintory's limitations then its features.

Data format

More checks are needed to ensure that the data format received for imports is what we expect.

At present time, any non-ASCII characters are stripped from the input file. This was because some windows software applications have weird non-ASCII characters that don't seem to have any meaning.

Paranoia

There is a reasonable amount of guess work involved in importing computers into the database. The design goal is to have the import abort with an error if it is unsure of something, rather then blindly do the wrong thing. For example, some computers come supplied with a dummy serial number, so the serial number cannot be used as the sole means of identifying the computer. However there may still be cases where it gets confused and does the wrong thing.

New computers

New computers will not be automatically created. This is because the algorithm attempts to avoid the risk of a false positive when identifying a computer from the data base, in favour of a false negative. As such, as false negative doesn't mean the computer doesn't already exist in the database, and be blindly creating a new entry we could end up with duplicates, which could get confusing.

The current solution is to manually select the data record associated with the uploaded file, and turn on the create_computer option. The next time the data is imported, the computer should be created automatically.

Storage devices

Problems can occur if for example the import routine does not recognise the current hard disk installed in the computer. Hopefully I have resolved all cases where this occurs, however I can't guarantee you won't encounter a corner case that riggers it again.

In that case Lintory will create a new hard disk, and mark the current hard disk as non-installed. As a result, the OS will no longer be marked in use by the computer, and all software will no longer be associated with the computer (it will still be marked as installed on the OS which is installed on the hard disk however). This can be rectified by finding the hard disk, and marking it as "installed" and "in use" on the computer again.

Security

If you allow anybody to upload data to the server, then anybody can upload data. Including false data. Or data specially designed to exploit hidden security issues within Lintory.

The solution to this would be to restrict running this application to a trusted user, and have that user authenticate when uploading results to the server.

Unfortunately there is no convenient method of having a program run automatically on a remote Windows desktop with a restricted account.

WMIEXEC:

Another solution might be wmiexec. Unfortunately it is no longer in Ubuntu.

Get a copy on wmiexec, from: http://boreditguy.com/blog/?p=274.

Do something like:

winexe //host -U domain/administrator '\\server\path\lintory\get_and_upload.cmd'

If you cannot connect to a remote Windows machine, check:

• Networking is working.

• Microsoft XP Home Edition won't work as far as I know. Probably none of the home edition products will work.

• Windows firewall (or some other fireall) isn't blocking the connection.

• Control Panel --> Administrative Tools --> Local Security Policy Expand Local Policies, and select Security Options. "Network access: Sharing and security model for local accounts" should be "Classic - Local users authenticate as themselves" and NOT "Guest only - local users authenticate as Guest"