This article explains the difference between folders, tags, owners and aliases, and how to set each one.
Before you start
Make sure you have the following:
An admin role, or ownership of the system you are editing.
An API key with Manage systems, and Manage folders to create folders.
Choosing between folders, tags, owners and aliases
There are four ways to label a system. They are not interchangeable.
Cardinality | Best for | |
Folder | One per system | Structural segmentation, such as customer, environment or site. Drives filtering, access design and usage reporting |
Tag | Many per system | Cross-cutting attributes that do not fit a hierarchy, such as |
Owner | One per system | Accountability. Drives the My systems view |
Alias | One per system | Human recognition. Nothing else |
Folders matter most. The usage report and installation keys both work in terms of folders, so the folder structure you choose early is the structure your billing attribution and provisioning inherit.
Folders
Create and manage them at Admin > Folders. The screen shows a folder tree on the left and the folders as tiles on the right.
Systems get into folders two ways:
At registration, from the installation key they installed with. This is the one to use: no manual filing, and it scales.
Afterwards, via Assign to folder… on a system's ⋮ menu, or Actions > Assign to folder for several at once.
Aliases
The Systems screen shows both Hostname and Alias. Hostname is what the machine calls itself, and it is often not meaningful: a cloud VM might be WIN-6UO5U0KAVT8, and two machines can carry the same one.
Tags
Set in the Edit panel. Format is name:value or a bare name. A system can carry many.
Tags are the right home for anything that cuts across the folder hierarchy: the attribute that would force you to choose between two folders if it were a folder.
Owner
Set in the Edit panel. Determines who appears accountable and populates the My systems saved view.
An installation key sets the owner for everything registered with it. A key that shows Needs owner produces unowned systems. See Installation keys.
When a system is offline
A grey dot and a stale Last Heartbeat mean the system has not checked in. The row menu says so rather than letting you try: Connect, Other modes, Inspect, Get logs, Transfer files and Send command are greyed out with System is offline beside them.
What you can still do is everything the console handles on its own: Edit, View Details, Assign to folder, Get link, Set log level, plus the recovery actions that queue for when it returns: Force retest, Reboot, Restart service and Upgrade HyperView.