LastPass collection library

LastPass is one of the rare applications where the vendor doesn't populate the version in the registry. (see below)

In order to create a collection or a report to verify versions of LastPass a custom file scanner needs to be used.

In the event that you haven't used custom scanners before I have attached some files to help you along. From PDQ Inventory import (File > Import) the two attached XML files. One will add a new Scan Profile called Apps and File Scans. Scan your computers with this Scan Profile. This scan profile will run four scanners: Computer Details, Applications and two file scanners looking for lastpass.exe in Program Files and Program Files (x86). After you scan a computer with this profile open it up and select the Files panel. (see below)

In the case above I chose to use the Other Version field. 

Import the attached collections. This will create a custom Variable called @(AppVerLastPass). The value is 3.1.92. When the next version of LastPass comes out you will need to update this version in Preferences > Variables.

The collections that you imported should look familiar. It shows computers with LastPass, current LastPass, Older LastPass and no LastPass.

The gotcha when it comes to custom scanners is that you need to make sure to scan computers with the appropriate scan profiles. You can, if you'd prefer, simply copy and paste the two file scanners in the new profile to your Standard or Applications scan profiles. 

As far as creating Collections in the Library for every package that we offer in the Library... we chose not to do this since many of the apps in the Library are rarely used. We didn't want to clutter up the Collection Library with hundreds of Collections that most of our customers wouldn't use. We do add additional collections as time goes on but we try to be prudent. Every collection that is created takes CPU cycles to verify membership. We are constantly verifying and updating collection members and this necessarily takes a lot of processing to accomplish.

One of the awesome things about PDQ Inventory is that you can create your own collections and reports. The Collection Library can also serve as a great cheat sheet when you want to learn how to build complex filters for your Collections and Reports.

Well, I can understand needing to add the custom scan, however cant the version variable be included when new versions are included in PDQ deploy? Cant the variable at lease be updated with new versions? This would allow users to setup once and not need to keep updating version info as new versions get posted to PDQ deploy.

And as for keeping collections out of the library to limit CPU usage that should easily be fixed by offering all collections to your customers but allowing them to selectively enable the ones they would like to use. If each collection eats up CPU cycles why not allow us disable the ones we don't use and enable the ones we do use so that any collection not being used will be skipped over when it comes time to process them? There are some collections that I know I'm not using and would like to be able to mark them as such to limit CPU usage as much as possible.

I ended up using the collections provided and placing the two file scans inside the Application Scan Profile. This way they they get auto run with the application scan profile each time software is installed since that's what I have it set to scan. It would then also be included with the Standard Scans since standard scans include Application Scan Profile.

P.S.  I'm running PDQ from a MacBook Air so limiting CPU usage is very welcome, but we should be able to pick and choose what collections get run rather than giving us a limited list of collections.

(would be nice if these forums allowed us to edit instead submitting additional posts)

Thanks for your feedback. We are considering an À la carte approach to the Collection Library but not in the near future. It's actually a fairly big change to the internals and we have quite a few new features on the road map at this point. That being said I think it's a good direction to move to.

When we released the Collection Library we did make it so that custom collections have a higher priority for updating membership. We made it so that the CL is at the back of the line and runs at a lower CPU priority. This generally only amounts to a few extra seconds in updating the CL.