Usage Data not Reported

Usage and Config BFI
1

I am finding that more and more products that are not reporting usage data. Usage data is one of the main features of BFI. The usage data exists on the endpoint. Why isn’t it being reported? For example, Chrome usage is not reported, but Edge usage is. There are many more examples. I don’t understand why some products have usage data and others do not.

I can get the usage by creating an analysis, but I should not need to do that. Isn’t that the point of BFI?

if exists application usage summary "chrome.exe" then (((last time seen of it - now) / day * -1), name of it, total run counts of it, image paths of it,version of it) of instances of application usage summaries "chrome.exe" as string else "never used"
2

I agree this is within the scope of BFI but unfortunately the work to gather usage information is typically vendor specific and not all vendors are supported so coverage will vary. Please open an Idea to track this request to enhance BFI with specific vendor coverage for usage at https://bigfix-ideas.hcltechsw.com/ideas

thank you,
Doug Rothert
BigFix Product Manager – Inventory, IoT Strategy

3

The data is in the Bigfix agent area. I can get usage data for any executable by creating an analysis. Shouldn’t BFI provide this so that I do not have to create a bunch of analysis.

if exists application usage summary "powershell.exe" then (((last time seen of it - now) / day * -1), name of it, total run counts of it, image paths of it) of instances of application usage summaries "powershell.exe" as string else "never used"

If I create a custom catalog entry, will that override the default catalog entry?

4

Are you running the Usage per Computer report? In my environment, I can see Firefox and PowerShell data.

Is usage calculated during every import (default) or on demand?

5

I am not getting powershell data. That is why I had to create the analysis.

There are a number of usage reports, and the usage fields can be added to most custom reports. The issue is that there is not always usage data available. Chrome vs Edge is a good example.

6

What version of BFI are you running? I mentioned Firefox, since I don’t have Chrome installed, as an example of a browser that shows up in my reports along with Edge.

7

I am on BFI version 10.0.8.