Configure Beacon Connections

Inventory beacons are the data-gathering arms of your compliance system.
Remember that it is both common and helpful to install an inventory beacon on your batch server. Uniquely amongst your inventory beacons, this one has access to the operations databases, which (for example) gives extra functionality to business adapters created and run on this inventory beacon.
Important: When you install an inventory beacon on your batch server, you must manually configure that inventory beacon to use Microsoft IIS, as described in the online help. In particular, see FlexNet Manager Suite Online Help > What Is an Inventory Beacon? > Configuring Inventory Collection. Also note that if you install an inventory beacon on your batch server, you must use the default location for its distribution folder (DATADIR) — to protect the integrity of your central application server(s), custom locations are not permitted on this shared server. For custom locations, use a stand-alone inventory beacon.
The process for installing and configuring inventory beacons starts from the web UI for FlexNet Manager Suite.
Note: Any computer on which you will install an inventory beacon must have at least version 3.0 of PowerShell installed. For more information, see Upgrade PowerShell on Inventory Beacons.

To install and configure an inventory beacon:

  1. Use a web browser to access the URL server-name-or-IP-address/Suite/.
    Tip: It's convenient to do this on the machine you intend to use as your inventory beacon. However, if your inventory beacon cannot access the central application server, you may download the installer to another convenient device and then move it to the proposed inventory beacon.
  2. In the Discovery & Inventory menu, under the Network group, select Beacons.
  3. Click Deploy a beacon.
    The Deploy a Beacon page appears. Ensure that the default Download a beacon section of the page is open.
  4. Click Download a beacon.
    Tip: This button is displayed only to members of the Administrator role.
  5. Use the web browser dialog to save the installer to a convenient directory (such as C:\temp).
    Tip: If you have not downloaded directly to your intended inventory beacon, you should now move the downloaded installer to that intended device.
  6. In Windows Explorer, navigate to the saved file on your inventory beacon, and double-click it to run the installer.
  7. In the web interface for FlexNet Manager Suite, expand the accordion sections (and see the related help) for guidance on how to deploy and configure your inventory beacon(s).
    Remember: When installing an inventory beacon on your batch server, you must manually configure that inventory beacon. In the online help, see FlexNet Manager Suite Online Help > What Is an Inventory Beacon? > Configuring Inventory Collection, and be sure to select the IIS option.
  8. When the FlexNet Beacon software is installed and configured on your inventory beacon, open Microsoft Task Scheduler and check the following tasks are correctly scheduled:
    • Upload FlexNet logs and inventories
    • Upload third party inventory data.
    On some systems, Task Scheduler waits until midnight to start the repeating schedule for these tasks (by default, both repeat every 10 minutes). If they are not yet running, and you want them running today rather than tomorrow, edit the start times to the current time.
  9. With your inventory beacon(s) configured, in the web interface for FlexNet Manager Suite, navigate to Discovery & Inventory > Discovery and Inventory Rules (in the Discovery group) to set up FlexNet inventory collection rules.
  10. Refer to the online help for details about configuring your inventory beacon(s) to connect to other data sources to import third-party inventory.
    For example, in the section FlexNet Manager Suite Online Help > Inventory Beacons, see (amongst others) the following topics:
    • Inventory Systems Tab
    • SAP Systems Tab
    • Engineering Apps Agent Page.
When the inventory collections rules are established, and the connections set up on the inventory beacon(s), FlexNet Manager Suite is ready to import data and start calculating your license position.