Upgrading to BigFix Inventory 9.2.17

You can upgrade to BigFix Inventory 9.2.17 from all 9.x versions. Upgrade of the entire environment consists of upgrading the BigFix Inventory server, VM Manager Tool, and the scanner as well as restarting actions created by fixlets that were updated. You cannot upgrade between different operating systems.

Before you begin

Important: It is strongly recommended, especially in big environments, to first perform the upgrade in the test environment. To do this, back up your production database, restore it on the test server, and perform the upgrade there. If it is successful, perform the upgrade on the production server.

Ensure that no files or directories in the BigFix Inventory installation directory are open in an external program. For example, that no log files are open in a text editor. Also, ensure that no PDF reports are being generated during the server upgrade. Otherwise, the upgrade might fail with error code 41.

For information about space requirements, see: Hardware requirements for the server on Windows or Hardware requirements for the server on Linux.

Procedure

  1. If the computer on which the BigFix server is installed does not have the Internet access, update the fixlet site.
    Otherwise, the site is updated automatically after its new version is released.
    Note: To check whether you have the latest version of the fixlet site, see: Checking the version of the fixlet site.
  2. Create a back up of the BigFix Inventory database, installation registry, and the server files to be able to restore the server if the upgrade fails.
  3. Upgrade the server. The easiest and preferred method is by using a fixlet. To use this method on Linux, the server must be installed by a root user. Alternatively, you can upgrade the server in interactive or silent mode.
    1. In the BigFix console, go to Sites > External Sites > IBM BigFix Inventory v9 > Fixlets and Tasks.
    2. Select Upgrade to the latest version of BigFix Inventory, and click Take Action.
    3. Select the computer on which the server is installed, and click OK.
      Tip: To check the status of the upgrade, in the BigFix console, go to Actions and look for the upgrade action. If the upgrade fails, check the logs.

    During the upgrade of the server, new software catalog and PVU table are uploaded to BigFix Inventory. The versions that are uploaded are the newest ones that were available during the release of the application update to which you are upgrading. If the versions that are already available in BigFix Inventory are newer than the ones that are uploaded as part of the upgrade, the upload is skipped.

  4. Upgrade the VM Manager Tool to the latest version.
    1. In the BigFix console, go to Fixlets and Tasks.
    2. Select Update VM Manager Tool to version version number, and click Take Action.
    3. Select the computer on which the VM Manager Tool is installed, and click OK.
  5. If the new version of the scanner contains security fixes, fixes of problems that appear in your environment, or new features that you want to use, upgrade the scanner to the latest version. For information about changes introduced in each version of the scanner, see the BigFix Inventory wiki.
    To update the scanner, perform the following steps:
    1. In the BigFix console, go to Fixlets and Tasks.
    2. Select Install or Update Scanner, and click Take Action.
    3. Select all relevant computers, and click OK.
  6. If some of the fixlets were updated on the action site, and you want to use features for which running the new version of the fixlet is required, restart actions created by these fixlets. Otherwise, the new features might not work properly.
    To restart the actions, perform the following steps:
    1. In the BigFix console, go to Actions.
    2. Look for actions started by the fixlets that were updated, right-click each action, and click Stop Action.
    3. Run the updated version of the fixlets.
  7. If the server database schema changed between the versions, update it after the upgrade of the server completes For the MS SQL database, the user who is configured in this database must have the db_owner role. Log in to BigFix Inventory, and click Update Schema.
    Important:

    The update can take from a couple of minutes to a couple of hours depending on your environment size and how long you have BigFix Inventory installed.

  8. To ensure that all changes are processed, run an import. In BigFix Inventory, click Management > Data Imports, and click Import Now.
    Important: The first import after the upgrade might last longer because it includes the new software catalog.

Results

After the upgrade, the following reports and panels are removed from the menu as they become deprecated.
  • Usage Properties
  • Package Properties
  • UNIX Package Properties
  • Current State Values

What to do next

Table 1. Considerations after the upgrade
Version from which you are upgrading Considerations
Earlier than 9.2.11

Information about version of scanned files is re-imported to show more details. The data is displayed on the Scanned File Data report in the File Version column.

The data is re-imported during a number of consecutive imports to avoid performance issues. Each consecutive import contains data from 10000 computers. The number of imports during which the data is re-imported is specified in the resync_imports parameter that is available on the Management > Advanced Server Settings panel.

Earlier than 9.2.1

If you had computer groups defined, subcapacity calculations are disabled for those groups after the upgrade. As a result, some of the panels and reports are not visible for users who are assigned to those computer groups. To re-enable subcapacity calculations, go to Management > Computer Groups, open a computer group, and select PVU, RVU MAPC and VPC. Then, click Save. For more information, see: Setting up computer groups.