title: Hardware/Software inventory open source projects
body: <p>I would like to develop a Network Inventory application that works on any operating system.
  Reports on every possible resource attacehd to a network.
  Reports all pertinent details of hardware and software.
  Thats (and i hate to use the phrase) my "End Game".</p>
  
  <p>However I am running before i can crawl here.
  I have no experience of this type of development, e.g. discovering a computers hardware and software settings.</p>
  
  <p>I've spent almost two weeks googling and come up short! :-(.</p>
  
  <p>So I am turning to you to ask these questions:-</p>
  
  <p>My first step is to find an existing open source project i can incorporate into my own code that extracts the fine grained details i am after, e.g. EVERYTHING there is to know about the hardaware and software on a single machine.</p>
  
  <p>Does this project exist? or do i have to develop that first?</p>
  
  <p>Have i got to write all this in C?</p>
  
  <p>I am guessing getting this information about a computer is going to be easier than for printers, scanners, routers etc... e.g. everything else you would find attached to a network.</p>
  
  <p>Once i have access to a single computers details i then need to investigate how i can traverse an entire newtork of printers, scanners, routers, load balancers, switches, firewalls, workstations, servers, storeage devices, laptops, monitors, the list goes on and on</p>
  
  <p>One problem i have is i dont have a 1000 machine newtork to play on!
  Is there any such resource available on theinternet? (is that a silly question?)</p>
  
  <p>Anywho, if you dont ask you wont find out!</p>
  
  <p>One aspect iam really looking forward to finding out how to travers the entire network, </p>
  
  <p>should i be using TCP/IP for this?</p>
  
  <p>Whats a good site, blog, usergorup, book for TCP/IP development?</p>
  
  <p>How do i go about getting through firewalls?</p>
  
  <p>How many questions can i ask in one go? :-)</p>
  
  <p>My previous question on this topic ended up with PYTHON being championed as the language/script to go with to develop this application in.</p>
  
  <p>Having looked at a few PYTHON examples they all seemed to be related to WINDOWS networks
  and interrogating Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI). I had the feeling you cant rely on whats in WMI, and even if you can that s no good for UNIX netwrks.</p>
  
  <p>Surely there exist common code for extracting hardware and software details from a computer? Why cant i find it on the internet?</p>
  
  <p>Pease help?</p>
  
  <p>Theres no prizes though :-(</p>
  
  <p>Thanks in advance</p>
  
  <p>I would like to appologise if i have broken forum rules or not tried hard enough on my own before asking for assistance.</p>
  
  <p>I just would like to start moving forward with this as its one of the best projects i have been involved with.</p>
  
  <p>I am inspired by the many differnt number of challenges involved and that if i manage to produce a useful application at the end of it it would hopefully be extremely helpful to many people.</p>
  
  <p>That sit</p>
  
  <p>Thanks in advance</p>
  
  <p>DD</p>