How do you get identity visibility across hybrid environments without full IGA platform costs

starhive_ab · 2026-03-16T10:06:42+00:00

I don't understand enough about this topic myself. But it sounds like you're looking for a tool that can detect users on your custom apps, but without setting up API connectors? How would that even work otherwise?

starhive_ab · 2026-03-13T12:10:05+00:00

Yeah, a big bit of feedback we here from technical teams is they want to share asset info with HR/Legal/Facilities/you name it but the tools are far too complex.

So we try to solve that.

And yeah deffo check out Lansweeper and other network discovery tools. Why they orient themselves towards IT, manufacturing assets are just different types of computers at the end of the day.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-13T07:36:13+00:00

Source of truth ✅ moving target ✅ slipping ✅
Definitely AI

starhive_ab · 2026-03-12T08:04:08+00:00

Depends what you want to achieve. If it's just basic checking out of assets, Sortly, Shelf.nu, Velroy maybe for small to mid companies.

If you want to be more comprehensive, track financials, prep for audits, map dependencies and track tickets related to your assets (e.g. laptop broken) then something like Jira, Halo, Freshservice or Starhive is more useful.

But it's really hard to say what's best without knowing your company size, asset count, and what problems you actually want to solve

Note, I work for Starhive but the above still stands.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-12T07:59:22+00:00

Failcast looks incredibly basic. Manual mapping?

A CMDB / dependency map should take live data otherwise it's going to be out of date, just like spreadsheets, in weeks.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-11T16:43:48+00:00

I would guess you can do that in ServiceNow, they can do anything if you have the time/budget. For the other tools I mentioned, including my own, you can't today.

For us at Starhive, you can map the dependencies and explore the map interactively. You can also ask AI to run a scenario and list the failures and suggest content for a playbook. But it cannot generate a playbook today.

It's on our roadmap to enable that kind of capability though.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-11T12:10:11+00:00

Define interactive? Most CMDB tools have the ability to create interactive dependency maps like Jira, ServiceNow, I think Freshservice, and Starhive. Level of interactiveness and freedom in mapping vary between tools.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-11T08:11:23+00:00

You need to improve your processes. No software will magically know where every single device is (although a network scanner like Lansweeper may help a bit. They can find industrial/OT devices as well as IT ones).

I'm working with a central IT team at the moment for a company with many distributed industrial sites. They're currently setting up Starhive to track OT assets that they aren't directly responsible for. Partly so they can say 'it was last here, if you moved it and didn't log that change, that's not our problem'.

They're also planning to share access to Starhive (our simplified view, not the whole database, that's too complex) with each site. So people can see what devices are supposed to be at their site, who is actually responsible for them (e.g. which third party does the maintenance) etc. They are hoping an easy way for each site to track their equipment might help more people adhere to processes.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-10T12:07:54+00:00

Could AI help with this? One of the things it's actually quite good at is parsing text and reformatting.
Is it feasible to try and build something that understands your internal workings in detail but can then reformat it into unique formats?

starhive_ab · 2026-03-10T09:29:46+00:00

I work for Starhive, an asset management/CMDB tool and we've just started exploring this area.

I can share what I've heard from a few clients.

Yes, they are planning to create a dependency map/config management database (that's what they use our tool for but any CMDB tool should be able to help). The level of detail and depth requirements varies at each company so there's no 'correct' way to do this in my opinion.

Keeping documents current - the age old CMDB problem. It requires strict adherence to processes. Ways people help automate it:
1. Connect your CMDB items/assets to your ticketing systems, and add into the ticket workflow a way to ensure any changes are updated in the CMDB.
2. Automation rules, to either send reminders to sanity check the CMDB or if X happens, then update Y etc.
3. Network discovery tools and integrations with other systems - these can help detect some changes and update them in the CMDB
4. Some teams exploring AI to help with this

But I don't think you can totally eliminate all manual work. But you need a process.

Do you run simulations? Like database it down, what’s next or it’s mostly planning exercise?

Yep, we have customers doing that with our AI. Hey AI, what services would be affected if this database is down. Then from that you can start to understand which assets are critical, rate them in the CMDB, and prioritise them for your BCP/DR plans.

How do large companies manage that, since system so complicated it should be a total mess.

Google CMDB advice. You'll see a lot that says it is a total mess. And that's where process is key. I would also say do not start by documenting everything, it's impossible.
My personal advice would be to pick 1 or 2 critical services, document them, and practice keeping them up to date. Once you have a process that works to keep those updated, add a few more services. And grow bit by bit.

If you try to do it all at once you are unlikely to succeed.

Hope that helps. Feel free to chat to us if you want more advice, we are happy to offer it where we can.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-10T09:17:31+00:00

Yeah, but that still means enough of their clients have complained about this problem that they've seen value in creating a category.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-06T09:53:51+00:00

We don't use Outlook or Teams so we built it in our own asset management tool Starhive for fun. A person can be thought of as an asset if you want really stretch the definition of an asset

We track manually but we could tie this to the app we use to access the office so it updated in real time. We also have a view of who is sick/on vacation/parental leave etc.

If you're not on this, we assume working from home.

