Unable to upgrade to 8.5 RU3

[deemacgee]

Folks, it looks like the ITMS repository is having some issues. Symantec Installation Manager can't update itself; we're seeing this error in the log:

Manually navigating to that URL in a browser will sometimes redirect to a login page, other times it will work and the product zip can be downloaded.

SIM also throws a login screen prompting for a domain\username and password, which I've never seen before.

SIM refuses to allow an ITMS upgrade, claiming our server has no connection to the internet, which it does. It also will not update the product listing unless it's given the zip file (manually downloaded as per the above).

When trying to create an installation package on another machine, downloads will proceed but occasionally fail with the username/password prompt. Strangely, skipping past these errors does allow some files to download, up to a point, until the below message (or similar) appears - but repeating the process does gradually build the necessary files - I am currently at 50% after multiple restarts.

This was not an issue a few weeks back when 8.5 RU3 was deployed to our testbed, so I'm assuming there's a problem on Broadcom's end. 

We had planned an upgrade for this evening (local time), taking advantage of the sudden off peak period, but this random failure has derailed those plans. Typically, there's never a human available on the "live chat" when required and I wasn't going to submit a request to support limbo (thanks Broadcom), so I'm posting here.

Can someone confirm/resolve?

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[Igor Perevozchikov]

When SIM asks for credentials, please try to specify your current logged in account & pass

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Software QA Engineer 3
Broadcom Inc.
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[deemacgee]

I probably should have said that I did try entering various credentials, and none worked.
Why it asks specifically for domain credentials made no sense, but I tried them anyway. As expected, no effect. Nor did the Symantec/Broadcom login details.

SIM is supposed to check for new versions and automatically update on launch; on doing so, it doesn't prompt for credentials, it simply fails and generates an error in the log file (as in my original post).

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[Igor Perevozchikov]

Try then local account usage, like

.\Administrator
password

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Software QA Engineer 3
Broadcom Inc.
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[deemacgee]

Yes, tried all variations on that as well: [account], .\[account], [domain]\[account]. No effect.

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[Igor Perevozchikov]

This problem should be resolved now. Please try again to start SIM and download all required packages.

Regards,
IP.

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Software QA Engineer 3
Broadcom Inc.
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[deemacgee]

Still no go, I'm afraid. Launching SIM generates this error in the log and prevents SIM from updating itself or allowing package downloads.
I've tried via proxy and from our DMZ. The error appears both when launching SIM and when attempting to update the product xml zip.

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[Igor Perevozchikov]

What about to try now, still the same will occur?

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Software QA Engineer 3
Broadcom Inc.
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[deemacgee]

That appears to be working now. What a relief. Thank you!

I'll update this thread if the error persists.

[deemacgee]

...aaaaaaaaaand the error is back.

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[deemacgee]

Finally managed to cache the install components after 5-6 retries. Each attempt brought down a handful of files until the bundle was complete.

This is not ideal.

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[deemacgee]

This is still happening. Could we get an update on this, please? Our platform upgrade is on hold until the issue is resolved - three weeks so far (at least).

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[Adam Fricke]

Dee,

We've also seen this a bunch with our Altiris environments when upgrading.  What we've started doing is getting all the packages pre-staged before attempting to upgrade in a change window.

What we do and it my take 20 to 50 retries, seriously, is the following but it seems to work in the end with great success:
1. Log onto SMP with any account, doesn't have to be service account.
2. Open SIM, let it update if it has to.
3. Click on "Create installation package"
4. Select the products you have installed or what we do, we filter and just select the ITMS suite.  (Even if you don't have all of ITMS installed, not a big deal, were just caching the install files.  The upgrade will only use what it needs.)
    a. To Filter: Click Filter by: Product Type; Click next field, Filter: Suites
    b. I just select "Altiris IT Management Suite 8.5 RU3."
5. Once the suite is selected, click Next, select what documentation you want (generally all are selected by default), click next.
6. Accept the EULA, and hit next.

At this point I stop, and let the SIM attempt to download the install files it needs, you'll see the progress bar just like you do when you go through the upgrade procedures.  I wait for it to finish, when it finishes I just hit cancel as the goal was to just get the files cached.

If the downloading of the files fails, which it will, in many different ways.  I always wait a few mins, hit no or cancel, and then restart this procedure till I get all files downloaded.  It seems overly complex and cumbersome and it is but this way we can get the install files pre-staged before going through a change window that we might miss due to trying to download these files.

Hope this helps, those errors should not stop you from upgrading, it hasn't for us, we just keep re-attempting to download until they complete basically.

[Dmitri Gornev]

Hi deemacgee,

IT reconfigured this server a week ago and we're not able to reproduce this problem after this.
Do I understand correctly that this is still reproducible for you this week? Is download retried successfully when you click OK?
If still reproduced may you provide us with exact time when error happened (you may check timestamp in the log and we'll need your timezone information) so we can escalate to IT team.

Thanks,
Dmitri.

[Johannes Bedrech]

Hi Dmitri

I can confim that upgrading to 8.5 RU3 works without any issues.. I´ve upgraded 3 Environments until Monday this week..

Network23

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ACP IT Solutions
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[Adam Fricke]

Dmitri,

Looks like the issue is back as I've just run into this issue in two of my environments again.

[Dmitri Gornev]

Hi Adam, can you provide us with "exact time when error happened (you may check timestamp in the log and we'll need your timezone information) so we can escalate to IT team."?

[deemacgee]

Hi Dmitri,

We ran an upgrade last week (from about 3PM AEST on Wednesday May 6th); I had pre-cached the install components for 8.5 RU0, but the error was definitely present about 8PM when I attempted to download the 8.5 RU3 upgrade source. It took 4-5 different download attempts to finally cache all the necessary files; fortunately there was minimal traffic on our link at the time so the requisite multiple retries were not overly problematic.

[Adam Fricke]

Dmitri,

That is great to hear, I will be upgrading two environments on Thursday, so we'll report back if we have any issues.  I did two upgrades on Tuesday of last week and I know for sure it was not resolved then.

Thanks.