[olug] Fwd: faulty Microsoft patch affects Exchange and DC

[Sean Kelly]

On Wed, May 18, 2005 at 10:31:21AM -0500, Rod Hurley wrote:
> Just another predictable Micro$oft snowjob.

That article is overhyped. We have many HP-UX systems and HP does this sort
of thing all the time. A patch may come out that is critical, and later
there will be a critical patch to replace said critical patch due to
unforseen problems with the first one. This is normal. I would only have a
problem if Microsoft didn't address the problem at all. This is not the
case. They're providing hotfixes, and they're redeploying a fixed patch.
What more do you want? Do you want 100% functionality all the time? This is
not possible.

The article makes one good point:

   "When we are dealing with Microsoft updates, one thing we always
   reiterate, then reiterate some more, is to test before deploying. The
   guidance is always to download, test, then deploy the patches.  With
   Microsoft, the test section of our guidance has gotten larger and
   larger."

We test all patchsets before applying them. We pick the least important
machine (or a test environment one) and apply the set. We do this for every
general configuration we have, be it HP-UX 11i, HP-UX 11, or Linux. This is
just good practice. And guess what? Our testing doesn't always find
problems with patches that we're later snagged by when we deploy it to all
systems. Just like Microsoft can't guarentee perfection, neither can our
testing procedures.

-- 
Sean Kelly         | PGP KeyID: D2E5E296
smkelly at zombie.org | http://www.zombie.org