My View 6.2 Upgrade

Hi all,

I have delayed this a bit as I was concerned that I would have to move to using the Access Point instead of the Security Servver.  Which I want too but it needs more testing and confirmation before I use it.  So I am glad I do not have to use it and there is still the traditional Security Server.  So lets get started.

This is an upgrade of a small lab, that I consider production and so I worry about how long this outage might last.  So I want the least amount of work, and no re-work!

Prerequisites

• docs, release notes, Upgrade Guide, bits, client bits.  BTW, if you download the Linux agent bits from this link it will work.  There is another place you can download them, and I am told I don’t have a license to do that do , which is odd but certainly I cannot download them there but I can in the link above.
• You should know what build you are at - I was at 6.1.1.
• There was a new message protocol in 6.1 that if you were doing an install new would be enabled and require new firewall ports.  For upgrades it was not enabled.  In theory you have already dealt with this so it should not be an issue.  More info is here.
• Most important is to make sure everything works. Several of the painful PS projects I had were ones that customers started things that ended up failing, and I had to clean up.  They were due to things not working before the project!  Even check the event logs.
• Also make sure you have good backups.  I also suggest using snapshots.
• I suggest you have configuration info, or screenshots of the important config info - the URL and IP information that is necessary for your View infrastructure to work.

Process - Connection Servers

• I like to do MS and any other updates at this time.  I have an outage so I should use it!
• Install the update.  It will be like an upgrade because it is has not so many questions.  It will take a little longer then normal, and a lot of deleting messages seem to go by.  No restart required.
• Now once it completes, you will need to connect to the View Administration and prepare the Security Server for update, and create a pairing password too.  Under the More Commands button for the CS you will find the command to do a Security Server pairing password.  Under the More Commands button for the SS you will find the prepare option.
• You can now upgrade the security server.  If this was a big project, or if I did not have a day job, I would in fact use an Access Point here but I am not.  During the update you will see the current options and you will need to enter the pairing password.  I was dropped when this server started to update as I was connected via View.  This did not happen when I upgraded the View server.  It is not a big deal, just wait a few minutes and connect again.  You will see where you left off.

Both of these were done without issue, and required no restart.

Process - View Desktop Agent

I had hopped to be able to do this while connected in via View. but no, you can start the install / upgrade but then it exits and says that an active View connection was found.  So for my own desktop I connected via the console and updated.

Need to update my templates!

Process - Clients

I had to update my Mac OSX Client to 3.5.0 after the 3.4 did not work for me after my El Capitan Upgrade.  So no big deal as Mac and PC clients connect fine both before and after this update.

Testing

After I finished the upgrade I connected to the View Administrator and confirmed both servers were reporting the 6.2 version info.  I also checked the Events to see if there was any issues.

Things to Note

• I am frustrated that the View agent cannot be updated while I am logged in View.  It used to work and was handy.
• I wish there was a better way - such as using VUM to update the View agent. I wonder if we could do it with AD?  I know of many big and small View shops and I wonder how they all do it?
• In the past Transparent Page Sharing (TPS) was disabled as a very minor security issue and starting in 6.1 you can enable it at the pool level (more info).  However, I think it is worth enabling for your whole cluster.  It is not super quick and easy doing that but find out how here.

Conclusion

So this is done.  It was not too hard, nor did it take too long.  There is a lot of things in 6.2, including Touch ID support for iOS client, so it is a good to be updated.

Michael

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