Creating and configuring assets in Admin Center (EAP)

Create and configure IT asset types and custom fields to manage hardware and software assets. Use hierarchical structures for efficient field inheritance. Track asset locations and bulk import asset data using a CSV file. This setup allows agents to interact with asset records in the Agent Workspace, streamlining asset management and enhancing your support operations.



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Assets are things, such as hardware and software, that teams need to procure, allocate,
refresh, and retire over time. Admins can create and configure asset types and then bulk
import existing asset data into Zendesk. This data is then available to agents to
interact with in the Agent Workspace.
This article contains the following topics:
Understanding assets and how they work
Creating asset types
Creating custom asset fields and adding them to asset types
Creating and using asset locations
Bulk importing asset data



Related articles:
Turning on IT asset management in Zendesk
(EAP)
Using assets in ticket workflows
(EAP)




Understanding assets and how they work

An asset is a physical or digital thing that you procure, allocate, maintain,
and retire. For IT teams, assets are often hardware, such as laptops and monitors,
and software licenses.
When managing assets in Zendesk, an admin must first define the asset type,
which becomes an object in Zendesk. The asset type definition consists of standard
and custom fields that describe the data you
need to store for this type of asset. This could be anything from text and drop-down
fields to lookup relationship fields, which define
how the asset type is related to other objects in your Zendesk account.
To save you the effort of recreating the same fields for many asset types, they're
created with a hierarchical structure that makes it possible for child asset types
to inherit the parent asset type's fields. For example, Zendesk predefines a
Hardware asset type with three predefined children asset types: Mobile, Desktop, and
Laptop. The children asset types' records automatically have all of the Hardware
fields.

After an asset type is created and configured with fields, admins can use the data
importer to bulk import their
asset data, and agents can view and manage the asset records in Zendesk Support.



Creating asset types

Admins can use the Types page to create and manage asset types. You can have a total
of 50 asset types.

To create an asset type
In Admin Center, click
IT assets in the sidebar, then select Assets > Types.
Click Create type.
Enter a unique Name for the asset type.
If applicable, select the Parent type. Asset types can only be
nested three layers deep. You can't select an asset type as the parent
if it would result in more than three layers.

Note: The new asset
type will automatically inherit the parent type's fields and be nested
under the parent asset type on the Asset types page.

Click Create.





Creating custom asset fields and adding them to asset types

Asset fields are the schema for your asset types, defined by standard and custom asset fields as well as the fields inherited from
parent asset types. These fields represent properties of the asset type that you
want to store and are used by agents when creating and managing assets.


Understanding the standard asset fields

The following common asset fields are pre-defined by Zendesk. These fields apply
to all assets and can't be edited or deleted.






Field name
Field type




Asset tag
Text


Asset type
Lookup relationship


Location
Lookup relationship


Manufacturer
Text


Model
Text


Notes
Multi-line


Organization
Lookup relationship


Purchase cost
Decimal


Purchase date
Date


Serial number
Text


Status
Lookup relationship (Valid values: available, in use,
missing, pending, retired, under repair)



User
Lookup relationship


Vendor
Text


Warranty expiration
Date







Creating custom asset fields

To finish creating an asset type, you must configure it with custom asset
fields. Custom asset fields can be applied to all asset types or specific asset
types only.
You can have up to 100 asset fields, including standard and custom fields.

To create custom asset fields

In Admin Center, click
IT assets in the sidebar, then select Assets > Fields. Alternatively, when viewing an individual asset type, click the
Field tab and then click Add field.

Click Create field.
Select the field type and enter a unique
Display name.
Verify that the Field key is the value you want it to be. The
field key makes it possible for the API to reference the field. When
you enter a name for the field, the field key is automatically
populated. If you want the name and key to be different, you must
edit the field key.

Note: You can't change the field key after
you create the custom object field.

Select which Asset types the field applies to:

Add to all types: Apply the field to all asset types.
Labeled as All in the asset type column of the field
list.

Add to selected types: Apply the field to the selected
asset types only. If you initiate the field creation while
viewing an asset type, Add to selected types and that
asset type are automatically selected but can be modified as
needed.



Set other properties for your field. Options vary by field
type.

Click Save.






Creating and using asset locations

Tracking the location of physical assets is important. Locations are referenced as
asset lookup relationship fields, so you can see and manage an asset’s location in
the asset record.
You can create up to 10,000 locations.

To create a location
In Admin Center, click
IT assets in the sidebar, then select Assets > Locations.
Click Create location.
Enter a unique Location name.
Click Create.





Bulk importing asset data

Rather than adding your assets one by one, you can import your asset data in bulk
after you create the asset types and add fields to it. To do this, upload a CSV
(comma-separated value) file. You must be an admin to import assets.

To bulk import asset data
Create a CSV file that adheres to the required formatting.
In Admin Center, click
Objects and rules in the sidebar, then select Tools > Data importer.
Click Import.
Under Target destination, select Assets.
Under Import type, choose one of the following:

Create only: Only new asset records are created. Any data in
the CSV file pertaining to existing records is ignored.

Update only: Replace data for the existing asset records
listed in your CSV file. Any data pertaining to new records is
ignored.

Create and update: Create new asset records and update data
for the existing asset records listed in your CSV file.


Under File upload, drag and drop your file or click to upload
and select your CSV file from the file browser. If you need to change the
file you've selected, click the delete icon ( ) next to the file name.

Click Next.
Review the Field mapping list.
If the field mapping is correct, click Next.
If the field mapping isn't correct, click Back. Edit your CSV
file to adhere to the format requirements, and then re-upload the
file.


Review the summary of import details in the confirmation dialog and then
click Start import. After the import starts, the imported changes
can't be reverted. To check the status of an import, check your import history.





Formatting your CSV file

When creating your CSV file to import asset data, keep the following in mind:
The file must be properly formatted CSV and saved using UTF-8 character
encoding.
The first row of the CSV file is the header row.
The header row must contain the following columns: name, asset
type, status, and external_id. All other field
names in the header row must be exact matches to the field keys in your
asset types.
Each row must contain valid values for all of the asset type's required
fields. Otherwise, the asset record can't be created.
Note: The asset
type, status, and location values are case-sensitive. Inconsistent
capitalization between your CSV file and the asset type, status, and
location names in Zendesk can result in a failure to create or
update asset records. Unrecognized location values, including
variations in capitalization, result in the creation of new
locations of that name.


The import CSV file can't exceed 1 GB in size or 10,000 rows of data.
Furthermore, each row can't exceed 32 KB in size.
The import CSV file can contain a maximum of 100 columns.
Don't include the same record more than once within a CSV file. Doing so
can cause your import to fail.
There's no guarantee that asset records are created or updated in the
order they appear in the CSV file.
To import values for dropdown fields, use the custom dropdown field's
field_key as the column heading and specify the options
tag, not the user-friendly value.
To import values for lookup relationship fields, use the custom lookup
relationship field's field_key as the column heading and provide
either the record's ID or External ID. If you use the
record's ID, provide the value. If you use the External
ID, use the format external_id:value, where
value is replaced with the related record's external ID
value.
Note: To assign an asset to a user during an import, you can
provide the user's email in place of the user's id or
external id. Assets are linked to existing Zendesk users
only.

The External system and Reference ID properties must be
used together as a pair or not at all. Together, these values are used
to associate assets in Zendesk with records in external systems, such as
Jamf and Microsoft Intune.
If you are not importing data for a field, do not list it in the header
row.
Add line breaks to notes or multiline custom fields by pressing
ALT+ENTER on Windows or CTRL+OPTION+RETURN on macOS.