Patching must be easy was Re: [LUG] Guardian Offline

[Simon Waters <Simon@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Mark Evans wrote:
> Simon Waters wrote:
>
> > First to make Outlook XP connect you need to install service pack 2
> > (which requires the Office CD you installed from and 60MB download).
> > So proprietary
>
>
> 60M just for a service pack, you can get whole office suites smaller
> than that :)

The 60MB download is an exageration - service pack 2 for Office XP is
only about 40MB - of course you have to install service pack 1 which is
19MB first.

The download is just an irritation - software has bugs - and I wouldn't
want just the source diff just because it is smaller - I want ease of
installation.

In that sense the CD check is a bigger hurdle - I was patching a laptop
- the CD's had to be brought in specially - Powerpoint was installed
from a seperate CD - so two sets of CD's (or 3 CD's) have to be to hand
"just in case this patch needs this CD" (I guess I could copy them all
to the hard disk - but we'll soon lose all the advantages of modern hard
disks at this rate).

In many ways it would be easier to download an entirely new Office
suite. Distributing updated versions is generally better than
introducing an arbitary "patch" item. The whole reason for "patches" was
to allow you to fix a specific problem without introducing others - that
mentality was fine on mainframe systems with a million lines of business
critical code and a team of professional support staff - but on desktop
systems with 10's millions of lines of code you need to manage code in
bigger chunks - so the one guy with dozens of desktops can keep them all
vaguely consistent and working.

Okay how many Office XP users do you think will have the critical
security patches.

Given:

1. Even our local Windows developer had never been to the Office Update
site (He seemed surprised that there was more to patching Microsoft
applications than Windows update - projection I suspect - he is assuming
they would do it the way he would do it).

2. It will take the average 56Kbps modem over 2 hours to download.

3. Parts require actions to be taken as an Administrative user (I
suspect most XP users just run as Administrative users anyway despite MS
advice not to, as it is just a pain to kee switching (although some apps
do just ask for the password it is a real lottery). It took me to or
three attempts first time to apply the patch - and a second download.

I'm guessing about 1% plus those who get it through corporate automated
software tools - so maybe 2% or 3% - at least till the first virus does
the rounds exploiting whatever was fixed in those critical security updates.

That said the actual mechanics of starting a patch are easy. But it is a
series of monotonous screens (and unenforcable changes to EULA - sorry
guys you can't change my rights to a product once I brought it just
because you fouled up). Oh and the wonderful select a patch - only to be
told no you can't have that selection because.... some stupid dependency
it could work out for itself once it had downloaded them all.

Oh well Douglas Adams had it down to a tee - first up against the wall
when the revolution comes.

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