Difference between Web Reports and BigFix Inventory software discovery results

This topic explains the reason behind the difference between Web Reports and BigFix Inventory software discovery results.

Web Reports (BES Inventory and License) and BigFix Inventory use different methods to discover software. The time of capturing the details might be different too. This results in the difference between discovery results shared by Web Reports and BigFix Inventory.

The Web Reports (BES Inventory and License) runs number of analyses included in BES Inventory and License site, which create a list of:
  • Install / Uninstall programs
  • Services
  • Package registry
  • Basic hardware information

BigFix Inventory performs a complete file system scan, complete registry scan, and complete hardware scan, including virtualization capacity. BigFix Inventory uses BigFix Inventory Software Catalog which contains thousands of software discovery signatures, component definitions and their relations to software products, and a number of product bundling information and licensing data.

BigFix Inventory is dedicated solution for Software Asset Management, whereas Web Reports (BES Inventory and License) is a demonstration of BigFix Platform capabilities and it includes set of analysis using BigFix inspectors to gather data from your environment. BigFix Inventory discovers software based on defined signatures, even if the signatures does not appear in the install registry (the reason the software only copied and not correctly installed). BigFix Inventory supports industry standard ISO tags as well.

Below table shows the results for BES Inventory and License site analysis “Application Information (Windows)” – property “Installed Applications – Windows” and BigFix Inventory
Parameter Installed Applications – Windows Mapping to BigFix Inventory
Source of data Several Keys of Windows Registry including: HKEY_USERS hive

Majority of entries will overlap with Package Scan available through Package Data. Due to different source there will be differences.

HKEY_USERS are not included in Package Data listing to work in-line with BFI Scanner (CIT).

Optimized For Actuals Only Software Installation Tracking
Execution Time

Daily

Evaluated once a day and reported to server

Scan & Transfer: 2022-03-11 01:00 PM

Weekly

Gather according to set up of Initiate Software Scan action and then refreshed daily. So, data might appear next day in BigFix Platform. After revealing in BigFix Platform it is picked up by BigFix Inventory Data Import.

  • Scan: 2022-03-11 01:00 PM
  • Transfer: 2022-03-12 10:00 AM
  • Data Import: 2022-03-12 11:00 PM
  • Available to user in BFI: 2022-03-13 06:00 AM