How do you do monthly updates to laptops?

[mconners]

Hi Folks,

Here at our college, we have a large number of laptops that are usually in locked cabinets until needed. This is true in our physics, chemistry and other areas, although many are used daily. The discussion here is related to a school environment and when you folks push out updates.

Our desktops are easy to deal with, we simply run updates monthly after 10 PM and before 7 AM. This is working smoothly.

Laptops on the other hand is another beast. What are you doing in order to get updates pushed to your laptops? I was toying with the idea of pushing them and triggering them on startup or check in without a specific date or time. Problem comes in when the updates require a restart and makes a user of a laptop restart right after they get it started.

Needless to say, it is the laptop group that I am struggling with and I am needing ideas or thoughts about how others are managing updates to their laptops.

Thank you for your feedback, I sincerely appreciate it.

Mick

[thoule]

This has been an issue since we started having computer labs. A classroom machine gets turned on for a class about to begin and has a list of required updates. The only solution is to get the teacher or someone else to boot up the machines another time so updates can apply.

I built my own update solution for my office. In that, updates are applied and have a due date. I also built a policy in Self Service that desktop support staff can use to disable the 'due date' requirement if necessary.

As for your office, that solution is up to you as every environment is different. But often a required restart soon after bootup is not uncommon. Users will accept/deal with it. Another option for you is to leave the updates as an offer and assign someone to make sure they are applied at an appropriate time.