automatic nightly updates

[Jesse Keating]

On Mon, 2005-04-25 at 14:33 -0400, Jim Popovitch wrote:
> You sort of just described such a system.  It makes good sense to have
> one or two production servers auto-update.

No.  Period.  The autoupdating ones are the ones in the lab.  Running as
close to a config as the production systems as possible.  THESE can
auto-update for testing purposes.

>   Those sames systems can then
> be quickly tested and then used as the update server for the internal
> system. 

Bad idea.  Don't autoupdate any production level system.  If you can't
have it go down at any time, don't allow auto updates.

>  What benefit do I gain by waiting on an email then manually
> downloading an update vs having the system automatically download and
> apply the update?  

Again, see above.

> Would you prefer Microsoft to automatically update end user systems
> (even small business Exchange systems hanging off a T1s everywhere),
> or
> do you think that it's best to wait on those people to get around to
> finally updating their virus ridden systems?  I personally think a
> valid
> case can be made for vendors forcibly updating neglected systems.  ;-)

I would never do business with a company that would want to install
updates w/out my approval.  People have the option to enable auto
updates if they want.  I personally have been bitten by way too many
updates that failed in a particular configuration that just wasn't
expected at the test labs at a vendor location.  A vendor can't possibly
test every permutation of how their update will effect running systems.
They make a best effort and it is the end user's responsibility to plan,
test, deploy, and test again to make sure the update doesn't cause any
problems.  Preferably with backups and a backout plan.  No changes
happen to production servers here without this.  Because of that we
haven't had an unexpected shutdown (minus hardware failure) in a very
very very long time.

-- 
Jesse Keating RHCE      (geek.j2solutions.net)
Fedora Legacy Team      (www.fedoralegacy.org)
GPG Public Key          (geek.j2solutions.net/jkeating.j2solutions.pub)
 
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