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Drag and Drop

IT Asset Management Guide
Asset Management

Drag and Drop

Drag and drop lets you reclassify or relate assets directly from the results grid, without opening each record. Select one or more rows in the grid, drag them onto a node in the tree panel on the left, and drop -- xAssets then asks what you want to do with the selected assets.

The description column (the asset's clickable link, e.g. td.assetlink) is the usual place to grab a row from, but any part of a selected row can be dragged.

Prerequisites

  • The results screen must have a tree panel on the left (Category Group, Location, Department, etc.). Grids without a tree panel do not support drag and drop.
  • You need permission to modify the classification field the tree represents (for example Location or Category).

How to Use Drag and Drop

  1. Open a results grid with a tree panel, for example Asset > Asset List. Select the assets to reclassify. See Selecting Assets for selection techniques.
  2. Click and hold on one of the selected rows, then drag across to the target tree node on the left. While dragging, xAssets shows a "Moving N records" summary of what is being dragged:

Screenshot

  1. Release the mouse button over the target node. A confirmation dialog appears with the actions available for that drop target:

Screenshot

  1. Choose the action and click OK to confirm, or Cancel to abandon the drop. The available options depend on what you dropped onto:
Target Actions offered What It Does
A classification tree node (Location, Category, Department, etc.) Move Changes the classification field to match the target node (e.g. moves the asset to the new location)
A classification tree node Financial Transfer Moves the asset and additionally creates the financial transfer transactions for the move (used when the change has accounting implications)
Another asset row (in views that support parent/child) Create Relationship Creates a parent-child relationship between the dropped assets and the asset you dropped them on

Once you click OK, the selected assets are updated and the grid refreshes to reflect the new classification or relationship.

When to Use Each Action

  • Move is the everyday choice for reclassifying assets -- for example, moving a laptop from "Florida" to "London" in the Location tree.
  • Financial Transfer is only needed when the move has financial implications (e.g. an inter-departmental charge-back). It creates the accounting transactions your finance team needs. Most IT-only installations will not use this.
  • Create Relationship builds parent-child links by dropping one asset onto another, for example dragging a monitor onto a desktop PC to record that the monitor belongs to it. See Parent Child Relationships.

Tip: Drag and drop works with multiple selected assets at once. Select a group of rows first, then drag any one of the selected rows to the tree node -- the whole selection moves together.

Warning: Check the target node before you release the mouse. If you drop on the wrong node, either drag the assets again to the correct node or open each asset and correct the classification field manually.