Summary

When processor clock speed details change on a managed device running a Unix-like operating system, a new partial inventory NDI file is generated and uploaded by the next IBM PVU inventory scan event, despite no meaningful change affecting PVU license consumption in hardware configuration taking place.

Details

When the an IBM PVU inventory scan is performed, the agent checks whether various hardware details in the inventory have changed. A partial inventory NDI file is generated and uploaded when a change is detected.

This issue results in a partial inventory NDI file being unnecessarily generated and uploaded when processor clock speed details change, despite there being no change in the computer's hardware configuration that has an impact on the calculation of PVU license consumption.

When this occurs, logging in the tracker.log file produced by the inventory gathering ndtrack process shows output indicating changes have been detected related to the MGS_Processor hardware item. For example:

[Thu 07 Apr 2022 04:09:04 PM CEST (G, 0)] {3397887} Searching for changes in hardware inventory...
[Thu 07 Apr 2022 04:09:04 PM CEST (G, 0)] {3397887} Previous hardware item 'MGS_Processor;Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2640 v3 @ 2.60GHz;MaxClockSpeed;2596' not found in latest inventory
[...]
[Thu 07 Apr 2022 04:09:04 PM CEST (G, 0)] {3397887} Started generating inventory '/var/opt/managesoft/tracker/inventories/system on wkstn102.ndi'

This issue does not directly result in inaccurate data being reported, but may place additional unnecessarily load on server infrastructure to process the additional inventory NDI files.

Related information

See the following other known issues which have some similarities to this one:

• Unnecessary high-frequency PVU inventory NDI file uploads may be triggered from devices running Windows by variations in processor clock speed details (IOJ-1852613)
• Unnecessary high-frequency PVU inventory NDI file uploads may be triggered when Win32_OperatingSystem.LastBootUpTime or InstallDate changes (IOJ-2247786)
• Unnecessary high-frequency PVU inventory NDI file uploads may be triggered by agent scheduled event changes (IOJ-2236677)
• Unnecessary high-frequency PVU inventory NDI file uploads may be triggered when network adapter details change (IOJ-2244446)