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 How does YOUR org validate after OS patches apply

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jspatz
Starting Member

15 Posts

Posted - 2009-04-15 : 09:31:39
We have just started "centrally managing" all of our SQL databases house wide, and we have been migrating a number of them to a clustered environment, so now we are in need of a policy on applying OS patches to the cluster. I am wondering how other organizations take OS patches in a clustered environment. Quarterly? As Needed? And when you do, do you typically apply the patches on a development cluster and wait, or just install and prey? Do you require the owners of the databases on the cluster to do any sort of extensive validation to verify the OS patches didn't do any damage to their individual databases?

Also, along the same lines, what about MSSQL patches, do you normally take them as needed to respond to issues in the DB or do you take them regularly?

tfountain
Constraint Violating Yak Guru

491 Posts

Posted - 2009-04-15 : 11:52:50
We have a group that performs these updates across all of our servers on a regular basis. They basically let Windows download the updates but not install them. On a scheduled basis this group coordinates a maintenance window (identifies timeframe, communicates downtime notice) and then performs the updates. This group maintains a checklist of smoke tests to perform after the updates to verify the servers are running, connecting to the network, etc. Some checklist items depend on the type of server (web farm, application server, database server, mail server, etc). 99.9% of the time everything works fine. When they don't we have escalation procedures in place to resolve the problem or put a bandaid in place until it can be resolved (i.e. remove the server from the web farm for IIS servers, etc).
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jspatz
Starting Member

15 Posts

Posted - 2009-04-16 : 10:28:06
Thank you for your response!
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