Configure the Technopedia Connector

On your chosen inventory beacon, log into FlexNet Beacon as administrator.

Note: To run FlexNet Beacon, you must have system administrator rights.

Select the Inventory systems page in the FlexNet Beacon interface.

At the bottom of the page, click New.... (The Create SQL Source Connection dialog opens.)

Tip: The New... button defaults to creating a connection for Microsoft SQL Server. If you use the down arrow on the split button, you can choose between SQL Server, Spreadsheet, PowerShell, and Other connections. However, while you are creating a connection to a Microsoft SQL Server database (regardless of the Source Type of the connection), use only the SQL Server option.

Complete the values in this dialog as follows:

Control	Comments
Connection Name	A descriptive name for this connection that you will recognize later in lists. The name may contain alphanumeric characters, underscores or spaces, but must start with either a letter or a number.
Source Type	From the drop-down list, select `Technopedia`. Tip: If this option is not visible in the list, it means that this inventory beacon has not updated its policy since the central application server(s) were updated with the Technopedia connector code. As a work-around, close and re-open the FlexNet Beacon interface. Restarting forces a request to update beacon policy. Remember that it may take a few minutes to then update your inventory beacon, before you can restart this configuration.
Server	Identify the server hosting your Technopedia database, using any one of: The server name Its IP address (in IPv4 format) The special value `(localhost)` if the database is installed on this same inventory beacon server.
Authentication	Select one of: Windows Authentication — Select this option to use standard Windows authentication to access the database server. The credentials of the account (on the inventory beacon) running the scheduled task for importing inventory are used to access the SQL Server database. This account must be added to an Active Directory security group that has access to the database. Windows (specific account) — Use the following two fields (enabled when you make this choice) to specify an account on the inventory beacon that can make a connection to the SQL database. SQL Authentication — Use the following two fields to specify an account and password registered as a user with database access on SQL Server . This account is used to access the database, regardless of the local account running the scheduled task on the inventory beacon server. Tip: The account used needs read-only privileges.
Username	The account name used for SQL authentication, or Windows (specific account). (Not required for Windows Authentication.)
Database	Enter the name of the database, or use the pull-down list to select from database names automatically detected on your specified server. For example, for a connection to Technopedia, select `BDNA_Publish` from the drop-down list.
Connection is in test mode (do not import results)	For inventory beacons that are free-standing (and not co-located with your application server, or in larger implementations your inventory server), this controls the upload of data collected from this connection and its import to FlexNet Manager Suite: When this check box is clear, the connection is in production mode, and data collected through this adapter is uploaded to the central server and (in due course) imported into the database there. When the check box is set: The adapter for this connection is exercised, with data written to the intermediate file in the staging folder on the inventory beacon (`%CommonAppData%`\Flexera Software\Beacon\IntermediateData) The immediate upload that normally follows data collection is suppressed, so that you can inspect the contents of the file The catch-up process that retries stalled uploads, normally scheduled overnight, runs as usual and uploads the file to the central server At the central server, the file contents are discarded (and not imported into the central database).
Overlapping Inventory Filter	If you use more than one inventory source, it is possible to get overlapping inventory (records about the same endpoint device from multiple inventory tools). Because of differences between inventory tools, the overlapping inventory records may contain slightly different data. In the web interface (in FlexNet Manager Suite), you may nominate one inventory source as Primary, which gives its collected data priority for hardware properties imported from target inventory devices. The choices here give another, separate axis of control, based on whether or not the data from this particular source is to be considered "stale". This is different from the Primary setting in the following ways: It is assessed first (before the primary setting is taken into account), and so may even modify the effect of your Primary setting. It is best practice to make sure that your chosen primary inventory source is not marked as stale with the following settings. It affects not only imported hardware properties, but also software inventory (installer evidence, file evidence, and so on), as follows: With two inventory sources (when neither one is considered stale), the total software inventory is a union (merging) of the results from both sources. This is useful when two different inventory tools have different specializations for software detection: the union means you are not blind-sided by a software inventory tool that missed something you should have licensed. This is considered the 'normal' operational case in a stable environment using multiple inventory sources. When one of the two available sources is declared "stale" (using either of the first two choices below), all of its overlapping software inventory is excluded from the possible union of data sources (hardware inventory too, but here we're considering software). This behavior is valuable, for instance, when a target inventory device has migrated from one inventory source to another (perhaps by moving offices), but has not yet been obsoleted from this first source. Imagine that, as part of the office move, the MyApp application had also been uninstalled from the inventory device. You do not want the old and stale record from this source insisting there's an installation of MyApp when in fact it's no longer on the device. Of course, best practice is to obsolete the device from this stale source so that it is no longer reported in this inventory source; but these first two settings allow a quick control of all the overlapping data from this source, rather than having to obsolete devices one by one in the source tool. Another common scenario is when you are migrating over time from an old version of your chosen inventory tool to a newer version (on a new connection), and during transition both systems are still running. Declaring the old version's connection as "stale" means that as soon as a record appears in the new version's inventory for a particular device, the old device import is automatically superseded, and updates rely entirely on the new version of your inventory tool. Each of the following settings only takes affect when FlexNet Manager Suite is comparing the inventory dates of a device from this current inventory source and an overlapping record from another inventory source: Ignore the device’s inventory from this data source — When you have more recent inventory from another source for the same target inventory device, the record from this source is completely ignored. (Technically, the device record is deleted from the staging table in the database, and so can never be imported.) Ignore this device’s inventory if older than `nn` days — If you select this option, overlapping inventory collected by this source more than the set number of days before the import is ignored. Fresher overlapping data is still imported and considered for data merging. Tip: In the interests of keeping inventory current, this control has a maximum value of 60 days. Import the inventory from this source for possible merging — Choose this option (the default) to declare that overlapping inventory collected from this connection is never considered stale. This is the normal operating setting when you are not trying to manage transitions from one inventory source to another. With this setting, overlapping records are merged in this way: If a data point exists in the Primary inventory source, it is used If two equal-priority sources have different inventory dates, the data point is taken from the most recent inventory As a tie-breaker, the connection ID for this source recorded in the database is used (normally meaning that the earliest-created inventory source has priority).

Click Test Connection.

If the inventory beacon can successfully connect to the nominated database using the details supplied, a Database connection succeeded message displays. Click OK to close the message. Click Save to complete the addition. The connection is added to (or updated in) the list.
If the inventory beacon cannot connect, a Database connection failed message is displayed, with information about why that connection could not be made. Click OK to close the message. Edit the connection details and retest the connection.

You cannot save the connection details if the connection test fails. If you cannot get the connection test to succeed, click Cancel to cancel the addition of these connection details.

With the connection saved, select it in the list, and below the list click Schedule.... In the Select schedule dialog, choose the schedule you created/selected earlier (see Schedule Imports from Technopedia), and click OK.

If this is a free-standing inventory beacon (one that is not co-located on any of your central application server[s]), you may optionally click Execute Now to trigger an immediate import, upload, and processing into the staging table and then compliance database.

Tip: A database "reader" loads the staging table immediately after the imported data is uploaded. Normally, when the reader finishes, a database "writer" fires off to update the compliance database promptly. If, in your environment, you have disabled this immediate flow-on, the production tables in the compliance database are updated in the next nightly full import and license compliance calculations.

After sufficient time for these processes (usually less than 15 minutes, but depending on what other database updates are already queued or in progress), you may validate by checking the System Tasks page – navigate to the system menu (

in the top right corner) and select System Health > System Tasks, or click the colored indicators on the navigation bar (top right). Your account needs the Troubleshooting: access to System Tasks page privilege to view this page.