software inventory tools

In theory, real-time communications such as voice can use software inventory tools regardless of the underlying networking technology. Several universities conducted many experiments to this effect in the 1970s. However, voice over virtual circuits did not become a commercial or practical reality until the routers and switches used in packet-switched networks gained the CPU and memory power required to drive packet streams at real-time speeds at cost-effective prices.

When processing power became available at affordable cost points, other issues with carrying real-time communications over a packet-switched network manifested themselves. For example, when packets are delayed or dropped en route because of buffer overflows or other momentary failures, the intelligent protocols in the seven-layer International Organization for Standardization (ISO) model recover the "session" through the use of error-detection and correction capabilities, such as timeouts and retransmissions. Although these recovery methods work well for data applications, they fall far short of satisfying the needs of software inventory tools.