When version 3.x came out, a long awaited feature was added to the product, Autoupdate and Autoupgrade. Our prayers have been answered. Almost... First, Autoupdate delivered the merchandise. You could connect with this utility through ftp or through UNC (Universal Naming Convention, used widely in Windows NT to set shared resources), update the .dat files or just keep them as is (I never figured that option), to back up previous .dat files (just in case), and to schedule the time the updates occur. You could connect to McAfee ftp site or set up your own ftp or NT server for your distribution. As far as my previous setup goes, this does nothing more that my batch file was doing. The batch file was actually better, because the .dat files would be matched for a new version at every login, while autoupdate was set to once a week. I switched to Auto update anyway, only because I thought it was cool to use all the options the software offered me by literally playing in the guts of the software. What became interesting was not how to distribute the files anymore, it was to play with the various settings of the configuration ASCII files that contained the server name, the schedule, ... And I knew that in the event of an emergency where I would want to rush files to prevent an infectious attack, I could implement quickly the old way, simple as it is. Which brings me to one point: the batch file is the quicker to get your files to spread on the network, but for it to work, you need your users to login. In the event of an emergency, set up your downloading batch file, along with the latest .dat files in the shared directory. Test it at least once just to make sure you didn't screw up. A typo happens sso quiclky. Then if you followed my advice about knowing your people, the rest is only a matter of human relations. Try to get good relationships with administrative assistants, or secretaries, these are the ones who really run the place, not their bosses. By reaching four, five or six of them will get a message in everybody's voice-mail in no time telling them to save their work and reboot at once. What? You think you can maintain your calling/mailing lists yourselves? Fine, go ahead, but then don't complain when you realize that you missed one machine used by a temporary employee that you didn't know about (Oh! She uses Carol password, she's only going to be with us for two weeks!). Trust me on this, these people are effective, use them wisely and they'll be your best friends. It doesn't hurt neither to go around in the offices to spread the word: Please reboot now, thank you. One sweep should be enough, the excitement of something potentially dangerous is enough to get people talking about it all afternoon, so you know that the ones you didn't catch will eventually hear about it sooner or later. Don't forget to send a quick e-mail reiterating the phone message they should have received (mailing lists are generally easier to maintain than phone lists).
On the other hand, Autoupgrade proved to be a fluke. The GUI (graphical user interface) was quite similar to the Autoupdate GUI. It would connect through ftp or UNC to a distribution server, download installation files necessary to upgrade the software to the new version, and then run Setup.exe from the local machine and proceeding with a silent install (the command ran was actually setup /s). Nothing extraordinary again that I couldn't have done without a batch file, which is why I was disappointed. I expected the Autoupgrade to keep the current configuration after the upgrade, keeping the software fully autonomous. Far from it. Running Autoupgrade forced the default settings to be implemented, which caused McAfee to forget to which server get his next upgrade, or even when he was expected to do an update/upgrade. That was really dumb design from the part of McAfee, to which I had complained. They answered me with the typical answer: this will be resolved in the next release (and they actually did, in version 4.x). Add to this that I still thought it was too risky at the time to remotely install software, let's say I retired more academic knowledge from this more than actual improvement, but that would help me later on.
By the way, my batch file stills force the configuration files to keep a homogenous environment.
3. The batch file strategy
5. Batch, batch and more batch...
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