What is new in V9.2

Important:

If you are installing BigFix Version 9.2.5, the default value of the Web Reports port is 8080. In the upgrade to BigFix Version 9.2.5 and in the previous versions of BigFix, the default value of the Web Reports port is 80.

BigFix V9.2 provides the following new features and enhancements:

  • Starting from V9.2 Patch 22, the SQLite library was upgraded to Version 3.34.1 and the OpenSSL library was upgraded to Version 1.0.2y.
  • Starting from V9.2 Patch 21, the Web Reports Overview page works without Flash Player.
  • You can define the following privileges at the user or role level by using the console or the REST APIs:
    • Ability to submit actions
    • Ability to reboot a client machine
    • Ability to shut down a client machine
    • Ability to lock and unlock a client machine
    • Ability to send broadcasts (such as wake-on-lan) or refreshes
    The new privileges apply only to non-master operators. Using these privileges you can avoid the disruption of services by preventing shutdown and reboot. You can also create users for auditing only.
  • You can configure the proxy configuration more easily:
    • On the server and relay you can configure the proxy by specifying the proxy hostname, port, and, if needed, user name and password.
    • The old configurations are automatically migrated during the BigFix upgrade.
    • You can configure the proxy at installation time, on the server by using the installer and on the clients by using the client deployment tools.
  • The relay recoverability has been improved as follows:
    • The relay discovers and automatically recovers from the corruption of downloaded files, gathered sites, and mailboxes.
    • You can set health checking options to run periodic checking and recovery of the corrupted relay cache. For information about the configuration settings, see List of settings and detailed descriptions.
  • You can obfuscate a password by setting an option with the BigFix Administration Tool.
  • New UNIX inspectors for creating the computer information system compliance checks. You can extract the following information:
    • On Linux systems: services, process (SELinux)
    • On AIX systems: kernel modules, RPC, message catalogs, network tuning
  • The performance of the FillDB component has been improved on Windows systems.
  • The BigFix server and relay can be installed on Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 7.
  • On Windows systems, the BigFix server and the Web Reports components can now be installed on 64-bit platforms only (Microsoft Windows Vista and Windows 2008). The Microsoft Windows 2003 platform is no longer supported for installing the BigFix server, the Web Reports and the console.
  • Both the code and the documentation have been reworked to implement an easy way for configuring the HTTP proxy on the server and client during the BigFix installation. The same method is valid on both Windows and Linux systems.
Starting from V9.2 Patch 6, BigFix provides the following new features and enhancements:
  • New reports within the Web Reports component to provide more analytics on hardware and software inventory and patch information.
  • Microsoft Windows 64-bit support added for all BigFix server components (allowing the components to access more than 4 GB of memory) and Microsoft Windows 10 support added for the agent.
  • Supports use of SAML V2.0 authentication via LDAP-backed SAML identity providers for the Web Reports and the Web UI. This support can be used to enforce two-factors authentication for BigFix with Common Access Cards (CAC), Personal Identity Verification (PIV) cards, or other factors. For more information, see SAML V2.0 Authentication Support.

Starting from V9.2 Patch 3, only the 64-bit architecture is supported for installing the BigFix Server, Console and Web Reports components on Windows systems.

For more information about the changes and the enhancements introduced with V9.2, see Change and Release Notes.

For a list of known limitations that affect V9.2, see Known limitations in BigFix V9.2.0.