From AppClarity 4.5, the ActiveEfficiency connector is the only means of getting data into AppClarity. It is enabled by default during installation but you can disable it at any time. Disabling integration services hides the connector but any data already in the AppClarity database is not purged.

It is no longer necessary or possible to add Configuration Manager connectors. They are available for you to view historical information related to the connection. However, you can delete these legacy connectors created in previous versions. There is also no longer a need to configure linked servers as the connection with Configuration Manager is now managed by the ActiveEfficiency Scout.

Connectors and their statuses

Connectors under Data Capture lets you to manage connections to ActiveEfficiency data sources. if you have any legacy Configuration Manager connectors they will also be displayed here – for you to view the status of the last synchronization.

To mange connections to ActiveEfficiency:

1. Click the Data Capture icon  to the left of the Console.
2. In the Data Capture navigation tree, click Connectors. The main screen displays an overview of its status.
   
   In this example, it displays the name and type of the ActiveEfficiency data source, the result for the last synchronization, the date and time it occurred and the number of new applications that were discovered.

Viewing connector details

To view details for a particular connector:

1. In the Data Capture screen, click Connectors to expand the tree.
2. Click a particular connector. It's details which are displayed in a table where each row represents an event for that connector. These events are:
   
   • Start – the time and date the event started
   • End – the time and date the event completed
   • Result – succeeded or failed
   • Details – details for the event. If this is the first event where the connector is created, it displays Created. If this is a synchronization event, it shows the number of new applications discovered.
3. Selecting an event displays its Properties and Discovered Application tabs.
   
   • The Properties tab displays verbose information for that particular event
   • The Discovered Applications tab displays a list of up to 250 newly discovered applications during the synchronization
     
   On the first synchronization, this is likely to contain a large list of discovered applications. We recommend managing these from the Applications and Products node. On subsequent synchronizations, the number of discovered applications will be much smaller and can be easily managed here.

   The columns for this list is described as:

   Column	Description
   Publisher	The publisher for the application retrieved from Add/Remove Programs or Programs and Features.
   Product	The name of the application retrieved from Add/Remove Programs or Programs and Features.
   Full Version	The version number of the application retrieved from Add/Remove Programs or Programs and Features.
   State	The status of the application which can be one of: Available for linking – an exact match to the Catalog was not found. Review the available for linking status by following the link. Product name – application is identified as belonging to a particular product. Review the association by following the link. Action – link, re-link or unlink the application. An applications can be disassociated from a product. To do this, select a product from the list and click Unlink (). You will be prompted to confirm your actions. Applications not associated with a products become Available for linking. For all states other than Auto Excluded the Link/Re-Link button () is enabled. To associate the application with a product, click the Re-Link Application button to open the Select or Create Product dialog for you to choose a publisher, product and release to associate the application with. If the application is already linked to a product, the dialog is pre-populated with the product details. For Applications in the Available for linking, Junk or Excluded states, the dialog fields are empty.

The AppClarity synchronizer

You can synchronize the connectors at any given time from the Console.

To do this:

1. In the Data Capture screen, click Connectors to expand the tree.
2. Select a connector.
3. On the menu , click  .

AppClarity also provides a command-line tool (the AppClarity.Coordinator.Synchronizer.exe) for starting the synchronization. It is installed as part of the AppClarity Service feature. The executable takes a single parameter – the name of the connector to synchronize. For example, to synchronize the connecter called ActiveEfficiency:

C:\Program Files (x86)\1E\AppClarity\Coordinator\AppClarity.Coordinator.Synchronizer.exe "ActiveEfficiency"

You must be an AppClarity administrator to use this tool. You can use it together with Windows Task Scheduler to create a daily schedule. When configuring tasks in Windows Task Scheduler, you will need to set an appropriate user account

Scheduling a synchronization

To ensure that application and usage data in AppClarity is always up-to-date, we recommend the ActiveEfficiency Connector is synchronized on a daily basis using the ActiveEfficiency Synchronization Manager. While it is still possible to schedule the ActiveEfficiency Scout and the AppClarity synchronizer to run independently, use the ActiveEfficiency Synchronization Manager for simplicity. You can also synchronize the ActiveEfficiency connector by selecting it and using the Synchronize action.