BES Agent API

Customizations
1

(imported topic written by gtallan91)

I was wondering where I can find more information about the BES Agent API, mentioned elsewhere. Mainly wondering whether it is feasible to query a host using a simple perl script or suchlike to determine if the BES Agent is installed?

Thanks,

Graham

2

(imported comment written by BenKus)

Hey gtallan,

The simplest way to check if the BigFix Agent is installed is to look for the service BESClient. You won’t need the Agent API for that… The BES Agent API is most useful when you want to have another agent or script query the BES Agent for info regarding properties, Fixlets, etc.

Ben

3

(imported comment written by gtallan91)

Ben Kus

Hey gtallan,

The simplest way to check if the BigFix Agent is installed is to look for the service BESClient. You won’t need the Agent API for that… The BES Agent API is most useful when you want to have another agent or script query the BES Agent for info regarding properties, Fixlets, etc.

Ben

I am probably asking completely the wrong question. I was wondering if there’s a way to remotely tell whether a system is running the bigfix agent. Say at a very simple level one could do an nmap scan and see if a machine is listening on udp/52311. But beyond that it would be better to verify if it really was the BES agent listening on that port. I suspect I was misinterpreting and assuming the BES Agent API might be a network protocol, but it makes more sense for it to be an API for agents or scripts on the local machine…

4

(imported comment written by BenKus)

Hi gtallan,

Yes… the BES Client API is something different…

Have you seen our BigFix Asset Discovery solution? http://support.bigfix.com/bes/sites/assetdiscovery.html

It uses the method you mentioned by scanning systems to detect if the agent running (using NMAP) and it also can compare against the computers in the BigFix Database…

Ben