Software Distributor Administration Guide HP-UX 11i v1, 11i v2, and 11i v3 (5900-2561, March 2013)

8.8.1 INDEX and INFO Compression
Another way to reduce your network traffic is by compressing INDEX and INFO files from the
source depot to the target. You can turn on INDEX or INFO compression by setting the
compress_index option to true in the defaults file (/var/adm/sw/defaults).
The SD-UX controller and target agents will request compressed INDEX files from the source agent.
If the source agent is read only or an older version of SD-UX, the agent cannot comply; consequently,
the client will request a normal INDEX. Otherwise, the source agent will send a precompressed
INDEX and INFO or compress it on the fly.
The target agent will then create a permanent compressed INDEX in the target, depot, or root. This
saves the next request for a compressed INDEX or INFO from having to compress on the fly.
8.9 Staging
The standard way to install software onto multiple targets is to specify a single source depot and
each target that is to receive the software. However, some software distribution environments
require that you manage software on large numbers of geographically dispersed target systems.
This may require the use of one or more intermediate source depots or staging areas. This variant
on the standard model is referred to as a staged installation.
There are two reasons for using a staged installation:
1. Minimize the amount of data transferred across a slow and expensive segment of your network.
2. More easily ensure a successful installation on all targets by reducing the risk of an unreliable
segment in your network.
If your environment has targets organized in separate, local area networks (LAN) and connected
via a low-throughput, less-reliable wide area network (WAN), staging software to intermediate
depots that are local to each grouping of targets and then doing the installation using these
intermediate depots reduces the amount of data that travels over the WAN segment.
By doing so, you also decrease the likelihood that a problem with the WAN will interrupt the
installation step.
Before you do a staged installation, you must first decide where the intermediate depots should
reside. Here are two possible approaches:
1. If the targets are grouped, you can put an intermediate depot on one system in each group
and configure the other targets to use it as their alternate source. This approach requires that
each target in the group be configured to use the designated intermediate depot.
2. If making sure that installations succeed is of highest importance, you can locate the
intermediate depots on the targets themselves, one-per-target. An advantage to this approach
is that it doesn’t necessarily require that you configure an alternate source on each target.
However, this approach requires that each target system have enough disk space to
accommodate the intermediate depot.
To do a staged installation:
1. First, decide on the location of the intermediate depots and use the swcopy command to copy
the software from your master depot to them. This step is no different from a normal multi-target
copy operation.
swcopy -s master -t depot_list NewApp
In this example, the master source depot containing the product NewApp is in the default
/var/spool/sw depot location and a file named depot_list contains the list of
intermediate depots.
The depot_list could identify the designated intermediate depots that have been configured
for each group of targets, or it could identify an intermediate depot located on each target.
2. Next, use the swinstall command combined with the option
use_alternate_source=true to do the actual installation. The use_alternate_source
8.9 Staging 141