Tool to aid patching

[Adrian Parker]

Hi,

Are there any freeware tools available to help with maintaining VMS patches? Looking at patches for VMS on ITRC, there are currently 76 for V7.3 and 54 for V7.3-1.

I'm thinking of something along the lines of the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyser (prevoiusly HFNETCHK), or Redhat Network.

Cheers,
Adrian

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello,

this is one of the aspects of ITRC which is really bad :-(

There are a lot less patches you really want to install, since most of them are actually bundeled into UPDx patches. For a well organized list have a look at

http://ftp.support.compaq.com.au/pub/ecoinfo/ecoinfo/index.html

I still hope that in spite of the PC correct notice on the top the good people downunder manage to keep this running after Oct, 1st.

Greetings, Martin

[John Gillings]

Adrian,
The only "patch" you need to know about for V7.3 is called V7.3-1 :-)

Many (most?) of the patches listed for V7.3-1 on ITRC have been superseded by VMS731_UPDATE-V0200. I'm not sure why they're still listed. The ITRC Patch site is new and some issues are still being worked out. Expect improvements in the near future.

Martin,
As one of the people responsible for the Sydney ECO site, I can tell you that updates were terminated yesterday (30th Sep 2003). Since our data source has been shutdown, and the format of recent ECO releases changed beyond the recognition capabilities of our software, it's way too much effort to rewite it all.

So, the site will be frozen in the state it's in right now. It may serve as a "deep archive" for old ECOs and unsupported versions. It all depends on what customers want.
The ITRC site either now has, or will have, all the features we implemented and more (I've always wanted to do the "shopping cart" model, but didn't have the resources) so there's no need for us to continue operating our unofficial, unsupported, unfunded and unapproved site :-)
The ITRC folk welcome feedback and will act on it, so please let them know what you want.

I believe they're planning on using some of the ideas from the Sydney ECO site, and implementing them for all platforms (including HP-UX).

We had hoped for more overlap between the sites, but circumstances beyond our control have prevented it. Sorry!

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello John,

It is a shame your site has to go.

Nevertheless I do want to express my gratitude for your work on an extremely usefull tool for hps customers in the past!

Lets hope the best for itrcs future in this area.

Greetings, Martin

[Mike Naime]

Well, Whoever is maintaining the VMS patches is doing a bad job in removing duplicates. I was looking for the new LAN patch, and found it listed twice.
-
For those that really do not want to install the UPDATE patch because of some of the included stuff, having access to the individual patches is still a desired end result.
-
Example: If I have a DS10 system, I do not want/need to install all of those CPUXXXX patches that address GSxxx issues. Also, If I am not using a particular layered product, I do not need a patch for that product that is never running on my system.

[Adrian Parker]

Thanks for the quick responses. I have no problem finding the patches. I used to use the Sydney site and now use ITRC following the shutdown.

I really wanted to find a tool that could audit a system and provide a list of available patches, not just for VMS but layered products as well.

Martin, you wrote
>... (I've always wanted to do the "shopping
>cart" model, but didn't have the resources)

Sounds like a step towards a VMS Windows Update..if this information could be provided in a standard format (MS distribute an mssecure.xml) this could be linked to providing a shopping list based on an analysis of my system. This is really what I'm looking for..

Cheers,
Adrian

[Willem Grooters]

It would if only date of release and severity were mentioned in the main data (preferably as a sort key). I lack both! Have to select them for download first, which shows me the date only.
I have told Engineering, they're willing enough, it's the patch-release department that seems to be reluctant in adding these items....Problem is that the current ITRC patch-area cost me a lot of time just selecting the patches I _may_ need, just because this data is lacking!