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Why doesn't my system install all updates at scheduled installation? |
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My observation has been that it will detect all of the
updates, but it will only download the first 'mandatory' update, install it,
restart, and then execute another detection cycle after restart to
detect/download the remaining updates.
This behavior is not a function of WSUS, specifically,
or the packaging, per se, but rather a function of the big picture of how
updates are classified. For our purposes, there are three types of updates:
mandatory - must be installed before any other
updates.
exclusive - must be installed independent of any
other updates.
all others updates.
An example of a mandatory update is the Windows
Installer v3.1 package.
Examples of exclusive updates are Service Packs, and
almost any IE Cumulative Update.
When any of the update methodologies detects a
mandatory update, it first downloads and installs the mandatory update.
Until a restart is completed following the mandatory update installation,
the WUA will not detect any additional updates. It won't even look. If there
are multiple mandatory updates, it will download all of the mandatory
updates, and install them prior to allowing detection for any other updates.
If none of the updates detected are classified as
mandatory or exclusive, then the WUA initiates download of all of the
updates, and they are installed (if deadlines apply), or scheduled for
install, based on some internal logic in the WUA. I've never actually
analyzed how it does this, so it could simply be the order of the download
completion, it could be by release date, it could be quasi-random. I imagine
somebody from MS could tell us exactly what the logic is for this, but it
really isn't important at this point. Ultimately everything gets installed.
The above observations are based on a full patch of an
XP SP1 installation, which is documented and described in the thread "Using
WSUS to Deploy Updates to New XP SP1 installation". posted on 4/30/05 in
this group, in addition to dozens of other reviews of logs describing the
detection and installation of various combinations of updates.
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