HP Smart Update Best Practices Implementer Guide

Using HP SUM
Minimum requirements
For more information about the minimum requirements for HP SUM, see the HP Smart Update
Manager Release Notes.
HP SUM execution modes
HP SUM provides two modes of execution for users: GUI and express. The express mode is for
software (drivers, agents and tools) deployments only. HP SUM enables you to use either mode to
handle both local and remote deployments. HP SUM can run in both standard Windows and Linux
operating systems in online mode and in offline mode via special boot environments based on
Linux boot kernels and Windows PE as long as all the prerequisites are met.
For details on specific HP SUM command-line options and their usage see the HP Smart Update
Manager User Guide.
NOTE: HP SUM supports updating firmware only for VMware vSphere targets.
HP SUM special considerations
HP Integrity servers running OpenVMS or Non-Stop
HP SUM interacts only with the management interface on HP Integrity systems running OpenVMS
or NonStop operating systems. HP SUM provides enclosure and platform firmware updates. You
must manually update I/O card firmware using the EFI packages method on these systems.
Using Linux root credentials
If you run HP SUM from a Linux system and you have not logged into the system as a root user,
you can still update targets from the CLI or GUI if you use Linux root credentials. In HP SUM GUI
mode, you can enter the Linux root credentials on the Enter Credentials screen when you select
targets. In CLI mode, use the sudo commands available for command lines. For more information,
see the HP Smart Update Manager User Guide.
Prerequisites for using Linux root credentials
• If you have run HP SUM as a root user, remove the temp directory created by HP SUM.
• Make sure you have read/write access permissions to the /tmp and /var directories.
• If you create a sudo user, make sure that you add the user to the /ect/sudousers file. The
following table shows the privileges and specifications for users
SpecificationPrivilegeUser
ALLALL=(ALL)Root
ALLALL=(ALL)Sudo_user
Network ports used by HP SUM
HP SUM requires that certain network ports are available for proper operation. If you lock down
network ports, make sure that the ports listed in the network port tables are open so that HP SUM
works correctly when connecting to remote node servers and hosts. If you are unable to unlock
these network ports, the only option is to run HP SUM locally and update network-based hosts,
such as the OA, iLO, and VC modules, through their web interfaces.
Updates for most node types require network traffic in both directions between the server running
HP SUM and the node. The server running HP SUM creates a local HTTP server, which is used to
26 Deploying firmware