User Management

The User Management menu allows the administrator to manage users in the Inventory system. Before starting with this page, be sure that you have the basic information about User Types and Permissions.

The user management interface supports the basic functionality:

Users List

This is the default view when accessing user managemnt. A list box is presented where you can choose which user type you wish to see in the list. The listbox will be displayed on top of all lists to allow for easy navigation to other user types.

The list displays basic information about each user, and also displays an icon indicating if the user is active or not. Otherwise, the list is standard allowing the regular funtionality and additional features as explained below;

Viewing a User

When clicking on a user record in the list, the user record will be displayed on the right. The record displays full information about the user, including associated hardware, and an option to view the logs generated by actions taken on the account and logs of all actions performed by the user. (These are available through the icons in the top title of the view).

Adding a User

As explained in the User Permissions section there are four types of users. Mainly, you can distiguish between two main types: those with access to Inventory and those without (which are only referenced in the system). Basically, Regular users / Hardware Owners can be defined without the login information like username, password etc. All other types must have these fields defined.

The Add dialog supports the following:

• User Type - Choose the user type from the listbox. The types defines the level of access a user has on the Inventory system. See User Permissions.
• Username - Username used in login to Inventory. Username must be alpha-numeric and between 3 and 8 characters long.
• Password - Password for login to Inventory.
• Confirm Password - Password validation, retype the password to verify.
• Permission Root - Choose a location from the listbox which will defined from which point in the locations tree the user has permission to access Inventory. This means that the user will only be able to view computer records (and all related information) that are associated with that location or any of it's sub locations. Notes
  1. This setting does not effect the user type. The user will have his type's permissions from the location he's currently defined in.
  2. There's no use to define Permission Root for Admin users, since they can edit their own profile and change the value to what they want.
• this user is active (checkbox) - Users can be enabled and disabled. Disabled users cannot access the Inventory system. This checkbox is one way to change this status; another is describe below.
• Real Name - User's Real Name
• Location - User's Location. Note, that contrary to Permission Root, this field is for information only. A user may have different location and permission root.
• Email Address - User's Email Address
• Rows Display - This field defines the number of rows to display on each screen when viewing a list. Since all menus in Inventory display a list of items, this defines how many the user can view in one page.
• Session Timeout - Value in minutes; defines the number of minutes after user's login when the session is terminated by Inventory automatically. After this timeout occurs the user is forced to logout of the system and is required to login again to continue usage. Setting the value to zero will disable session timeout for that user.
• Notes - Free text

Editing a User

The Edit dialog is similar to the Add dialog. Note, that if you fill in the password field for the user you're currently editing - the password will be changed. (And you're expected also confirm the password). If you leave that field empty, password will be left unchanged.

Deleting a User

You can delete a user in the standard way. You should consider that user deletion can cause incosistencies in the system: log items will refer to an "Uknown" user, and generally where-ever the user is referenced (hardware, computers etc.) the reference will be annuled or invalid. We recommend using other means instead of deletion:

• If you need to keep the user from using Inventory but you may still reference him as a Hardware Owner - You can change the user's type to Regular User.
• If you need to keep the user from using the system, and you want to stop referening him as a Hardware Owner - You can use the Disable function to disable this user. (See below)

In any case, those two options are better than deletion because they will maintain data integrity inside Inventory.

Toggle User Status

You can toggle user's status between enabled and disabled by chosing the user record from the list and clicking the toggle button on the top toolbar. The user will change status and the indicating icon on the list will change to indicate the new status: (In the default theme) this is denoted by a lit light bulb for an active user, and a dim one for an inactive user. See the explanation in the Delete section above why Status Toggle is bettern than Deletion.

User Management