Which solution offering is currently better, ILMT or BigFix Inventory?

Currently, the BigFix Inventory solution is better for maintaining an up-to-date inventory of software assets that are installed in your infrastructure, gathering information about your hardware, and ensuring license compliance of your enterprise. You always know what software you have, where it is, and how it is used. By monitoring PVU and RVU MAPC consumption of IBM® products under full and subcapacity licensing terms, not only can you understand current license consumption but you can also predict the future one, thus providing the means to optimize your license costs.

With BigFix Inventory you gain access to IBM’s world class support and problem resolution assistance.

Please contact your IBM Sales Rep for licensing and pricing details on adding the IBM BigFix Inventory solution as a new BigFix deployment or as an add on to an existing IBM BigFix deployment.

Links:

BigFix Inventory – Ensure Continuous Software Audit Compliance

BigFix Inventory User Guide

BigFix Inventory on DeveloperWorks

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Ok, I’m afraid the whole “Inventory” thing is a bit confusing because it’s hard to tell what is the current product.

https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSKLLW_9.5.0/com.ibm.bigfix.inventory.doc/Inventory/planinconf/t_enabling_fixlet_internet_win.html

In the pane on the right, locate the entry called Inventory, and accept the license agreement.
From the list of available sites, enable the IBM BigFix Inventory v9 site. The content of the site is downloaded to the BigFix server.
Tip
If there is no site called Inventory, select the site called IBM Endpoint Manager for Software Use Analysis v9.

Is there a difference between these two Sites? I don’t have an “IBM BigFix Inventory v9” site, but I do have an “IBM Endpoint Manager for Software Use Analysis v9”. I have the BigFix Lifecycle license. Do I need a license update to get “IBM BigFix Inventory v9”, or are the sites equivalent?

Are these other sites deprecated, or different products?

BES Asset Discovery
BES Inventory and License
IBM Software Inventory
IBM License Reporting (ILMT) v9
Tivoli Endpoint Manager for Software Usage Analysis v1.3

Hi @JasonWalker,

I think the two sites are equivalent, based on the tip from the knowledge center for BFI. I currently have a total of 58 (relevant and non-relevant) Fixlets and Tasks in the IBM BigFix Inventory v9 site in my installation.

  • BES Asset Discovery - this site helps you find computers and other network devices using nmap. This data can then be imported into BigFix as Unmanaged Assets under Asset Discovery in the Systems Lifecycle Domain. From there, you can find systems that are missing a BigFix Client, along with other network devices.
  • BES Inventory and License - There are some useful analyeses in this site which provide more detailed hardware data. The software product detection analyses in this site are deprecated in favor of using BFI.
  • IBM License Reporting (ILMT) v9 - This site is not needed if you are running BFI in your environment. This site is for IBM Customers to report on the use of IBM software, and is identical to BFI, except for the Software Catalog, which is restricted to IBM software.
  • IBM Software Inventory - I don’t have this site in my license, but it may be an older version of BFI
  • Tivoli Endpoint Manager for Software Usage Analysis v1.3 - this is the first production version of BFI

Note that there is no separate domain for BFI, it is combined into the Systems Lifecycle Domain in the BF Console.

Hope this helps.

It does, thanks much!

So what my CDM provider is telling me, is that in the License Dashboard, the main site name to use is named “IBM Endpoint Manager for Software Use Analysis v9” until we enable it; and that after we enable and gather the site, the site name changes to “IBM BigFix Inventory v9”.

I’ll be trying that out today or early next week, but if that’s really the case, it’s not very amusing.

Ugh - that’s not very helpful. I’ve seen a few places where names don’t line up, which adds to the challenge of managing BigFix.

Yep, seems to be the case.
My license dashboard showed “IBM Endpoint Manager for Software Use Analysis v9”.
After subscribing, the External Site Name was "IBM Endpoint Manager for Software Use Analysis"
After gathering, the External Site Name changed to “IBM BigFix Inventory v9” with gather URL http://sync.bigfix.com/cgi-bin/bfgather/ibmforsua

Your end result matches my environment. I have been using BFI since version 1.3, so I never saw this behavior.

Yeah I have seen this also where the name changes after the gather completes. This is the same as the “Patches for Windows” which starts as “Enterprise Security” :slight_smile: