Adding a data source

To collect data from multiple infrastructures and report it to a single instance of License Metric Tool, add multiple data sources to License Metric Tool. You can have a mixture of disconnected and BigFix® data sources that report to a single instance of License Metric Tool. In case of BigFix, it can use both MS SQL or DB2 regardless of which database License Metric Tool uses.

1. In the top navigation bar, click Management > Data Sources. Then, click New.
2. From the Data Source type list, select the type of the data source.
   • To add a disconnected data source, choose Disconnected. Then, perform the following steps.
     1. Provide the data source name and the location of the directory to which packages with disconnected scan results are uploaded.
     2. Optional: If you are using License Metric Tool Lite and you do not have disconnected scanners installed in your infrastructure, click the links in the Disconnected scanner installation packages section. For more information about downloading and installing the disconnected scanners, see: Downloading the disconnected scanner package (disconnected scenario).

        If you are using License Metric Tool with Ansible, use playbooks to install the disconnected scanners. For more information, see: https://github.com/IBM/ansible-automation-for-lmt.

   • To add a BigFix data source, choose BigFix on DB2 or BigFix on SQL Server. Then, perform the following steps.
     Note: You can choose BigFix on DB2 or on MS SQL Server regardless of which database License Metric Tool uses.
     1. To automatically enable scans that collect data from the computers in your infrastructure, select Enable default scan schedule for this data source.

        If you enable the default scan schedule, actions that are needed to collect data from the computers in your infrastructure are automatically started on the BigFix server. This option is advised for environments with up to a few thousand computers. For larger environments, divide the computers into groups, and then manually set up scan schedule for each group to avoid performance issues. For more information about the default and manual scan schedule, see: Setting up data collection (BigFix scenario).

     2. Provide a unique name for the data source.
     3. Specify the host, port, and database name of the BigFix database.
        If you selected BigFix on SQL Server, the format of the host name depends on whether you are connecting to a default instance of the MS SQL Server and use the default port.

        	Default instance of MS SQL Server	Non-default instance of MS SQL Server
        Default port	hostname	hostname\instance_name:port
        Non-default port	hostname:port	hostname\instance_name:port

     4. If you selected BigFix on SQL Server, choose the authentication method.
        Restriction: If your License Metric Tool server is installed on Linux, you cannot choose Windows authentication.
     5. Specify credentials of the user that can access the BigFix server database.
        Important:

        BigFix on DB2

        Ensure that the DB2 user has the DBAUTH permission for the BigFix database (BFENT). The permission applies only if the database was installed with default settings, and all customizations and hardening configurations were consulted with IBM support.

        BigFix on MS SQL

        Ensure that the MS SQL Server user has the following permissions for the BigFix database (BFEnterprise): CREATE FUNCTION, CREATE SCHEMA, CREATE TABLE, CREATE VIEW, EXECUTE, SELECT. These permissions apply only if the database was installed with default settings and all customizations and hardening configurations were consulted with IBM support.

     6. Provide credentials of the Console Operator that you created while installing BigFix (by default, IEMAdmin).
     7. Optional: If the BigFix and License Metric Tool servers are in separated networks, the automatic address lookup might return incorrect address. To disable the lookup, select Disable automatic address lookup, and specify the address manually. Then, configure additional environment variables on the License Metric Tool server. For more information, see: Configuring servers in separate networks (BigFix scenario).
3. To create the data source, click Create.