Installing an IT Visibility Inventory Beacon
Important:The inventory beacon information in this section is specific to IT Visibility only. For related information, see Uploading Inventory Data into IT Visibility. For help using inventory beacons with IT Asset Management, see Using IT Asset Management Inventory Beacons to Collect Inventory.
To use the instructions provided in this section, make sure that the computer to be used as an inventory beacon meets the requirements listed in Prerequisites for IT Visibility Inventory Beacons and Agents.
Accounts
To complete the following installation process, you must have both:
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Internet access to Flexera at (login required). |
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An account with local administrator privileges on the computer that is to be your inventory beacon. |
Tip:After installation is completed, you also need an account with administrator privileges to run the FlexNet Beacon software. You can use the same account for installation and operation of FlexNet Beacon user interface.
After installation and configuration, the FlexNet Beacon engine (as distinct from the user interface) operates as a long-running service to gather and upload data. During installation, this service is automatically configured to run under the local SYSTEM account (the default and recommended configuration). If you have reason to manually configure different credentials (perhaps to manage access through a proxy server), be aware that these manually-configured credentials for running the service are reset to SYSTEM at each update to FlexNet Beacon. Therefore, manually configured credentials must be manually reconfigured after each upgrade of the FlexNet Beacon software.
To install an inventory beacon:
To modify the security settings to allow access to the download server, perform the following steps:
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In the Search box on the Windows taskbar, type Internet Options, and then click Internet Options. The Internet Properties window appears. |
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Click the Security tab. |
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Click the Trusted sites zone, and click Sites. |
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In the Add this website to the zone field, add one of the following URLs, and then click Add: |
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https://app.flexera.com |
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Access one of the following URLs and log in with your Flexera credentials: |
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Do one of the following, depending on your scenario: |
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IT-Visibility-only customer
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Go to Data Collection > IT Visibility Inventory Tasks > IT Visibility Beacons.
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IT Visibility customer and IT Asset Management customer
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Go to Data Collection > IT Assets Inventory Tasks > Beacons.
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IT Asset Management-only customer
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Go to Data Collection > IT Assets Inventory Tasks > Beacons.
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On the Beacons page, click Download Beacon. The Installers page appears. |
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In the Beacon Installer section, from the Version dropdown list, select the appropriate version of the FlexNet Beacon software. |
Note:The shared services edition of FlexNet Beacon is supported only for version 14.2.0 and later.
The software is downloaded to your Downloads folder on the inventory beacon server. This file is an executable called BeaconInstallerversion.exe, where the version matches the version number you selected for download.
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Double-click the downloaded executable. |
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Accept the license agreement to proceed with the installation. |
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Accept a Typical installation for all defaults. |
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In the Change Distribution Folder panel, you specify the folder where the inventory beacon saves data downloaded from Flexera. |
These downloads may include beacon policy, which updates settings that the inventory beacons may (in future) also distribute to instances of FlexNet inventory agent installed on target inventory devices. Self-updates for the inventory beacons may also be downloaded.
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In the Configure Scheduled Tasks panel: |
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Choose whether to allow the installer to Configure scheduled tasks (recommended), or to prevent that by selecting Do not configure scheduled tasks (keeping in mind that if you specify Do not configure scheduled tasks you must manually configure the correct scheduled tasks, since the inventory beacon does not function correctly without these). By default, all four tasks trigger at midnight and repeat every 10 minutes throughout the day.) The four tasks are used as follows: |
—Upload Flexera inventories: Uploads the current contents of the inventory staging directory on the inventory beacon. When the upload is completed successfully, the results are in a staging directory in Flexera One. They become visible in IT Asset Management after the next inventory import and compliance calculation in Flexera One. The default is: Repeating every minute throughout the day.
—Upload Flexera logs and inventories: This becomes important when the inventory beacon will upload inventory collected by the installed FlexNet inventory agent. This uploads the current contents of the staging directory on the inventory beacon. The ten-minute checking cycle on the empty directory is very quick and does not perceptibly load the beacon server. Uploaded files include inventory, usage (when enabled), and results of the inventory beacon applying rules for agent deployment and the like. When the upload is completed successfully, the results are in a staging directory in Flexera One. They become visible in IT Asset Management after the next inventory import and compliance calculation in Flexera One. The default is: Repeating every minute throughout the day
—Upload FlexNet Beacon status: This status is used for uploading the beacon service status. It uploads the current contents of the inventory staging directory on the inventory beacon. When the upload is completed successfully, the results are in a staging directory in Flexera One. They become visible in IT Asset Management after the next inventory import and compliance calculation in Flexera One. The default is: Repeating every minute throughout the day.
—Upload third party inventory data: This is used for catch-up uploading of inventory when an immediate upload after collection did not succeed. This option uploads the current contents of the inventory staging directory on the inventory beacon. When the upload is completed successfully, the results are in a staging directory in Flexera One. They become visible in IT Asset Management after the next inventory import and compliance calculation in Flexera One. The default is: Repeating every ten minutes throughout the day.
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Identify the account (such as a service account) that is to run these scheduled tasks, and provide the account name and password. |
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Ignore the page about drivers, as at this time FlexNet Beacon for Flexera does not support these advanced forms of inventory import. Currently, only import from Microsoft SCCM is supported. |
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On the Ready to Install the Program panel, click Install to start the installation process, and wait for its completion. |
When installation is completed, you must configure connections in two directions:
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Outgoing inventory—This is the connection through which this inventory beacon uploads collected inventory data to Flexera. This same configuration also allows for download of things like beacon policy and self-update packages. For details, see Configuring IT Visibility Beacon to Upload Inventory to Flexera One—the full list of URLs to configure for a firewall is included there. |