Ping Paul: WSUS offline

Hi, Paul,

With the problems I've been having getting these updates installed,
pretty much half of them fail as best as I can tell, thought I'd give
the WSUS Offline a shot. That failed too.

WSUS gives me an error message, "Download failure for w60 glb".

Tried WSUS on my W7 machine, same error code.

Can't say as a search on Google for that phrase has been much help to
me. :-(

The one and only hit for the exact phrase (found via DuckDuckGo) was
where the suggestion was that Redmond servers were overloaded, and to
try again when traffic was less. The poster tried at 5AM Redmond time,
no problems.

So, I'm kinda in the dark.

--
Ken
Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 42.0
Thunderbird 38.0.1
"My brain is like lightning, a quick flash
and it's gone!"

Ken Springer wrote:
Hi, Paul,

With the problems I've been having getting these updates installed,
pretty much half of them fail as best as I can tell, thought I'd give
the WSUS Offline a shot. That failed too.

WSUS gives me an error message, "Download failure for w60 glb".

Tried WSUS on my W7 machine, same error code.

Can't say as a search on Google for that phrase has been much help to
me. :-(

The one and only hit for the exact phrase (found via DuckDuckGo) was
where the suggestion was that Redmond servers were overloaded, and to
try again when traffic was less. The poster tried at 5AM Redmond time,
no problems.

So, I'm kinda in the dark.


The Microsoft servers have been modified, since the
Win10 catalog server was set up.

They all seem to have developed "bad eating habits".
The servers don't seem to work properly with regular
HTTP protocols. The servers do seem to work with BITS
(background transfers done for Windows Update).

So it looks like Microsoft has progressed to the
"secret handshake" era. And what I don't understand
is why there isn't a torrent of complaints about it.
I first noticed this, when an attempt to download
a Win10 ISO with a direct HTTP link, did not work
properly.

I've even tried Netscape Communicator, which had a
retry capability. And then the symptoms ended up being
really weird. The bottom line was, I still didn't get
an intact file. It's like the client end doesn't know
what the correct file size is. The transfer is
truncated, the client end is "happy".

And I have zero workarounds for this... I'm as
stumped as you.

Microsoft knows how to build a content distribution
network, so to me, a "busy server" isn't a good
enough excuse.

WSUS is protected by various checksums, so it should
be able to detect each crappy download that occurs. If
it couldn't even get an intact manifest file, then it
would be in real trouble.

Vanguard found a web page the other day, showing
BITS has an API. You can write a program to call
BITS and get it to do a transfer for you. So it's
not like the protocol needs to be reverse engineered,
whatever they've done to it.

Paul

On 1/18/16 2:41 PM, Paul wrote:
Ken Springer wrote:
Hi, Paul,

With the problems I've been having getting these updates installed,
pretty much half of them fail as best as I can tell, thought I'd give
the WSUS Offline a shot. That failed too.

WSUS gives me an error message, "Download failure for w60 glb".

Tried WSUS on my W7 machine, same error code.

Can't say as a search on Google for that phrase has been much help to
me. :-(

The one and only hit for the exact phrase (found via DuckDuckGo) was
where the suggestion was that Redmond servers were overloaded, and to
try again when traffic was less. The poster tried at 5AM Redmond time,
no problems.

So, I'm kinda in the dark.


The Microsoft servers have been modified, since the
Win10 catalog server was set up.

They all seem to have developed "bad eating habits".
The servers don't seem to work properly with regular
HTTP protocols. The servers do seem to work with BITS
(background transfers done for Windows Update).

So it looks like Microsoft has progressed to the
"secret handshake" era. And what I don't understand
is why there isn't a torrent of complaints about it.
I first noticed this, when an attempt to download
a Win10 ISO with a direct HTTP link, did not work
properly.

I've even tried Netscape Communicator, which had a
retry capability. And then the symptoms ended up being
really weird. The bottom line was, I still didn't get
an intact file. It's like the client end doesn't know
what the correct file size is. The transfer is
truncated, the client end is "happy".

