Software policy compliance

A software policy compliance scan determines whether a managed server’s is compliant with the software resources, application configurations specified in its attached software policies. Scripts specified in a software policy are not used to determine software compliance. If the managed server does not match its attached software policies’ requirements, the server is considered to be non-compliant.

If a managed server is not compliant with even a single attached software policy, it is considered non-compliant. Non-compliant servers must be brought into compliance by remediating the software policy against the server.

The SA Client displays the following compliance information for managed servers:

  • Compliant: If a server is compliant with all software policies attached to it, the server is considered compliant and displays this icon .
  • Non-compliant: If a managed server is not compliant with one or more of the software policies attached to it, the server is considered non-compliant and is represented by the icon .
  • Scan Started: When a software compliance scan is in progress and information is currently being calculated, the server is represented by the icon .
  • Scan Needed: If a server’s software compliance information must be (re)calculated or its compliance information could be inaccurate, it is represented by the icon .
  • Not Applicable: Software compliance information is not applicable and the server is represented by a dash (—).

For example, if you detach a software policy from a managed server but do not remediate the server against the detached software policy to remove the installed software, the server’s compliance status is displayed as Not Applicable.

Using the SA Client, you can scan for software compliance by selecting servers from the server list or from the Compliance view of a server or device group. See Running the software policy compliance scan for information about performing a compliance scan from the server list. See "The Compliance View" in the Audit and Compliance for information about the Compliance View for a device or device group.

Running the software policy compliance scan

Perform the following tasks to scan a managed server for software policy compliance:

  1. From the SA Client navigation pane, select Devices>Servers>All Managed Servers. The server list appears in the content pane.
  2. From the content pane, select a server to scan.
  3. From the Actions menu, select Scan>Software Compliance. During the scan, a dialogue shows the status of the scan. After the scan, the compliance status of the server appears in the server list.

The results of this scan show you the servers that are in compliance and the servers that are out of compliance and specify the number of checks that the server is not compliant with.

Remediate non-compliant servers to bring the servers back into compliance. The software compliance scan status is automatically updated after you install or uninstall software or remediate a software policy against a managed server. For more information, see Remediate servers with software policies.