These three types are all tracked by quantity rather than one record per unit. What separates them is where they end up.
Accessories attach to people. Components attach to devices. Consumables get used up.
Reusable items you hand out and expect back: keyboards, mice, docks, headsets.
Required when creating one: Name, Category, Quantity, Status.
Optional: minimum quantity, manufacturer, expected lifespan, purchase details, notes.
Actions. Check out assigns a chosen quantity of the accessory to a person; its status becomes In use once any units are checked out. Check in returns that assignment's units to the available pool.
Because accessories are tracked by quantity, more than one person can hold units of the same accessory at the same time, each checkout is its own assignment. There is no single "assigned to" field or reassign option like on devices, to move units to someone else, check in the existing assignment and check the quantity back out to the new person.
An accessory's quantity can never be edited down below the number of units currently checked out.
Statuses: Available, In use, Broken, Disposed, Archived.
Parts that get installed inside a device: RAM, SSDs, GPUs.
Only Name is required. Everything else — serial number, category, manufacturer, location, quantity, minimum quantity, purchase cost, order number, status, notes — is optional. Components are the only quantity-tracked type with a serial number field.
Actions. Assign to device installs a chosen quantity of the component into a device. You can also do this from the device's own detail page. Bulk status change, location change, and delete are available from the list.
Statuses: Available, In use, Low stock, Out of stock, Broken, Disposed.
Stock that gets consumed and never returns: cables, ink, batteries, paper.
Required when creating one: Name, Category, Quantity, Unit of measure, Status. Unit of measure defaults to "pieces".
Optional: minimum quantity, reorder point, reorder quantity, model, manufacturer, location, purchase details, notes.
Actions. There is no check-out — consumables are never assigned to a person. From the list you can bulk adjust quantity (increment or decrement by an amount), change status, change location, or delete.
Statuses: In stock, Low stock, Out of stock, Discontinued.
Changing a consumable's quantity does not automatically move it to Low stock or Out of stock. Reorder point and minimum quantity are recorded for your reference and for automation rules, but the status field itself is yours to set.
If you want to be told when stock runs low, build an automation on the Consumable low stock or Consumable out of stock event — see Automations.
