tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post5524522831621032229..comments2023-11-01T18:25:49.063+01:00Comments on VMware Front Experience: Are ESXi 5.x patches cumulative?Andreas Peetzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comBlogger17125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-65469041616486175862018-12-17T13:53:06.301+01:002018-12-17T13:53:06.301+01:00Info still useful today.
Going from 6.0.0-2.34.362...Info still useful today.<br />Going from 6.0.0-2.34.3620759 to 6.0.0-3.110.10719132.<br /><br />VMware obviously want to popularise their software, hook you up and eventually make you pay for licenses.<br />Citrix Xen implement the same strategy. Manual updating is non-trivial.<br /><br />Adam from LondonAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-1072487685612388042017-04-07T10:16:32.700+02:002017-04-07T10:16:32.700+02:00Andreas, this is a life-saver post.
While I am te...Andreas, this is a life-saver post.<br /><br />While I am technically an I.T. professional I haven't done much with VMware for at least a year or two, and I spent the better part of a day today trying to figure out the disastrous VMware support/download portals and documentation which are, to put it nicely, very unhelpfully designed. It's amazing how many words they can put on a page without actually clarifying the matter at hand.<br /><br />To make matters worse there are TONS of misleading and misinforming blog and forum posts out there, including some right on VMware's own blog, that do little to clear up the confusion about exactly how the patching process works. When I ran across your post today I recalled your domain from when I was doing more with VMware, and I'm very glad I found it again.<br /><br />One of the problems I think is that it's much more complicated for those of us using free ESXi licenses. It would surely be much simpler to just use vCenter/Update Manager, but this is not an option for us. (It also leads me to wonder if VMware is not actually too sad that free users are left in perpetual confusion about how to get things done. ;) )<br /><br />Just wanted to let you know that 4.5 years after you posted this, it's still doing a lot of good. :)<br /><br /><br />Phil in CaliforniaAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-42949162825332636312016-03-01T10:51:19.938+01:002016-03-01T10:51:19.938+01:00Hi Anonymous,
the reason for the differing patch ...Hi Anonymous,<br /><br />the reason for the differing patch bundle sizes is that some patch bundles include an additional security-only Imageprofile and possibly *two* versions of the large esx-base and tools-light VIBs.<br /><br />Example:<br />The ESXi 6.0 Update 1b bundle includes esx-base and tools-light versions 6.0.0-1.26.3380124 (from Imageprofile ESXi-6.0.0-20160104001-standard), but also esx-base and tools-light versions 6.0.0-1.23.3341439 (from Imageprofile ESXi-6.0.0-20160101001s-standard).<br />This nearly doubles its size (compared to a patch bundle that does not include an additional security-only Imageprofile).<br /><br />AndreasAndreas Peetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-45462665658873100112016-03-01T10:41:04.649+01:002016-03-01T10:41:04.649+01:00I know the topic is old, however could you explain...I know the topic is old, however could you explain why some of the patch archives are almost twice the size than others?<br /><br /><br />The size from one patch ZIP file to the next jumps from typically ~ 350 MB to something around 650 MB. <br /><br />However I did update from 6.0 Update 1 directly to the latest patch (as of writing: ESXi600-201602001 / build 3568940) and saw that all VIBs mentioned in your patch tracker that got updated between Update 1 and this patch were updated as well (for example 'xhci-xhci' which got updated just before the mentioned patch in build 3380124).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-23295832256267213252016-02-25T08:41:21.133+01:002016-02-25T08:41:21.133+01:00Hi Anonymous,
the vihostupdate.pl script was for ...Hi Anonymous,<br /><br />the vihostupdate.pl script was for ESXi 4.1 only (which is quite old now). If you are still on ESXi 4.1 then you should upgrade to 5.0 using vihostupdate.pl, and from there to 5.5 or 6.0 using esxcli (a direct upgrade from 4.1 to 6.0 is not supported).<br /><br />AndreasAndreas Peetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-28380048339460919042016-02-24T05:59:27.818+01:002016-02-24T05:59:27.818+01:00thank you very much.i use "vihostupdate.pl --...thank you very much.i use "vihostupdate.pl --server 192.168.1.1 --username root --password vmware --bundle c:\update-from-esx4.1-4.1_update02.zip --install " and know nothing about it. I will use "esxcli software profile update".Could you write some about vihostupdate.pl update method? Thank you again.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-27542508283410825872015-03-11T08:15:17.630+01:002015-03-11T08:15:17.630+01:00Hi Anonymous,
thank your for your comment!
