The software maintenance contracts available together with TightGate-Pro entitle you to updates and upgrades within the term. The update of TightGate-Pro is possible manually or time-controlled.
Special tasks of the administrator update are the:
In general, the installation of updates always requires the prior download of the updates. Since the updates can be several 100 MB in size, it makes sense to download the updates beforehand. During the download, the productive operation of TightGate-Pro can continue unhindered. During an update (installation of the updates), all user sessions are automatically logged off from TightGate-Pro. The TightGate-Pro server is not available to users during the update.
Both the download and the actual update can be time-controlled. This makes it possible to postpone the download of the updates to a time of low network load. The actual update should be scheduled at times when there are no users, so that productive operation is affected as little as possible.
The execution of an update should be planned in such a way that the users of TightGate-Pro are informed about the maintenance work in good time.
The auto-update should not be confused with the time-controlled update. While time-controlled updates start automatically at a fixed time, only the update process itself is automated in the case of the auto-update . However, it must be initiated manually by calling up the menu item Auto-Update.
This is how it works:
1. schedule maintenance operation (approx. 2 hours before carrying out the update!)
Update 2.
A TightGate-Pro server (single system or Clsuternode) cannot be updated with users logged in. Therefore, all running user sessions are automatically terminated during the update process (after a query). Under certain circumstances, data may be lost on the part of the users. Before a system update, the upcoming maintenance work should be announced via the internal notification system of TightGate-Pro with sufficient advance notice. This gives users the opportunity to complete their work and save important data before the update begins.
TightGate-Pro offers the option to start the update process automatically at a certain time without intervention. For this purpose, the TightGate-Pro server contacts the update servers of m-privacy GmbH at the scheduled time and checks them for available updates. If no updates are available, the process is terminated until the next scheduled update run and the result is logged. If, on the other hand, updates are available, maintenance mode is activated, i.e. logged-in users receive a notice of the upcoming work. Single systems deactivate the client logon immediately before the start of the update process; in cluster systems, the node of the computer network to be updated is excluded from the load distribution 1 hour before the update.
At the configured time, all logged-in users are disconnected, the updates are retrieved and installed. Finally, the system or the node is restarted if necessary as a result of the update. If the process is consistently error-free, the maintenance operation is cancelled and the VNC logon for users is released again.
This is how it works:
1. set a time-controlled download
2. set time-controlled update
In computer networks (cluster systems), several nodes can carry out scheduled updates at the same time. It is essential to ensure that no more nodes of a computer network carry out updates at the same time than the maximum permissible. It is strongly recommended to plan time-controlled updates for complex computer networks (cluster systems) in consultation with the technical customer service of m-privacy GmbH !
If a scheduled update fails, an update lock is automatically set, which initially prevents further update attempts. In this case, a menu option Remove update lock is displayed in the administrator's main menu update . This must be selected to remove the lock and enable a new update run.
Special situations may require unscheduled updates at TightGate-Pro. The technical customer service of m-privacy GmbH informs users in cases where unscheduled updates ("hotfixes") should be applied by e-mail and, in urgent cases, additionally by telephone. These services are included in all software maintenance levels.
Unscheduled updates can be installed manually or automatically with the normal scheduled update process.
This is how it works:
If an update is omitted, serious problems may occur with further updates. It is therefore advisable to catch up on a previously omitted update. To do this, log in as update and go to the submenu Customer service. Here you can update individual packages (Partial update from Oldstable) or the entire system (Full update from Oldstable).
For the sake of operational safety, it is necessary to sensibly limit the existing automatic updates of TightGate-Pro. If a time-controlled update (download incl. import of files) is planned, the download of the update files starts 1 hour before the actual update run. A maximum of 10 attempts will be made to obtain the necessary files from the update server of m-privacy GmbH . If the download fails, a "warning flag" is set and another 10 download attempts are made immediately before the actual update run. If the download fails again, the time control is first switched off and the actual update run is prevented by an update lock.
If the node of a cluster system is involved, it also switches to maintenance mode if the download of the update files has definitely failed. This can only be deactivated manually as an administrator maint .
As soon as the "warning flag" is set due to a failed download, the error status is also signalled via Nagios using the sensor check_versions with the error message "Update download failed". Furthermore, a corresponding display "Update download error" is shown in the title bar of the administrator's configuration menus update . The "warning flag" can only be reset by completely downloading the update files.
There are two ways to proceed:
In contrast to the update lock, a "warning flag" about the failed download cannot be deleted manually. This has no influence on the productive operation of TightGate-Pro and does not hinder the initiation of further manual or time-controlled updates. However, the error is indicated until the next successful download of the update files.