Getting Started
Last updated
Last updated
When your FixedAsset Pro installation is first set up, it can be a little overwhelming to figure out where to get started.
The first place to start is usually your Admin Settings. We go through each of the specific admin options one by one in the Admin Settings section (and sub-sections) of this documentation, but that's where you can set your branding (logo, etc), alert preferences, LDAP configuration, two-factor authentication and so on.
Once you've gotten your settings all sorted, you'll want to think through exactly how your workflow currently functions, and what that should look like in FixedAsset Pro.
A common setup will have Assets being checked out to People, however you can also check out Assets to Locations and other Assets. (That last one can get a little confusing, so we generally don't recommend it outside of very specific and already-established workflows.)
If you've already been using something (even spreadsheets) to keep track of your asset data, you probably already have a workflow of sorts, even if it's something very straightforward (and perhaps not even officially formalized), such as:
New employee is hired
Asset(s) are assigned to them
System is updated to reflect who the Asset is checked out to
Employee leaves, turns in Assets during final interviews
Asset is marked as "Pending Imaging" and added to the queue to be backed up/wiped
Asset imaging is completed, Asset is put back into circulation to be checked out to someone else
Some organizations will have different workflows, and FixedAsset Pro tries to be flexible enough to accommodate those as well. Additionally, how People and Assets get added into FixedAsset Pro may differ depending on your workflow. For example, for some organizations, this process is all manual (by choice). For others, they may use LDAP sync or rely heavily on importing assets to keep everything up to date. Even still others use the FixedAsset Pro API to automate some of these things to work with the other tools in their Asset Management toolchain.
To figure out what workflow will be best for you, you'll need to examine what tools, IT support staff and other resources you have available to you - and don't panic. Even a straightforward, manual-only Asset Management program is better than spreadsheets, and your system will evolve over time as you tailor your workflow to your own organization and resources. FixedAsset Pro can grow with you as you refine your process.
How to best start adding assets depends on what information you have to start with. If you have an existing CSV (Google Doc, etc) with asset data in it, your first stop will be importing your assets through the Import tool. See the Importing Assets and More documentation for details and sample CSVs.
If you don't have any existing asset data and you're just getting started on developing your asset management program, you'll likely want to start by creating Categories and then Asset Models.
Think of categories as high-level descriptions of your assets, for example "Laptops", "Desktops", "Servers", etc. You'll want to adapt this for the types of assets you have, but Categories are important because you'll determine whether or not assets require your users to accept delivery and/or EULAs of the assets, and whether they should get email notifications on asset checkout/checkin.
You can learn more about how categories work in the Categories documentation.
FixedAsset Pro comes with a powerful API that lets you add/update assets, users and more. If you have multiple systems that are already scripted, using the API might be your best bet. You'll find comprehensive instructions on using the API here .
Note: Adding assets via the API is recommended for developers or folks familiar with scripted languages only.
You'll find the LDAP settings in Admin Settings > LDAP. It can be a little tricky to get LDAP working to start with, and it's difficult for us to document that, since everybody's LDAP/Active Directory is set up differently, but the LDAP Sync & Login documentation has examples of the most common settings within LDAP and Active Directory.
If you'd like to limit the assets that your users can see within your FixedAsset Pro setup, you'll want to enable Full Multiple Company Support and use different "companies" to segment those users and assets. (Companies within FixedAsset Pro don't have to be actual companies - some users prefer to treat them more as roles or departments.) You can learn more about Full Multiple Company Support here.
Custom fields allow you to include arbitrary data with your assets that doesn't come out of the box in FixedAsset Pro. Learn more about how to set up your Custom Fields here, and then how to import those custom fields here.
FixedAsset Pro comes with a sophisticated permissions system that allows you to control what actions your users can and cannot do.
A common setup for many organizations is to have a small handful of Superadmin or Admin users who do the checking in and checking out for the organization, and all of the other users are created without any special permissions. Users who are created without any management permissions will only be able to see items checked out to them, or items they have requested.
Learn more about permissions here.
The way labels work with FixedAsset Pro, they get generated with a QR code and/or a UPC-style barcode. The QR code allows you to easily scan the code to open the link to that asset on your mobile device, while the UPC-style barcode is designed to be used in the top search in your FixedAsset Pro UI.
While you can use your own pre-existing labels for your assets in FixedAsset Pro, you won't get that built-in QR code/top search functionality with them. If you don't need that functionality and already have labels printed out for your assets that include the asset tag, etc, feel free to use your own.
You can learn more about labels and barcodes here.
When you first get started importing with FixedAsset Pro ands you try importing assets, if your import fails, there's usually something funky in your data - missing fields, BOMs included in the CSV, or weird characters that got included in your export. Check out our Importer Issues documentation for help debugging those.