The p...Hi Anonymous,<br /><br />thank your for your comment!<br /><br />The process of keeping the VIBMatrix up-to-date is semi-automated with a PowerCLI-script that queries the VMware Online Depot and some Excel formatting magic, but it also involves manual work today.<br /><br />If I find the time I will work on fully automating this process like I already did for my new service - the <a href="http://esxi-patches.v-front.de" rel="nofollow">ESXi Patch Tracker</a>.<br /><br />AndreasAndreas Peetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-26896774453622941702015-03-10T15:15:45.629+01:002015-03-10T15:15:45.629+01:00Great post and still clearing up confusion to this...Great post and still clearing up confusion to this day! Thank you for keeping your Patch Matrix up to date? What is your process for gathering the data populating the matrix? Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-31354168975166728912013-12-09T04:33:37.712+01:002013-12-09T04:33:37.712+01:00Awesome work. Has help a lot - and cleared up a f...Awesome work. Has help a lot - and cleared up a few questions I had. Such a pain to sift through hundreds of posts and vmware support docs. This was all I needed.<br />Thanks Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-70014528342884387172013-09-23T18:29:28.340+02:002013-09-23T18:29:28.340+02:00Thank you sir, this helped a casual ESXi user trem...Thank you sir, this helped a casual ESXi user tremendously!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-811467206203138082013-08-30T20:25:30.608+02:002013-08-30T20:25:30.608+02:00Thanks Satish,
I'm glad that you found my art...Thanks Satish,<br /><br />I'm glad that you found my article helpful.<br /><br />AndreasAndreas Peetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-17012251728823015882013-08-30T20:20:47.490+02:002013-08-30T20:20:47.490+02:00Thank you Andreas
Your article has been of great ...Thank you Andreas<br /><br />Your article has been of great help. We had been struggling to patch the customised ISO by HP/DELL and it was resulting in PSOD. Neither vmware nor the hardware vendor was able to provide a soltuion even after weeks of troubleshooting.<br /><br />Referring to your article helped me understand the patch process and how to patch.<br /><br />Regards<br />SatishAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11104060204019488899noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-86434405326467558852013-08-08T11:16:33.465+02:002013-08-08T11:16:33.465+02:00Thank you! Finally I know what I'm doing durin...Thank you! Finally I know what I'm doing during patching ESXi servers.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-43474356813686085542013-07-29T11:37:15.201+02:002013-07-29T11:37:15.201+02:00Hi Patrick,
thanks for the feedback! You exactly n...Hi Patrick,<br />thanks for the feedback! You exactly named the reason for why and how I wrote this article. I'm glad you found it useful.<br />AndreasAndreas Peetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-33208011742139995812013-07-29T11:23:59.113+02:002013-07-29T11:23:59.113+02:00Thanks for this article.
The only one I found that...Thanks for this article.<br />The only one I found that clearly shows how the patches are cumulative, and the excel doc is a very good illustration.<br />All other articles to be found are more like 'they are cumulative (or are not), because someone from VMware said so in a forum', and even VMware employees appear to have contradicting opinions on the issue.Patricknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-60621886101861692632012-11-08T20:58:22.118+01:002012-11-08T20:58:22.118+01:00I don't know. Need to look into that.
However,...I don't know. Need to look into that.<br />However, please note that you can also run esxcli commands remotely through PowerCLI. See e.g. Luc's post here:<br />http://www.lucd.info/2012/10/15/update-a-remote-server-to-esxi-5-1/<br />Andreas Peetzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12918778845056237847noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6059874241017858476.post-11860216422472864922012-11-08T20:40:08.418+01:002012-11-08T20:40:08.418+01:00thanks for some really good information in this bl...thanks for some really good information in this blog post!<br />Do you know how PowerCLI installs patches when using the "Install-VMHostPatch" cmdlet? I mean is it equivalent to the "esxcli software profile update" or "esxcli software profile install" command? I'm asking this because I couldn't find an "Update-VMHostPatch" cmdlet.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00239030925914496587noreply@blogger.com