 inventory manager (IM) to check if sufficient inventory exists to complete an order. The purchase and sales module updates the IM with new assets added, old assets sold, assets given to an outside party on rental, and assets that were borrowed from a third-party vendor. Provisioning module interacts with IM to work on allocated resources and also for updating the status of allocated resources. The next module that gets feed from IM is the network manager. The network manager contacts the IM to get static information on the resources being monitored and managed by the network manager. Provisioning system Provisioning commands Network and Network and Network and Management element element element plane managers managers managers Communicate with component APIs Infrastructure Wireless Access Transport plane components components components Figure 20.4 Provisioning OSS. Fundamentals of EMS, NMS and OSS/BSS The network manager user interface will have the capability to display the attributes of the resources being managed. The value of some of these attributes can be queried from an IM module. Inventory management is mostly automated with minimal or no manual entries. This is because small errors while manually feeding inventory data can result in major trouble conditions and network failure. For example, two bridges intended for the same functions, with a similar look and feel, and with similar specifications and cost. The only difference is a single digit difference in the product code. This might correspond to a major impact if the bridges are intended for working in two different configurations, making one nonsuitable for working in the other's configuration. While there is a high prob- ability that based on external features, the two bridges may look similar and the manual entry in IM might result in a bug. This problem does not arise when the product code and other parameters are read using a scanner even when the product code is an alpha numeric string or a barcode. Auto discovery and status update is availabl