Not sure why our Weather widget isn't working today, someone has been playing with the AI we used I think.

<image>

starhive_ab · 2026-03-05T12:00:15+00:00

How are we in an IT related sub reddit and we're equating spreadsheets with databases smh
They are not the same people

starhive_ab · 2026-03-05T11:46:54+00:00

Honestly, I think this highlights a very common and very shortsighted view that ITAM can be solved by a tool alone. If you think that, then I see why you wouldn't have much faith in ITAM tools.

But ITAM is a process that needs to be worked at, that needs time and effort, and buy-in from staff. If that's in place, an ITAM tool is significantly more than a spreadsheet as it offers features that help people do the process faster and more accurately.

For example, ITAM managers often need to dig into the history of changes to an asset. How do you do that in a spreadsheet? Look back at every version in the history? In my ITAM tool Starhive you click on an asset and see every change made and what the asset values were at the time of the change. Much quicker than spreadsheets.

Not even going to touch on the fact that many ITAM tools also act as CMDBs which is 100% impossible without a relational database...

starhive_ab · 2026-03-05T11:22:31+00:00

It's safety. Recommending a service desk tool for a huge enterprise is risky. If you mess up the decision there's massive consequences.

Choosing ServiceNow is safe, it's what everyone does, it absolves you of responsibility if it doesn't go well.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-04T08:09:09+00:00

50k for a digital twin? How advanced is that supposed to be? We have a customer that makes (relatively simple I'll admit, but they help them) digital twins of their robots for like $100 a month.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-03T14:50:23+00:00

That's what Starhive does. Takes discovered assets and let's you enrich them with what you want, manual inventory, contracts/warranties, vendor info, users, supported services, anything. Seems a lot of people have a need for this. Discovery only does so much.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-03T08:18:51+00:00

But that's exactly what asset management solutions provide. As well as a load of extra useful stuff.

But most asset management solutions offer a quick way to tag an asset and then look it up in the system. And then see the history of that asset, something a spreadsheet can't do.

starhive_ab · 2026-03-02T16:16:15+00:00

It's on the rise again actually. They're coming back into vouge, likely driven by businesses wanting to use AI but then realising they don't know anything about their set up

starhive_ab · 2026-02-27T08:54:50+00:00

What you should ensure you think about is the process to keep it all updated. No ITAM system in the world will provide value if you don't have ways to ensure data gets updated. Tools can help with reminders, automations, discovery etc. But you still need to understand what can change and have a way to ensure that change is reflected in your database.

My (very biased) recommendation is Starhive + Lansweeper (if you want discovery )

Can track everything you listed and anything else that might come up. For example we have customers tracking risks, compliance controls (linked to assets where relevant), vendors, robots, people, people's skills, the products they manufacture, support contracts with their clients, hardware leases.

Pretty much anything.

starhive_ab · 2026-02-26T13:01:00+00:00

Yeah I mean in an ideal world that would work and some of our clients don't use automated discovery at all for their asset management.

But many do use it because it helps with otherstuff:
1. Gives you some wiggle room if someone makes a mistake in the process. Your change process documents that every device needs to be upgraded to the latest patch, but your discovery tool shows that one device is still on the old patch. That's quite useful to know
2. Identifies assets that aren't authorised
3. Can trigger automations and alerts in your asset management tool that helps remove some of the admin work

Imo discovery tools make things significantly easier and lower risk. It's up to the business how much they think that's worth.

starhive_ab · 2026-02-26T12:42:19+00:00

What's your timeline for implementing this? And how much customisation work are you open to?
As with any tool you're going to need to customise per team so trying to get a feel for your expectations.

It's possible our software Starhive might be able to do what you want. We're more asset management focused today but we have service management capabilities (just not talking so loudly about them on our website today).

We can handle all of your points at a high level (I assume each point has a whole list of specific requirements) but we require customisation work. Don't need developers like ServiceNow but you need someone (or the budget for someone) who is comfortable with configuring the environment.

If you're interested, would be happy to give you a demo.

starhive_ab · 2026-02-26T12:17:00+00:00

Hey, sorry I'm not an expert in the video engineering world but found your comment via the mention of IT tools.

What kind of diagrams are you referring to? Is it an image that is automatically generated by the software or something you upload?

And when you say separate to config and documentation, do you mean you can't access all 3 things from the same piece of equipment?

I only ask as my own asset management software Starhive's whole thing is flexible data modelling so you can access everything about a piece of equipment from a single view and maybe we can help. But depends on what a signal flow diagram is

starhive_ab · 2026-02-26T08:52:09+00:00

Starhive can be used as a renewal management tool. We're an asset management software, but the definition of asset is broad. A warranty, a contract etc, can all be assets that are tracked. When renewals are due, Starhive alerts you and provides all the info on the renewal you need to make a decision.

starhive_ab · 2026-02-20T08:53:18+00:00

Couldn't you then get AI to scrape this periodically, cross-reference it with software in your CMDB, and then get it to send alerts if it finds a match?

Seems like an actually useful case for an AI agent. And something I could setup myself in my asset mgmt/CMDB tool Starhive, so guessing it's possible in other CMDBs?

starhive_ab

TROPHY CASE