Patent ID: 8490076

Claim:
A method for collecting installed application data from a computer system, comprising: scanning a file system of the computer system to produce file system data; scanning an installed application database of the computer system to produce installed application data; collecting system information comprising at least one of a host name, an IP address, a MAC address, and a serial number associated with the computer system; combining, using a processor, the file system data, the application data, and the system information to produce an output file, wherein the combining of the file system data, the application data, and the system information comprises concatenating the file system data, the application data, and the system information; writing the file system data to a file system section in the output file, the file system section identified by a first identifier; writing the application data to an application data section in the output file, the application data section identified by a second identifier; writing the system information to a system information section in the output file, the system information section identified by a third identifier; and using the output file to facilitate creation of at least one application signature associated with a software application, wherein creation of the at least one application signature does not require execution of the software application and wherein the at least one application signature is derived from information from at least two of the file system data, the application data, and the system information.