How iTRACS® Templates can Simplify Infrastructure Management

With greater pressure from the business to perform better, faster, in a more distributed environment, and with greater transparency—it’s no wonder organizations are looking for solutions (e.g., a Digital Twin) to simplify their processes, improve data accuracy and accelerate decision making.  With iTRACS every facet of your organization is cataloged and represented in your facility's Digital Twin, and the key to that representation are Templates. Templates are a model of any asset, usually from an audit or manufacturer listed data and dimensions. As your list of equipment grows, the benefits of efficiency grow as well, and at the heart of that efficiency is the use of Templates in iTRACS.  There are multiple benefits an organization will gain from Templates.

One of the primary benefits of using iTRACS Templates is that it streamlines the addition of new assets. By creating Templates for distinct types of power, cooling, and IT equipment, data center managers can quickly add new assets to the system without having to manually enter all the relevant information. This saves time and reduces the risk of errors, improving accuracy.

A second benefit of an iTRACS Template is the level of detail. Unlike other solutions, iTRACS Templates accurately depicted both visually and attributively each individual component (e.g., rack, chassis, power supply, blade or connector). This helps to further improve the accuracy of the data, enabling greater confidence in decisions.

A third benefit of Templates is that every Template is made by CommScope to the same scale, with an emphasis placed on visual accuracy. By utilizing the same scale, decision makers can have confidence that a piece of equipment will fit in a specific location. Organizations no longer need to rely on inaccurate representations like spreadsheets to understand capacity and utilization.

With a subscription, or active Maintenance, you have access to our vast and ever-growing collection of 170,000 Templates, and any devices not found in our Template Central™ system can be requested with an average return time of 4.84 days.

Template Central™ is the fourth benefit of iTRACS Templates and makes distribution a breeze as you can select any new templates and download them directly, separate from a product update.

A fifth benefit, if an organization chooses, is they can create their own Templates. If you have a proprietary piece of equipment that you don’t want to share with CommScope, you can create it yourself. The same tools that CommScope uses to create a Template are available within the iTRACS Data Manager application.

A sixth benefit is Templates can be combined and then referenced to make a SKU, ensuring that every configuration of a particular device is not only possible, but can be saved and duplicated for later use. SKUs can add incredible value and efficiency to any asset management tool or software such as ServiceNow® or BMC® Remedy by matching the asset in iTRACS exactly with the asset management application. For example, your organization may utilize several variants of the Ruckus® ICX 7750 switch family, some with DC power supplies, others with AC, and both with multiple redundancy scenarios. By documenting each separate component and their configuration organizations have a better understanding of quantity and availability. Finally, SKUs can also be used to simplify deployments by combining multiple pieces of equipment into a single SKU (e.g., rack and roll deployments).

The use of templates in iTRACS is a powerful tool for improving efficiency and reducing errors at every level of the Data Center, saving time and ensuring that critical infrastructure components are accurately tracked and managed.