Patent ID: 7506038

Claim:
A method for determining a software configuration a computer system having a plurality of devices which can communicate with a central server and a one or more shared file systems, the method comprising the steps of: determining, by each of the devices, which of the one or more shared file systems the corresponding device is mounted to; retrieving, by each of the devices, one or more of hostname, mount point, and directory information corresponding with the one or more shared file systems that the corresponding device is mounted to; associating, by the central server, each of the one or more shared file systems with each of the devices that is mounted thereto based upon one or more of the hostname, mount point, and exported directory information; designating, by the central server, for each of the one or more shared file systems a device which is mounted thereto to perform a scanning operation on the corresponding shared file system, the device being selected from the plurality of devices; transmitting, to each designated device, information related to the one or more shared file systems that the corresponding designated device has been designated to scan, the information related to the one or more shared file systems comprising hostname information, directory information, and catalog information, the catalog information comprising signature matching information and platform information; scanning, by each designated device, the one or more shared file systems that the corresponding device has been designated to scan so as to identify software products on the corresponding shared file systems that correspond with the catalog information; receiving, from each designated device, results of the scanning, the results of the scanning comprising an identification of the designated device which performed the scan, identified software products, and hostname, mount point, and exported directory information corresponding with the designated device that performed the scan; downloading, by the central server, to requesting devices that are selected from the plurality of devices other than the designated devices, the results of the scan; processing, by the requesting devices, information related to the results of the scan; merging, by the requesting devices, the results of the processing with a list of software products that are determined to be present on a local volume of the corresponding requesting device so as to obtain information related to a software inventory; uploading, to the central server, the information related to the software inventory; and determining, by the central server, a software configuration using the information related to the software inventory and the results of the scanning.