Patching without permission

Hrm, I thought they were already doing that for a while - I know I've had a completely rebooted machine when I woke up in the morning and realized it was update.  First time, I was a bit annoyed yes.  However, I save often and not a big deal anymore.

blowdart wrote:

So is anything truely important enough to ignore user settings and reboot a machine without intervention? I know I'd be peeved, as I leave my laptop on at night, with applications open, and potentially files unsaved.

Before we go off on a rant on whether MS should be allowed to reboot our machines, let's make sure they actually do it.
I have two machines, XPSP2 and 2003SP1, and both downloaded the patch and then asked me if I wanted to install it, and then asked me if I wanted to reboot. I wasn't forced into anything.

Most of the updates seem to force a reboot now eventually if you have automatic updates turned on.

if you at the computer, it is actually pretty annoying to be asked every 10 minutes or so, and i have lost data this way, (especially typing while looking at something besides the screen) IMHO, it should only interactively prompt if the computer has been inactive for that time.

if i am not at the computer, sure reboot it, logging on only takes like 2 seconds... makes me happpier than comming back to "you should restart" thus wasting more of my time.

http://blogs.technet.com/msrc/archive/2006/01/10/417231.aspx

"Also, I know there was a question out there about the behavior of the WMF update through autoupdate, just wanted to be clear that the update behaves just like any update released through automatic update and will respect your existing settings regarding prompting for a restart or automatic restart, depending on what you have chosen."

- Mike Reavey

Don't believe the crud on digg/slashdot.  I think I'm going to make a list of all the false stories about microsoft... I'm sick of all this b/s.

I do think it is acceptable for an update to force a reboot.

Some of these security issues are so nasty and so virulent that a  mandatory response is the only effective defence against the threat.

All to often some machines are 'Typhoid Mary's' meaning they are infected and because of negligence have not had security patches applied. Forcing an application of a patch would reduce the number of Typhoid Mary's, but I dare say this would not eliminate them altogether after there are still machines out there running XP without any service packs or even older OS'es, such as NT4 or Windows 95!

I think some users are also confusing Automatic Updates automatically installing with other applications.  You can turn off the ability for Automatic Updates to install as soon as it downloads by having them only PROMPT you when the installation is ready to take place.  That is something you manually have control over, not Microsoft... and it allows you to keep your computer on or whatever until you're ready to install it.

I have AU on prompt and it didn't do anything.  In fact, it's still sitting in my Automatic Updates queue with three other updates from Tuesday...  should probably do that.

Sabot wrote:

I do think it is acceptable for an update to force a reboot.

Some of these security issues are so nasty and so virulent that a  mandatory response is the only effective defence against the threat.

All to often some machines are 'Typhoid Mary's' meaning they are infected and because of negligence have not had security patches applied. Forcing an application of a patch would reduce the number of Typhoid Mary's, but I dare say this would not eliminate them altogether after there are still machines out there running XP without any service packs or even older OS'es, such as NT4 or Windows 95!

Let's just hope that those machines aren't running your pacemaker or some other life critical application.

Besides, all the end user would have to do is run a copy of VirtualPC on the machine.  My computer will not reboot if VirtualPC is running (thanks for that, MSFT).

This sounds like a rumor to me.

If it was true, however, it would be very serious.

"None shall patch without my permission!" (apologies to Labyrinth)

Regarding Windows Update, I am pissed off manily at the recurring, focus-stealing "I need to reboot NOW" pop-up dialog box. "No, I DON'T want to reboot RIGHT NOW, stop (I need to watch my language)ing asking me." It'll nag the crap out of me until I let it reboot. Never mind that I wanted to finish what I was doing first.

Cairo wrote:

Regarding Windows Update, I am pissed off manily at the recurring, focus-stealing "I need to reboot NOW" pop-up dialog box. "No, I DON'T want to reboot RIGHT NOW, stop (I need to watch my language)ing asking me." It'll nag the crap out of me until I let it reboot. Never mind that I wanted to finish what I was doing first.

If you got access to Vista (Dec CTP), you'll notice - they fixed that thing. It was probably the most annoying thing since the clippy Not sure which patch it was (probably the one talked about here), but on the Dec CTP of Vista, it downloaded the patch and like XP - asked me if I wanted to install. Install I did, and then came the annoying popup, but with a change.

There's a "sleep" option for x, xx, xxx, mins/hours. Someone can probably tweak the registry and make it 9999 days But nevertheless its good, I can make it sleep for few hours (until the time I know i won't be around or its nap time).

Also, it won't install the patches WHILE the machine is doing the work - you'll see a shield icon on the start->shutdown button suggesting that if you are doing a reboot/shutdown down, it'll install the patches...so saves the cpu time...(again, this is Dec CTP of Vista)

Fun stuff ahead ....

- Keeron

keeron wrote:

Also, it won't install the patches WHILE the machine is doing the work - you'll see a shield icon on the start->shutdown button suggesting that if you are doing a reboot/shutdown down, it'll install the patches...so saves the cpu time...(again, this is Dec CTP of Vista)

Fun stuff ahead ....

- Keeron

I think I've seen it on WinXP too... in last year I think.

On that day I'm no aware of the update notice during the day's job, and when I wanted to shutdown, there's little shield at the side of the reboot icon...

I think this does sort the thing neatly and please keep doing this way for other patches.

When you're running business server, you certainly don't want to encounter situations when you're doing work but see "can't connect to database" things.