Suitable Naming Conventions For Workstations?

spectre_240sx writes "We've discussed server naming a fair amount in the past, but I haven't seen much about workstations. Where I currently work, we embed a lot of information in our workstation names: site, warranty end date, machine type, etc. I'm of the opinion that this is too much information to overload in the machine name when it can more suitably be stored in the computer description. I'd love to hear how others are naming their workstations and some pros and cons for different naming schemes. Should computers be logically tied to the person that they're currently assigned to, or does that just cause unnecessary work when a machine changes hands? Do the management tools in use make a difference in how workstations are named?"

Comments

Depends, really...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

I'm not a fan of crazy overloading(the name has to be unique in any case and I'd rather do a lookup if I really need the warranty details, rather than stare a nasty truncated version of them in the face every day); but what works best really depends on how computers are used in your organization.

For instance, if you have laptops, individually assigned to employees, and relatively low turnover, a name that tells you about the machine's primary user is really handy. It allows you to instantly associate the voice on the other end of the phone, or the name on the trouble ticket, with the machine in question.

If you have desktops, location based naming might be more useful, particularly if users move around, are replaced frequently, or share hardware per shift or something.

It's hard to give general rules for naming because, in essence, a name should capture(as succinctly as possible) the salient characteristics that make something unique. Exactly what those characteristics are depends heavily on how your organization is set up.

service tag

[smash]

There is very little you can store in a workstation name that will be static and useful once you go beyond about 10 machines (maybe even less than that).

People move, machines get re-allocated, rebuilt, etc.

I use the service tag. Why? Several reasons:

• its already printed on the machine
• you can get it out of the bios when imaging the PC
• its one less thing to ask the user for if you need to do a warranty claim
• it will never change
• if will be unique, presuming you are a single supplier organisation

Stuff like "bob-pc" or "accounts1" does not scale and either becomes inconsistent, or you need to keep renaming PCs which presents other issues (fucks up any configuration databases you have, etc).

So, service tag - boring as fuck, but does the job.

I think I'm in the minority here...

[wandazulu]

...but I'm a big fan of giving machines actual names, after TV shows, bands, movies, fiction, etc. I prefer to log into "Trixie.mycompany.com" instead of "LAUX001"; the former, in addition to being easier to remember, just gives the machine a trifle bit of "personality". Yes, I realize that the latter may convey more information (mail servers especially seem to do this: "CHIMAIL01", "NYCEXCH05", etc.), but it feels cold and impersonal; if you treat your machines as just machines, as just any old random tool you'd grab and work with, then they become just a series of interchangeable parts. Giving a machine a name invokes something, typically whimsical, that just adds a touch of humanity back into the system. Yes it's still a machine, yes it's going to spit out a thousand nonsensical errors when you forget a semicolon somewhere in your C++ file, and yes it will eventually be replaced, but for that period of time when you're working with it, you're just that little bit more connected to something more ... personal.

Maybe this is just old school thinking; it seems like this was much more common back when everyone had an account on the campus Unix boxen, complete with subtle importance ("Oh, you have an account on Kramden? That's a much faster Vax than Norton...what project are you working on that you scored that??").

KISS

[Frippet]

Keep it simple. I work at a college, and what we do for desktops is, we name them after location, room, number of workstation. So if the workstation is at our aviation campus in room Y109 and it's the 3rd workstation, it would be AVY10903 (AV-Aviation, Y109-Room, 03-3rd workstation) Laptops, we tie to users, we give it the users login name as the laptops name. We find this easy so when we have staff/faculty turn over, we are not running to workstations to rename them, and if its a laptop user that is being replaced, the laptop is returned to IT and we get it ready for the next user. This may or may not work for you, but it works for me.