Learn

Our database contains thousands of examples where community users researched and worked hard to develop something worth sharing and published their works. You too can do this, and we felt it was only fair to make sure everyone was on the same footing.

On this page you'll find very useful official documentation and some unofficial documentation to help guide your developement skills.

If you're looking to get a trial version of BigFix... try looking here.
Maybe you'd like to hire the professionals? Look here to get the official BigFix Professional Services team involved.

Grand Overview

BigFix Unified Management Platform ChalkTalk - This video is a great way to understand the core product, how it communicates and controls your infrastructure.


Content? Fixlets?

Our friend over the pond, Darryl Miles, has put together a good video for understanding what a Fixlet is and why it's the cornerstone of the BigFix Product.


Introduction to Software Catalogs

The BigFix Inventory team has produced a video describing software catalogs and software signatures. A good introduction for those who are interested in working with the signature content that's in the community.

IBM publishes many more videos which can be helpful... View them on YouTube.

Handy Blog Articles

Various people have writen articles on building content and developing for the BigFix platform over the years. Here are a few of our favorites you might find useful:

Deployment Articles Older Deployment Articles Understand the Concepts Maybe what you're looking for is covered under any of these topics:
Developing content for BigFix is a whole category unto itself. There is so much to learn... Fixlets/Tasks development, Analysis and Global Properties, Fixlet Debugger tools, etc... This section contains helpful information, links and videos for the purpose of learning to develop content for BigFix.

Essential Training Guides

bigfix.me's Inspector Guide - Online wiki-like Inspector Guide full of user submitted documentation on Inspectors and Key Phrases which make up integral parts of the Relevance Language.
This Guide is a complete and comprehensive collection of inspectors based on user submissions. If it isn't there, then add it!

Custom Authoring Training Guide (PDF) - Complete Guide to creating Custom Content for Windows including advanced Relevance Language training, advanced Action Language Training, QNA error messages, and strategies for creating Fixlet messages.
If you're a beginner, pay particular attention to "What is a Fixlet message?" and "Fixlet messages Vs BES Tasks".
For Moderate to Experts, it's always good to refresh yourself on the basics of the language to ensure you're following best practices.
Relevance Language Guide (PDF) - The heart of Fixlet technology is the Relevance Language. This allows developers a single multi-platform evaluation language used write expressions describing virtually any aspect of the client environment.
In this guide, you'll learn about the basics, best practices and even see simple examples which you can use as a starting point for your expertise.
Like other languages, as you develop relevance statements you may come upon error messages when using the QnA tool. Here is an online guide to understanding those errors.
Core Inspector Guide (PDF) - This guide will help you with the core ordinary phrases (known as Inspectors) that make up objects within the Relevance Language. Using this guide you can write your own Relevance Expressions and use them to target actions to precisely those endpoints that need them.
This guide shares inspector details related across all operating systems. With that said, there are operating system specific Inspector guides available which digs deeper into OS Specific inspectors. Web Reports is the special reporting engine for BigFix. You can build custom reports using the Session Relevance Inspector Guide.

IBM Endpointment Manager - RESTful API

You heard right, the newest version of BigFix has added a RESTful API to its integration ability. Now you can develop and pull content from your infrastructure using a simple URL.

bigfix.me's Rest API Guide - Online wiki-like Rest API Guide full of user submitted documentation on resources of the new BigFix v9 REST API. This Guide is a complete and comprehensive collection of inspectors based on user submissions. If it isn't there, then add it!

Official REST API Documentation - This link will provide you with additional details and links to other resources.

Useful Utilities

There are many utilities you may find useful when developing content. You can find many of them here. Two of the most essential are listed below.

QnA

An essential tool you can use even without a license or console is the QnA tool. You can download v8.2.1310 here. If you want to use the non-windows flavor... here is some information on launching QnA on Linux. You can find archived versions of the this tool here.

Presentation Debugger

Similar to the QnA tool for traditional relevance is the Presentation Debugger which is used to evaluate session relevance. This tool is built into the Console... If you don't see the "Debug" menu, push Crtl-Alt-Shift-D and check the "Show Debug Menu". Here's how to launch the debugger if you already have the "Debug" menu on your console:

Catalog signatures provide the information needed by BigFix Inventory (BFI) to produce software inventory reports for your enterprise. This section contains useful information about how BFI uses its software catalog, how you can create signatures for the BFI catalog, and also contains other details useful for software asset managers who want to get more out of BigFix Inventory.

Introduction to BigFix Inventory and the Catalog Community

  • Welcome to the BFI Catalog Community! - If this is your first time exploring BFI catalog signatures on Bigfix.me, this page will provide you information about what is available on the web site and give you tips for how you can become an active part of the Bigfix community.
  • Product Page for BigFix Inventory - If you're new to BigFix Inventory, you may want to review the product page for BFI and see the features we've highlighted. This review can give you ideas about how to most effectively use BFI in your enterprise.
  • IBM BigFix Inventory Knowledge Center - If you are looking for official information about how to install, configure and use BigFix Inventory this is a place for you to start.
  • IBM BigFix Platform Knowledge Center - Here's where you can find information about the BigFix console, fixlets, analyses, etc. Of course, there's a lot of information about BigFix on the rest of this site!
  • IBM License Management Channel on YouTube - A collection of YouTube videos on current and previous versions BigFix Inventory.

Catalog Overview

Introduction to Software Catalogs

Basic Catalog Management

  • Customizing the software catalog (video) - A YouTube video providing a demonstration of the Catalog Customization capability (also known as "Simple Catalog Management") inside of the Software Use Analysis (now called BigFix Inventory) console.
  • Creating, importing and exporting custom signatures - Another YouTube video providing additional information about creating custom signatures as well as showing how to use the export and import capabilities.
  • Customizing the Software Catalog - A wiki page on developerWorks that provides a few useful documents on creating software signatures. One of the documents is a checklist that provides an end-to-end process in creating, testing, and maintaining your custom signatures.
  • Importing and Exporting Catalog Signatures in BFI 9.x - A direct link to the Knowledge Center topic on the BFI 9.x capability that allows users to import and export catalog signatures. It's this capability that has enabled us to have this signature sharing community!

Have questions? Check out the discussions on our SUA Signature forum.

Organize your favorite content in Bigfix.me

  • Using Bigfix.me Site you can organize your favorite content into groups.
  • You can also subscribe to sites created by other community members.
  • Installing the BigfixMeSync available now on bigfix.me , you can get the subscribed site content directly on your IEM console.

Install BigfixMeSync

  • Download the fixlet Install/Upgrade BigfixMeSync Plugin and install the plugin on your IEM server
  • At the first run BigfixMeSync plugin will create custom site “Bigfix.Me Sync” and will import dashboard and BESDomain files (5Mb ca). Note:You may need to restart your console after that "Bigfixme Sync" site has been created to see the new dasboard and bigfix.me domain.
  • Launch Sync BFME dashboard , insert your bigfix.me credential and schedule syncronization.

  • When the next sync occurs, the list of the subscribed sites is dispalyed.
  • For each subscribed site select or enter a IEM custom site where you wish download the content. From now on, when the syncronization occurs all the content found in the subscribed site will be downloaded in your IEM custom site.

  • Subscribe to BigfixMe Sync to automatically get on your IEM env upgrade fixlets for BigfixMeSync