How to Update Satellites from an Alternate Source

When the Central Monitoring Service sends an update command to the Satellites, the Satellites download three files from the Central Service's Install folder:

• Sleep.exe
• Upgrade_Satellite.bat
• Sat_Only_Setup.exe

The last file, Sat_Only_Setup.exe, is usually in the 30-40MB range. If you have a very slow network connection to the Central Service, or you have many Satellites (some customers have many hundreds), the bandwidth used might cause a problem.

By editing the Upgrade_Satellite.bat file, AND replacing the Sat_Only_Setup.exe with a smaller file (which will be ignored and overwritten), you can direct the Satellite to download from a different location. And since Sat_Only_Setup.exe is a small file, bandwidth to the Central Service server will be greatly reduced.

If you look in Upgrade_Satellite.bat, you'll see it does the following steps:

1. logs the time
2. stops the service
3. sleeps for 60 seconds
4. launches setup
5. waits 30 seconds
6. starts the service

You can edit the file (in the Central Service's Install folder) and add a step 3.5 which will use wget to download the Sat_Only_Setup.exe from a different location.

For example, right before Sat_Only_Setup.exe is launched, insert this code:

Thank you to Russell at Sheffield Business Systems for helping us work this out!

The above code will download Sat_Only_Setup.exe from a location you choose. You should upload the Sat_Only_Setup.exe file from your Central Service's Install folder -- that way the Satellite is guaranteed to be the same version as the Central Service.

One note: Every time the Central Service is upgraded, the Upgrade_Satellite.bat will get overwritten with the original file. That turns out to be helpful as it will be a good reminder to upload a recent Sat_Only_Setup.exe to your preferred download location.

Summary

1. Upgrade_Satellite.bat in the Central Service's Install folder according to the above example
2. Upload the valid Sat_Only_Setup.exe in the Central Service's Install folder to a website of your choosing
3. Replace Sat_Only_Setup.exe in the Central Service's Install folder with any small file (it will be ignored)
4. Tell the Satellites to upgrade themselves via the Console