And I have zero workarounds for this... I'm as
stumped as you.

Microsoft knows how to build a content distribution
network, so to me, a "busy server" isn't a good
enough excuse.

WSUS is protected by various checksums, so it should
be able to detect each crappy download that occurs. If
it couldn't even get an intact manifest file, then it
would be in real trouble.

Vanguard found a web page the other day, showing
BITS has an API. You can write a program to call
BITS and get it to do a transfer for you. So it's
not like the protocol needs to be reverse engineered,
whatever they've done to it.

This is on the same computer that sparked my earlier thread of large
updates not installing.

Something is sure amiss somewhere, and beginning to suspect MS. This is
a fresh install with factory disks. (Had to replace the HD.) Updates
started out fine. Then things went downhill.

Tried System Restore, too, no go. Now working on a 2nd Mr. Fixit, not
sure if it's actually working, or simply hung up. Going to let it run
all night, see what I find in the morning.




--
Ken
Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 42.0
Thunderbird 38.0.1
"My brain is like lightning, a quick flash
and it's gone!"

Ken Springer wrote:

Something is sure amiss somewhere, and beginning to suspect MS. This is a fresh install
with factory disks. (Had to replace the HD.) Updates started out fine. Then things went
downhill.

Tried System Restore, too, no go. Now working on a 2nd Mr. Fixit, not sure if it's
actually working, or simply hung up. Going to let it run all night, see what I find in
the morning.

I sometimes don't bother updating the three W7 machines for a month or two.
When I finally get around to it there are 30+ updates.
Updating MUST be done when it's not prime time in the USA, like 11 PM Redmond time,
or it just sits there and does nothing.
When I installed W7 on this machine it took a week of 1 AM updates to get
them all. During daylight hours it was a no go.

I examine every update and do them by batches of 10-15, W7 all security ups,
then Office 2003, Office 2007, lastly are no security and optional.
(Three versions of Office reside more or less peacefully together on each machine.)

System restore will work from Safe Mode.
Something is active and not releasing during regular mode.

Charlie+ wrote:
On Mon, 18 Jan 2016 16:41:41 -0500, Paul wrote as
underneath :

Ken Springer wrote:
Hi, Paul,

With the problems I've been having getting these updates installed,
pretty much half of them fail as best as I can tell, thought I'd give
the WSUS Offline a shot. That failed too.

WSUS gives me an error message, "Download failure for w60 glb".

Tried WSUS on my W7 machine, same error code.

Can't say as a search on Google for that phrase has been much help to
me. :-(

The one and only hit for the exact phrase (found via DuckDuckGo) was
where the suggestion was that Redmond servers were overloaded, and to
try again when traffic was less. The poster tried at 5AM Redmond time,
no problems.

So, I'm kinda in the dark.

The Microsoft servers have been modified, since the
Win10 catalog server was set up.

They all seem to have developed "bad eating habits".
The servers don't seem to work properly with regular
HTTP protocols. The servers do seem to work with BITS
(background transfers done for Windows Update).

So it looks like Microsoft has progressed to the
"secret handshake" era. And what I don't understand
is why there isn't a torrent of complaints about it.
I first noticed this, when an attempt to download
a Win10 ISO with a direct HTTP link, did not work
properly.

I've even tried Netscape Communicator, which had a
retry capability. And then the symptoms ended up being
really weird. The bottom line was, I still didn't get
an intact file. It's like the client end doesn't know
what the correct file size is. The transfer is
truncated, the client end is "happy".

And I have zero workarounds for this... I'm as
stumped as you.

Microsoft knows how to build a content distribution
network, so to me, a "busy server" isn't a good
enough excuse.

WSUS is protected by various checksums, so it should
be able to detect each crappy download that occurs. If
it couldn't even get an intact manifest file, then it
would be in real trouble.

Vanguard found a web page the other day, showing
BITS has an API. You can write a program to call
BITS and get it to do a transfer for you. So it's
not like the protocol needs to be reverse engineered,
whatever they've done to it.

