How To Install or Upgrade Open-AudIT (Windows)

Owned by Mark Unwin
Last updated: Aug 07, 2024
3 min read

(and discovering What’s On Your Network in 10 minutes)

Open-AudIT can be downloaded, installed, configured and discovering devices in under 10 minutes.

The main points are:

  • Go to Nmap.org and download Nmap for Windows. Install Nmap.
  • Download and install the Microsoft Visual C runtime.
  • If you haven't already, go to firstwave.com or open-audit.org and download the latest version. Install Open-AudIT.
  • Edit the Apache service on Windows.
  • Log on to Open-AudIT and fill out the form to receive a free 20 device license.
  • Add some credentials.
  • Add a Discovery.
  • Run the Discovery.
  • Done!

Installing

Windows Server only (or Linux)

Open-AudIT should be installed on 64bit Windows Server systems only. Windows 10 and Windows 11 are not supported.

Nmap

Open-AudIT uses Nmap as part of its discovery routine. No Nmap, no discovery. Go to the nmap.org webpage, click the Downloads link and download the latest Nmap version for Windows.

Linux users don’t have to do this as our Linux installer will automatically install Nmap (and the other dependencies) for you.

Install Nmap by right-clicking the .exe and selecting “Run as Administrator”, and simply use the default (already chosen) options. Open-AudIT doesn’t require any special setup or configuration of Nmap – we just need it installed.

Visual C Runtime

Please install the latest Visual C runtime from https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/the-latest-supported-visual-c-downloads-2647da03-1eea-4433-9aff-95f26a218cc0

Go to open-audit.org and download the latest version. Supply your name, email and company and download the binary. Right click the .exe and selecting “Run as Administrator”.

Download and Install

Log on to Open-AudIT and you should see a splash screen informing you that you do not have a license – but Opmantek will give you a 20 device license for free. Just fill out the form and your 20 device Professional license will be activated.

All you need to do now is add some credentials, add a discovery and run it. Done!

You can see the entire process below in a short video.

A more in depth explanation for Linux users is available on this page. That page details items like Apache proxy configuration, ip tables concerns, etc. The installer should take care of these automatically, but in case something goes wrong, please consult that page.


Edit the Apache service on Windows

For Open-AudIT 5.0.0 and newer, when running Open-AudIT on Windows the Apache service account must be that of a 'regular' user (or the Administrator). This is because the "Local System" account normally used to run Apache has no access to any "network" resources. IE - We cannot use Apache when running as the Local System account account to copy the audit script to Windows PCs.

To make the change, just follow the steps below.

Select the Start menu and type "services". Click the Services icon.

Next, right click the Apache2.4 service and select Properties, then click the Log On tab.

Select the "This Account" checkbox and provide the account name and password.

Next, click OK, then right click the Apache 2.4 service and click Restart. Done.

Upgrading

Upgrading is essentially the same as installing - although you will already have Nmap, so no need to reinstall that.

Just run the installer as per above and when you log on to the web interface, you will be directed to the database schema upgrade screen.

Run this and your schema will be upgraded and you can then continue to use Open-AudIT as normal.

Don't forget we have release notes available for every version so you'll know exactly what has changed.



Database Creation

Open-AudIT requires a database to store its information in. The installer automatically does this for you, but if you ever need to manually create this database, the commands to do so are below. You should have already set a root password. If you have not, the default root password set by an Open-AudIT installation is openauditrootuserpassword.

Create the database.

c:\xampp\mysql\bin\mysql.exe -u root -p -e "CREATE DATABASE openaudit;"

Create the database user.

c:\xampp\mysql\bin\mysql -u root -p -e "CREATE USER openaudit@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'openauditpassword';"

Give the user access tot he database.

c:\xampp\mysql\bin\mysql -u root -p -e "GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON openaudit.* TO openaudit@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'openauditpassword'; FLUSH PRIVILEGES;"

Populate the database schema.

c:\xampp\mysql\bin\mysql -u root -p openaudit -e "c:\xampp\open-audit\other\openaudit_mysql.sql"