Installation guide

Table Of Contents
Follow this procedure for each Red Hat Linux alternate location patch repository machine in your
environment.
Procedure
1. On the Red Hat Linux alternate location machine, configure the protocol to receive patches from the
patching repository machine.
2. Configure the protocol to communicate with the target managed machines so that the managed
machines can copy patches from the alternate location machines.
What to do next
Configure VCM. See "Configuring VCM to Work with the Patching Repository and Alternate Locations"
on page 162.
Configuring VCM to Work with the Patching Repository and Alternate
Locations
The distributed Linux and UNIX patching environment includes a Red Hat Linux patching repository
machine and the VCM Collector. Optionally, you can include one or more geographically distributed
alternate location machines. VCM uses the patching repository and the alternate locations to store patches
and stage them to Linux and UNIX managed machines for patch deployment.
VCM supports distributed patching environments with the use of a single patching repository machine
and one or more alternate location machines to store replications of the patches for automatic and manual
patch deployment to managed machines.
A physical or virtual machine is potentially a patching repository machine if it is a Red Hat Linux machine
that has the VCM 5.7 Linux Agent and the Software Content Repository (SCR) Tool 5.0 installed. The Red
Hat Linux machine that you designate as the patching repository machine must be configured as a trusted
machine in Administration >Certificates and must have the Patching Repository status assigned to it to
elevate its status as a trusted machine for security purposes.
All target managed machines to be patched must be trusted machines, if they require credentials to obtain
patch payload from the patching repository or a geographically distributed alternate location.
To patch managed machines in a geographically distributed patching environment, you configure a
separate Red Hat Linux machine to be the alternate location patching repository for that environment.
vCenter Configuration Manager Administration Guide
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VMware, Inc.