How to exclude XP computers from automatic updates

[thies_laemmke]

Hi all,.

for me it seems that SAP GUI for Windows 7.40 is not running on computers with Windows XP. Fair enough. However, we still have some old computers running XP.

I would like to update the installation server and via that way the 90% of computers running later versions of Windows. But I definitely don't want the last 10% of computers left with a not-working GUI.

Any Ideas how to accomplish this?

Thies

[Matt_Fraser]

Yes, 7.30 will indeed run fine on XP, and I think SAP declared it would be the last version to do so. Unfortunately, it is a reality for a large number of organizations that XP still exists in places. It's true for us, although over the past few months we have been systematically replacing or re-imaging XP computers to get them up to Win7.

Thies, my advice would be to:

• As Jude says, push your organization to start getting those XP machines upgraded or replaced before support for SAPGUI 7.30 expires (October 2015 - see Note 147519);
• Remain on SAPGUI 7.30 for the moment, but put in place a plan to upgrade to 7.40 before that same October 2015 deadline.
  • 7.40 is very new, and at this point I would typically advise waiting anyway, even without the XP issue, while the initial bugs get worked out and a few patches are released.

As a workaround, you could look at having XP users use the WebGUI. It should generally work in IE8, although would be better in IE9 which doesn't run on XP. Alternatively, it may work in Firefox, but that will depend on your backend NetWeaver release and SP level.

It is possible to insert checks for OS versions into your On Upgrade scripts, but I'm not sure if that will be capable of cleanly aborting the entire upgrade. Have you checked to see what happens when an XP client auto-updates against a 7.40 installation server? Does the upgrade run, leaving you with a useless client? Or does it detect an unsupported OS and abort? If the latter, then it's not really an issue, but you'll want to find a way to turn off the automatic update service on the XP clients so they aren't bugged by the process each time they logon.

Otherwise, if you must deploy 7.40 now, you may need to have two side-by-side installation servers, keeping one on 7.30 for the XP machines.

Regards,

Matt

[thies_laemmke]

Hi Matt,

the Automatic Workstation Update Service on XP machines will trigger the update, the update is partially performed on the XP machine and leaves you with a useless client. As you wrote, it would have been better if the upgrade detected the unsupported OS and stopped, leaving the machine in it's original state.

I considered having two side-by-side installation servers, but then I would have to move all non-XP machines (90%) to a different installation server. That would be quite time consuming.

So I was hoping we could make the installation server somehow to recognize the client OS and not triggering an upgrade if it's a Windows machine. Or maybe disabeling the Automatic Workstation Update Service on XP machines.

Thies

[Matt_Fraser]

Since responding to this yesterday, I have seen a number of forum comments about significant issues with the initial release of 7.40, so I would double-down on the wait strategy.

That aside, here's an idea. As you say, the trick is to disable AWUS on the XP machines. So, before you upgrade your 7.40 installation server, put in a new On-Update script on the existing 7.30 server. In that script, you can detect for OS version, and if it's XP, deactivate AWUS (I think it should be a matter of editing a line in a config file). If it's Win7, leave it alone. Increment the patch number on the script, and all machines with AWUS currently enabled should execute it within a day or two. Let things stand for a couple weeks, to ensure you catch the XP machines that were turned off while their users were on vacation, etc, and then upgrade your installation server. Later, when the XP machines are upgraded to Win7, you can manually trigger a new installation as part of that process to not only upgrade the SAPGUI, but also reactivate AWUS.

There are a number of ways you can detect the OS in the script. Here's a way that I do it in my On Update script:

Set objWMIService = GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate}!\\.\root\cimv2")

Set colOS = objWMIService.ExecQuery("Select * from Win32_OperatingSystem")

For Each objOS in colOS

     strOSVersion = Left(objOS.Version,1)

Next

If strOSVersion = "6" Then

     'Vista/Server 2008 or higher

End If

Checking for "6" in the first digit of the major version number is good enough at this point, as it is 6.x for Vista, Win7, and Win8 (as well as Server 2008 and 2012), whereas XP is 5.x.

Turning off AWUS should be controlled by editing the file C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP\SapSetup\Setup\Updater\WkstaUpdater.cfg. There's a line in there for "Disabled=false". I think you could just switch that to "true".

Also bear in mind that if you do want to setup side-by-side installation servers, another way that should work is through this same method as above. You can setup an On-Update package event script that detects for OS, and if in the right version changes the "Server1" line in the WkstaUpdater.cfg file and changes registry keys in HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\SAP...

\SAP Shared\SAPsourcedir

\SAP Shared\SAP_WUS\SAPSourceDir

\SAPLogon\Options\ConfigFileOnServer (if you use this)

\SAPSetup\General\InstServer (though I think this key is deprecated and no longer has any effect)

Anyway, some ideas to investigate. Hopefully these are helpful.

Regards,

Matt

[jude_bradley]

Hello Thies,

Running an unsupported OS such as Windows XP is a huge security risk to a company.

As a far as  I know, 7.30 will run on XP,but Microsoft has discontinued support for this OS in April.

This means that there no free corrections Microsoft can provide.

We really do recommend updating as soon as possible to a supported OS.

The only way I can think from an SAP installation server point of view to avoid automatic installs to XP is to have the machines shut down by the end-users before the planned rollout.

Jude

[thies_laemmke]

Hi Jude,

you are absolutely right that upgrading the OS would be a preferred scenario, however this doesn't seem to be an option on all our machines at the moment. Fortunately we have almost no Vista installations and End of Life for 7 is not before april 2020 .

Thies