Linux Client Not Seeing BigFix Management or ILMT Sites, But I See This Client Active In The BigFix Console

Hi all …

I have a BigFix client that is behind a firewall and it connects to a local relay, which connects to a parent relay on the other side of the firewall, which connects to the BigFix server.

I see this client in the BigFix console and it is active.

This client responds to a blank action when I took that action at the console, and I see the client reporting back that it completed. (Tested connectivity on port 52311).

This client, however, is not seeing the BigFix Management or ILMT tasks / fixlets. The list of tasks/fixlets for this client is empty, except for the single “blank task” task that was created locally.

Where should I be looking to debug this problem? I verified that all computers are subscribed to the BigFix and ILMT sites (there are 2,000+ other clients that are fine, even clients behind firewalls).

Since I did not install this client, one thing I’ve asked the admin to do is to stop the client, use a besclient.config file to point to a specific relay and then restart the client. But I have my doubts that this will be effective because there is connectivity between this client and the BigFix server.

Any ideas?

–Mark

Hi Mark,

the client will show tasks/fixlets in its applicability list only if it is relevant to those tasks/fixlets, that is if the relevance conditions defined for those tasks/fixlets are verified for the specific client.
You should select one of the tasks/fixlets the client is supposed to be applicable and verify if the client is really relevant to the related relevance statements.

Thanks,
Emiliano

I would recommend trying the various relevance statements for an item you think should be relevant on that endpoint to see why it isn’t.

Do you mean that this client is also a Relay itself? It sounds like the Relay may not be gathering a current version of the ILMT site.

Check the relay troubleshooting at https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/community/wikis/home?lang=en#!/wiki/Tivoli%20Endpoint%20Manager/page/BigFix%20Monitoring to determine if the Relay’s copy of the site is up to date. Are there any other clients using this relay, and if so, are they reporting status for fixlets in ILMT site?

Are you using a DSA server configuration, and if so, are there other clients rolling up to the same server that are reporting status on the ILMT content?

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Hi Jason … no, this client is not a relay and there’s no DSA here.

I suspect that what happened here was that the client was forced to point to a particular relay because of a firewall, but the masthead might be pointing to a different BigFix server (a wrong one. This customer has several BigFix deployments to adhere to ILMT region rules.) So it is connecting to the BigFix server and I see it in the console, but it’s not getting anything because it’s using an incorrect masthead file.

That’s my theory anyway; this issue was at a customer site and I haven’t heard about it since I posted. If I get any updates, I’ll post here.

–Mark

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what does this mean?

@jgstew, IBM subcapacity licensing rules define three regions:

  • Region 1: North America and South America
  • Region 2: Europe and Africa
  • Region 3: Asia and Australia

License usage is supposed to be counted separately in each region. I think it may have to do with pricing, but I am not 100% certain.

When ILMT gets deployed in a global company with locations spanning all three regions, you would deploy three instances of it (meaning, three instances of BigFix, too). More recently, however (I think starting in the 9.2.2 release of ILMT), you could deploy one instance of BigFix/ILMT and use ILMT roles / groups to differentiate the three regions instead.

See https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SS8JFY_9.2.0/com.ibm.lmt.doc/Inventory/overview/c_multi_regions_v2.html for more details.

–Mark

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This would make the most sense, similarly the option to use BigFix automatic groups.

I don’t like that sound of that at all.

Until recently, there was no choice - three regions meant three ILMT/BigFix deployments, but with the 9.2 release, that is no longer necessary.