What data does the FlexNet inventory agent gather as file and installer evidence?

[#1]

The FlexNet inventory agent gathers inventory data from various sources. This article details where data is sourced from that is subsequently imported and treated as file and installer evidence by FlexNet Manager Suite.

Installer evidence

The agent gathers installer evidence data from the following sources (depending on operating system):

• Add/Remove Programs: Information about installed applications stored in the registry on Windows facility computers
• Windows Installer (MSI) cache: Evidence left in the local Microsoft Installer configuration cache on Windows
• BEA: A custom installer developed by BEA Systems, acquired by Oracle in early 2008
• IA: InstallAnywhere, from Revenera
• IPS: An Oracle installation technology used on Solaris 11
• ISMP: InstallShield MultiPlatform, from Revenera
• LPP: The installation technology for licensed program products on AIX from IBM
• Oracle Universal Installer (OUI): Oracle data used to identify Oracle Applications
• Oracle EBS Module: Oracle data used to identify Oracle Applications
• OS X App: An application bundle for OS X/Mac OS
• RPM: A widely-used installation technology available on many GNU/Linux distributions, AIX, and Novell Netware
• SDUX : The Software Distributor for HP-UX, from Hewlett-Packard
• Software ID tags: evidence gathered from software identification tag files following the ISO 19770-2 standard
• SUNPKG: An installer on Solaris for the SVR4 package format. (Legacy SVR4 packages installed by the Solaris 11 IPS tool will also be recognized and identified with this label)

File evidence

On Windows, details of files with a .exe extension are gathered as file evidence.

On UNIX-like operating systems, details of files that are configured with "execute" permissions are gathered as file evidence.

When compliance import procedures are run with the -nooptional parameter to skip optional import steps, the process will only import details of files whose names end with any of the following strings:

• .exe
• .sys
• sys2
• wtag
• ptag
• .lax
• dtag
• .sig

Related articles

• Information about Oracle Universal Installer (OUI) evidence gathered by the FlexNet inventory agent
• What is Oracle Fusion Middleware (OracleFMW) Evidence?
• What is BEA evidence?
• What is IBM Installation Manager (IIM) Evidence?
• How is InstallShield Multiplatform (ISMP) package evidence captured by FlexNet inventory agent?

[bmaudlin]

How are we able to configure the agent to scan for .jar files on Linux installs? 

[kclausen]

@bmaudlin - Here is some information on how you would configure the agent to capture File Evidence in On-Line Help:
https://docs.flexera.com/fnms/EN/WebHelp/index.html#tasks/InvSet-FileInvSection.html

Here is the relevant information, showing what files would be captured.  On Linux, any file with the "Execute" bit set would be captured.

Note: Once you allow collection of file evidence, the FlexNet inventory agent reports .exe files on Microsoft Windows, and on UNIX-like platforms reports all files with no file extension and the Execute bit set on file permissions. In addition, on all platforms, the agent by default reports all .sys, .sys2, .swtag, .swidtag, .cmptag, .sig, .exe, and .lax files

[bmaudlin]

@kclausen - that's a great help thank you 🙂

[bfaller]

Hello, thank you, but your post and help text are not the same.

Which one is correct ?

Help: all .sys, .sys2, .swtag, .swidtag, .cmptag, .sig, .exe, and .lax files

Post: 

any of the following strings:

• .exe
• .sys
• sys2
• wtag
• ptag
• .lax
• dtag
• .sig

[ChrisG]

@bfaller - the two sets of information are talking about subtly different (but related) processes which handle the filename suffixes slightly differently. The documentation describes the filename extensions (characters from the final "." in the filename) that the agent gathers. The list of 4-character filename suffixes listed in this article describes the suffixes that the compliance import procedures looks for when importing file evidence data.

You'll note that the 4-character suffixes that the compliance import looks for are a superset of the extensions that the agent gathers.

[darren_haehnel]

I see in the documentation that we can add an extension type (on Unix) in the config.ini using the "IncludeExtension" option.  We want to apply this change to all agents in our estate.  Is there a way to add a new extension type without going to each deployed device and updating the config.ini? 

Also, if we do have to update the config.ini, either manually or scripted, on each device, does anyone know if adding "IncludeExtension=jar" in the config.ini would overwrite the default values of .sys, .sys2, .swtag, .swidtag, .cmptag, .sig, .exe, and .lax or would it append to the list? (ie: Do we need to have ALL extensions in the "IncludeExtension" value or just any new, non-default extensions?)

[erwinlindemann]

Hi Darren,

If you are working in an on-prem environment, you can configure this setting in the database and it will be downloaded to all agents.

Providing some documentation and sample SQL code for download 😊.