Assigning components to products

9.2.7 Available from 9.2.7. After new components are discovered, they are associated with products based on bundling rules. As a result, most components are automatically assigned to products. Correct assignment of software components reduces the cost of software ownership and ensures audit readiness. Compare the automatically created bundles with information in your license agreement, confirm the accurate assignments, or reassign the components to right products.

Before you begin

An icon representing a user. You must have the Manage Software Classification permission to view the Software Classification panel and classify software. To view some additional columns related to computers on which the components are installed, you also need the View Endpoints permission.

About this task

Assign components to products based on the following scenarios:
  • Assign a single component to a single product.
  • Assign multiple components to a single product. To properly use this option, set filters that limit the displayed components, select them, and assign to the product.
  • Assign a single component more than once to share this component between multiple products. Each assignment associates the component with one selected product. To view all shared components, apply the following filter: Shared, equal to, Yes.

You can automate your software classification process by creating a set of custom rules that will automatically classify your newly discovered software. For more information, see: Creating and managing custom rules.

Procedure

  1. Log in to BigFix Inventory, and go to Reports > Software Classification.
  2. Select a component or components that you want to assign.
  3. Hover over the Assign icon The assignment icon. and click Choose from Catalog.
    Tip: To narrow the list of displayed products, you can sort the data by columns or use the search bar that is available at the top of each column. After you type the search phrase, press Enter.
  4. Select the product to which you want to assign the component and the license metric that is suitable for your pricing calculations model.
    • If you want to assign the component to a product according to a relation that is defined in the software catalog, simply select the product from the list.
    • If the product is not detected and the value of the Product Name column is <not set>, see:Catalog Problems: The <not set> value appears under the Product Name on Software Classification panel.
    • If none of the products that is listed by default matches your license agreement, create a custom relation known as custom bundling. You create a custom bundling in the following situations.
      • The component was obtained as part of a product that is not listed as an existing relation.
      • 9.2.12 The type of the relation that is listed in your license agreement is not available by default. For example, when the existing relation between the component and the product is charged, but your license agreement states that the component is not charged.
      To create a custom bundling, perform the following steps.
      1. Clear the List products for which the component is listed as a bundling option check box to view all products that exist in the catalog, and select the appropriate product.
      2. Specify whether you want the relation between the component and the product to be charged or not charged. If you specify the relation as not charged, the component does not contribute to the license metric utilization of the product to which it is assigned.
      Creating a custom bundling impacts using bundling assistant. It increases the chance for newly discovered components to get automatically bundled according to custom bundling definition.
      Note: 10.0.11 Starting from version 10.0.11, you can assign components to products coming from template signatures, having product version *.
  5. Optional: To extend the current component assignment with the selected product instead of reassigning the component, select Share component. The component will be shared between the product to which it is currently assigned and the selected product.
    If you share the same component between multiple products, each assignment is listed as a separate instance on the report.
    Note: To stop sharing the component between multiple products, select all instances of the component and assign them to a common product, but leave the Share component check box cleared.
  6. Optional: If you do not want the assignment to be automatically confirmed, clear the Automatically confirm the affected components check box.
    Note: To change the default setting of the check box, go to Management > Advanced Server Settings, and change the value of the automaticConfirm parameter according to your preferences.
  7. To change the assignment, click Assign.

Results

The component is reassigned to the specified product and metric. The change is reflected on the report.

What to do next

To ensure that metric utilization reflects the change of the component assignment, go to Reports > All Metrics, and click Recalculate.