Prerequisites

Availability (Without Installation)

The Business Importer is available as a standard part of the product installation:
  • It is installed on each inventory beacon, along with the Business Adapter Studio. The default location on each inventory beacon for the Business Importer executable is C:\Program Files\Flexera Software\Inventory Beacon\DotNet\bin\MGSBI.exe.
  • For on-premises implementations only, the Business Importer is also available on the central application server for use where direct connection to the central compliance database is available. There are two possible locations:
    • If you have an inventory beacon co-installed on your application server, the Business Importer is available in the same path as shown above for all inventory beacons
    • If you do not have a co-installed inventory beacon, the default location is on the server hosting the batch server functionality, under C:\Program Files (x86)\Flexera Software\FlexNet Manager Platform\DotNet\bin\MGSBI.exe.

Because Business Importer is installed as standard, it does not require additional specific installation tasks.

In all cases, the complete Business Importer consists of:
  • The executable, called MGSBI.exe
  • A set of template XML files for you to modify as required
  • This documentation is available through the title page of online help.

Connections and Drivers

Connections can be considered in two directions:
  • 'Downstream' from the Business Importer to the original data sources
  • 'Upstream' from the Business Importer as it uploads the collected data to the central application server for FlexNet Manager Suite.

Downstream, it's obvious that the Business Importer requires connections to the source data it is to collect. Depending on the data source used, additional drivers may be required. For instance, if data is read from Oracle databases, the Oracle OLE-DB driver (delivered by Oracle as part of the Oracle client) must be present .

In contrast there are no special requirements needed 'upstream':
  • In disconnected mode, where the Business Importer is running on an inventory beacon and cannot access the central compliance database, no drivers are required. When it is executed by the Business Adapter Studio, the Business Importer writes the collected data to a special staging file on the inventory beacon, where other automated processes upload it to the central application server, and subsequently import it into the compliance database.
  • In connected mode, which (clearly) requires a SQL Server connection from the Business Importer instance to the database server hosting the central compliance database, there is no need to install any specific SQL Server tools or drivers. The Business Importer uses the Microsoft SQL OLE-DB driver provided as standard on appropriate Microsoft Windows Server operating systems.

2022 R1