External systems integration is one of the key features of BigFix Inventory. Business logic is enabled for integration and interfaces are provided for common integration points.
Managing large amounts of information by using the application user interface can be time-consuming. You can use the REST APIs as an alternative to the graphical user interface to reduce the time that is needed to manage your software inventory and the content of your software catalog.
You can use REST API requests to import contracts from a csv file.
BigFix Inventory detects software components which are bundled with the product.
The operations of the BigFix Inventory REST API protocol are defined as HTTP methods on certain REST resources.
You use connectors and operators to build query segments that filter on matching conditions and values.
Available from 9.2.8. For some REST APIs, version 2 is created to provide improved functions or experience. In such cases, the original API becomes deprecated with time and only version 2 is further developed. If you have custom tools or internal processes that are based on such REST APIs, it is best to adjust the tools to use the new version of the APIs.
You use the POST operation on the api/get_token element to request your unique token that is required to authenticate the REST API requests.
POST
api/get_token
You use the GET operation on the api/sam/about element to request information about the version of BigFix Inventory.
GET
api/sam/about
Available from 9.2.2. Retrieving raw scan results through REST API is intended to improve the monitoring of your environment by allowing you to quickly discover software that was installed or modified recently. By using shortened data imports, data about your software reaches the server much quicker, and at the same time allows you to increase the number of imports that you can run each day.
You can reduce the time needed to manage your software inventory in a large environment by using REST API instead of the application user interface. You can use REST API to get a list of software products, releases, and release instances. You can also find out how your software can be bundled.
You can reduce the time that is needed to manage your software instances in a large environment by using REST API instead of the application user interface. You can use REST API to share instances, include or exclude instances from a pricing calculation, confirm and assign instances, and reassign instances.
You can use REST API requests to add and change VM managers in your infrastructure.
Available from 9.2.3. You can change the parameters of the BigFix Inventory server by using REST API.
You can use this REST API to quickly retrieve large amounts of data related to your computer systems, clusters, software instances, and license usage. Once the data is retrieved, it can be passed to other applications for further processing and analysis.
Available from 9.2.8. You can use REST API requests to quickly retrieve large amounts of data related to license metric utilization as well as your software inventory, including historical data about uninstalled software. You can then pass this data to other applications for further processing and analysis.
Available from 9.2.8. You can use REST API requests to quickly retrieve large amounts of data related to hardware inventory, including historical data about removed computers. You can then pass this data to other applications for further processing and analysis.
Available from 9.2.11. You can set and delete the end of support date for any software component by using REST API.
Available from 9.2.14. You can add and remove tags for any software component by using REST API.
You can use REST API requests to export a saved report view from one instance of BigFix Inventory and import it to another instance of the application.
You use the POST operation on the api/sam/contracts/import element to import contracts from a csv file
api/sam/contracts/import
You can use the cURL command-line tool to issue a POST request to import a csv file with contracts.
Available from 9.2.8. You use the PUT operation on the api/v1/servers element to change the processor core factor that is applied to a group of servers for the purpose of calculating utilization of the Oracle Processor Core metric.
PUT
api/v1/servers
Available from 9.2.8. For REST APIs in version 2, you can use associations to retrieve additional data as part of API requests. For example, you can retrieve detailed information about computer hardware as part of the software_instances API request.
software_instances
IBM Control Desk is an integrated service management solution that helps you manage a comprehensive range of IT processes, services, and assets. You can use one of its components, Integration Composer, to import and then process data from external applications, like BigFix Inventory.