How is the 'Device' field populated in Blueprint 3.0, 3.1 and 3.2?

How does the Device name field on the Devices screen in Pharos Blueprint Administrator get populated?

Device records can be created three ways:

1. Auto-creation by the Blueprint Normalizer, i.e. autodiscovery of devices using print transaction data.

2. Through a device import.

3. Manually by a user of the Blueprint Administrator.

If a device is created by the Normalizer or a device import, the name is figured out according to the available information. If the device is created manually, the device name will be whatever the user enters into the Admin.

The Normalizer chooses the device name to be the IP address or hostname of the logical printer if it has an IP address or hostname connection to the device; the (machine name + ": " + printer name) if it has a local port (LPT printer) connection; or (server name + ": " + share name) if it has a server share connection.

The device importer chooses the device name to be serial number, else hostname, else MAC address, else IP address depending on what is present in the feed.

A device name chosen by the Normalizer will be overwritten by the importer if a more 'fundamental' device identifier is present in the import record. For example, if the device name chosen by the Normalizer is the device's IP address and the import record for that device contains a serial number, the device name will be updated to the serial number.

Once set either manually or via import, the device name is not subsequently ever modified automatically by Blueprint.

Note that the device import naming rules can be modified by a custom importer.