Device management

Device management is an optional feature in Allocator for managing your device fleet or contracts, their basic information, and how they generate tasks. It is divided into three areas.

Devices

A list of individual devices and their additional details. In this view you can define an individual device’s details, tasks, and additional information. If an individual device’s data differs from the device model’s data, those deviations should be recorded here — see Individual device details.

individual devices, deviations, additional details

Device models

A list of device models and their data. Individual devices inherit the model-specific data.

model data, inherit, defaults

Capacities

Manages the capacities and consumption used in connection with devices. Capacity and consumption are used by the algorithms that schedule the related tasks.

capacity, consumption, scheduling input

Where the device list comes from

Devices are not created in Allocator by hand. The list is kept in step with the system your organization maintains its devices in, so what you see here mirrors that system’s devices.

This has one consequence worth knowing about. When a device is no longer in that system, it disappears from the list here — and its open tasks are finished automatically. The tasks are not deleted, but they are done as far as Allocator is concerned, so they leave the task list and are no longer scheduled.

There is no notification when this happens and no way to undo it in Allocator. If a device and its work vanished unexpectedly, the place to look is the system the devices come from, not Allocator.

where devices come from, external system, device disappeared, removed device, tasks finished, kept up to date

devices, fleet, contracts, models, capacity, consumption, device disappeared, where devices come from