| 4.3. Software Upgrades | ||
|---|---|---|
 | Chapter 4. System Administration |  |
| 4.3. Software Upgrades | ||
|---|---|---|
| | Chapter 4. System Administration | |
FB2500 users benefit from FireBrick's pro-active software development process, which delivers fast fixes of important bugs, and implementation of many customer enhancement requests and suggestions for improvement. As a matter of policy, FireBrick software upgrades are always free to download for all FireBrick customers.
To complement the responsive UK-based development process, the FB2500 is capable of downloading and installing new software directly from Firebrick's servers, providing the unit has Internet access.
This Internet-based upgrade process can be initiated manually (refer to Section 4.3.3.1), or the FB2500 can download and install new software automatically, without user intervention.
If the unit you want to upgrade does not have Internet access, then new software can be uploaded to the unit via a web browser instead - see Section 4.3.4.
Software upgrades are best done using the Internet-based upgrade process if possible - this ensures the changes introduced by Breakpoint releases are automatically accounted for (see Section 4.3.1.1)
Software upgrades will trigger an automatic reboot of your FB2500 - this will cause an outage in routing, and can cause connections that are using NAT to drop. However, the FB2500 reboots very quickly, and in many cases, users will be generally unaware of the event. You can also use a profile to restrict when software upgrades may occur - for example, you could ensure they are always done overnight. The reboot will close all L2TP connections first. The reboot will close all BGP sessions first. The reboot will wait for all VoIP calls to complete before rebooting.
There are three types of software release : factory, beta and alpha. For full details on the differences between these software releases, refer to the FB2500 software downloads website - please follow the 'read the instructions' link that you will find just above the list of software versions.
In order to be able to run alpha releases, your FB2500 must be enabled to run alpha software - this is done by changing the entry in the FireBrick capabilities database (hosted on FireBrick company servers) for your specific FB2500, as identified by the unit's Serial Number. Normally your FB2500 will be running factory or possibly beta software, with alpha software only used under advice and guidance of support personnel while investigating/fixing possible bugs or performance issues. You can see whether your FB2500 is able to run alpha releases by viewing the main Status page (click the Status main menu-item), and look for the row labelled "Allowed" - if the text shows "Alpha builds (for testing)" then your FB2500 can run alpha releases.
Sometimes the configuration will need to be transformed during an upgrade, these transformations will be automatically performed when needed as part of the upgrade (see Section 3.4 for details). However we do not keep the update procedures around forever, instead we flag certain releases as breakpoints that upgrades must go through sequentially to maintain a valid configuration.
Between breakpoints changes to config could be made, for instance in alpha releases. These transformations will be kept around until at least the next breakpoint release to maintain compatibility.
When using the Internet-based upgrade process, the FB2500 will always upgrade to the next available breakpoint version first, so that the configuration is updated appropriately. If your current software version is several breakpoint releases behind the latest version, the upgrade process will be repeated for each breakpoint release, and then to the latest version if that is later than the latest breakpoint release.
On the FB2500 software downloads website, breakpoint releases are labelled [Breakpoint] immediately under the version
number.
If you have saved copies of configurations for back-up purposes, we recommend saving a new version after upgrading to a breakpoint release.
If you use automated methods to configure your FB2500, you will need to check the documentation to see whether those methods need updating before the next breakpoint release.
Downgrading the software past a release that makes configuration changes will (provided the running version is recent enough to have this feature) show a warning that the current configuration patch version is too recent.
In this case check that the configuration looks correct for the running version, and correct or remove the patch attribute (this can be done in the XML editor, or by making any change in the UI based editor).
The current software version is displayed on the main Status page, shown when you click the Status main menu-item itself (i.e. not a submenu item). The main software application version is shown next to the word "Software", e.g. :-
Software FB9001 TEST Abbotscliffe (V2.00.100 2023-10-09T14:56:04)
The software version is also displayed in the right hand side of the 'footer' area of each web page, and is shown immediately after you log in to a command-line session.
'Out of the box' the FB2500 is configured to automatically download and install new factory releases. This is a safe option, and we expect many users to be happy with this - however, if you would prefer, this process can be disabled - refer to Section 4.3.3.2.
If automatic installs are allowed, the FB2500 will check for new software on boot up and approximately every 24 hours thereafter - your FB2500 should therefore pick up new software at most ~ 24 hours after it is released. You can choose to allow this process to install only new factory-releases, factory or beta releases, or any release, which then includes alpha releases (if your FB2500 is enabled for alpha software - see Section 4.3.1) - refer to Section 4.3.3.2 for details on how to configure auto upgrades.
Whenever you browse to the main Status page, the FB2500 checks whether there is newer software available, given the current software version in use, and whether alpha releases are allowed. If new software is available, you will be informed of this as shown in Figure 4.2 :-
To see what new software is available, click on the "Upgrade available" link. This will take you to a page that will show Release notes that are applicable given your current software version, and the latest version available. On that page there is an "Upgrade" button which will begin the software upgrade process.
There are two attributes on the system object (see Section 4.2) that affect the automatic software upgrade process :-
Table 4.4. Attributes controlling auto-upgrades
| Attribute | Description |
sw-update | Controls what types of software releases the auto-upgrade process will download/install. This attribute can also be used to
disable the auto-upgrade process - use the value of false to achieve this.
|
sw-update-profile | Specifies the name of a profile to use to control when software upgrades are attempted (see Chapter 9 for details on profiles). |
sw-update-delay | Specifies a minimum number of days after release to attempt the upgrade (intended for automating staggered upgrades). |
The current setting of sw-update (in descriptive form) can be seen on the main Status page, adjacent to the word "Upgrade", as shown in
Figure 4.2 (in that example, sw-update is set to, or is defaulting to, factory).
This method is entirely manual, in the sense that the brick itself does not download new software from the FireBrick servers, and responsibilty for loading breakpoint releases as required lies with the user.
In order to do this, you will first need to download the required software image file (which has the file extension .img) from the
FB2500 software downloads website
onto your PC.
The next step is the same as you would perform when manually-initiating an Internet-based upgrade i.e. you should browse to the main Status page, where, if there is new software is available, you will be informed of this as shown in Figure 4.2.
This step is necessary since the manual upgrade feature currently shares the page used for Internet-based manual upgrades, which is reached by clicking "Upgrade available" link. After clicking this link, you will find the manual upgrade method at the bottom of the page, as shown in Figure 4.3 :-
| |  | |
| 4.2. General System settings |  | 4.4. Boot Process |
