Patent ID: 8314965

Claim:
A method for installing a patrol device for monitoring printers on a powered network, the method comprising the steps of: assigning the patrol device a device ID and storing the device ID in a database wherein the patrol device comprises: a processing unit; a status indicator interconnected to the processing unit; an Ethernet network interface interconnected to the processing unit wherein the Ethernet network interface is configured to receive power over the network to power the patrol device via Power over Ethernet; the processing unit including a memory for storing information about the printers on the powered network, the processing unit including: a printer discovery engine for discovering a plurality of printers on the network; a printer patrol engine for patrolling the discovered plurality of printers; and a reporting engine for reporting patrolling information obtained by the printer patrol engine to the database; and a standalone housing; wherein the status indicator, the processing unit, and the Ethernet network interface being mounted within the standalone housing; associating the patrol device with an installer, and storing the association in the database; mapping the patrol device to a customer location and storing the mapping in the database; installing the patrol device at the customer location whereby the patrol device first obtains an IP address, then authenticates itself with the database, and then scans a network at the customer location to gather information about printers connected to the network; registering the patrol device upon successful installation, whereby the patrol device notifies the database of successful installation at the customer location and the patrol device uploads the information gathered about printers connected to the network; and notifying the installer after successful installation, whereby the notification includes the IP address of the patrol device, a count of printers discovered by the patrol device, and a device ID of the patrol device.