Paul - Interesting posts, thanks.
Just for info. I updated WSUS version last week when my previous working
version started to fall over on client updates. I notice that the new
version has a prerequisite KB check and load right at the front of the
client full update train ( one w7 x32 installation required three KB
installs in this stage). This newer version seems to have got rid of the
fallover (hanging) problem I mentioned in another thread.
For Ken - I havnt tried it with a new install from zero W7 yet tho. C+

I downloaded the latest wsusoffline, and it's not having
a problem pulling in Windows 7 updates. And I don't happen
to believe that "overloaded servers corrupt downloads".
An overloaded server stops allowing new connections,
if machine resources are exhausted. Downloads can be
corrupted if the machine has bad memory, a bad disk,
a bad CPU, a bad power supply, but many times subsystem
checks (like CRC) help protect against problems. But
an outright protocol failure, I have direct evidence
here that can bust things. As I received two ISO
downloads from Microsoft that failed on power-of-two
boundaries. And that suggests a protocol reason as
playing a part.

And it turns out, that there is already a way to get BITS
to work for you. From Powershell...

http://superuser.com/questions/36215...ows-powershell

Import-Module BitsTransfer
Start-BitsTransfer -source "http://urlToDownload"

But to use that, would require a bit of hacking of the
wsusoffline scripts, if it came to that.

It appears PowerShell, some version, has a built-in copy
of wget. The Wsusoffline package uses wget, but feeds it
a text file of links to download. So the wget is not
actually being used in "one-off" mode, it's not being
used to fetch just one file at a time. So you'd have to
be careful, no matter what hacking you did, to support
whatever mode of operation that wsusoffline is using.

I was also hoping that Wsusoffline had a "dry run" mode,
so it would just make a list of what it intended to download,
but that would be hard to implement given how they've bolted
this thing together. The Wsusoffline is still running
right now, on my other computer. It claims it has 187 updates
to download.

Paul

On 1/18/16 2:05 PM, Ken Springer wrote:
Hi, Paul,

With the problems I've been having getting these updates installed,
pretty much half of them fail as best as I can tell, thought I'd give
the WSUS Offline a shot. That failed too.

WSUS gives me an error message, "Download failure for w60 glb".

Tried WSUS on my W7 machine, same error code.

Can't say as a search on Google for that phrase has been much help to
me. :-(

The one and only hit for the exact phrase (found via DuckDuckGo) was
where the suggestion was that Redmond servers were overloaded, and to
try again when traffic was less. The poster tried at 5AM Redmond time,
no problems.

So, I'm kinda in the dark.

Well...........

It took forever, but the 2nd Mr. Fixit fixed nothing. The last message
from Mr. Fixit said it was looking for updates, but found nothing. Say
WHAT????? This was from the MS article on reseting the update
components. The article had the manual instructions so I started
running through them.

All was going well until registering.dlls and I got a message for 3 of
them that said the dll was missing or corrupt. That triggered the
question "What else might be missing or corrupt?" assuming the messages
are correct. I no longer have 100% faith the messages really mean what
the problem is.

So I've thrown in the towel and reinstalling from scratch. If this was
my computer, might have played around some more, but like most of us,
have other things to get done.


--
Ken
Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 42.0
Thunderbird 38.0.1
"My brain is like lightning, a quick flash
and it's gone!"

In message , Paul in Houston TX
writes:
[]
I examine every update and do them by batches of 10-15, W7 all security ups,
then Office 2003, Office 2007, lastly are no security and optional.
(Three versions of Office reside more or less peacefully together on
each machine.)
[]
Why do you do this (have multiple versions of Office)?

(At a _guess_ - you _prefer_ one of the older ones, but keep the newer
ones so you can read - and convert - files people send you. But, unless
the very latest versions don't support files produced by some of the
older ones, I still can't see why _three_ versions ...)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"I am entitled to my own opinion."
"Yes, but it's your constant assumption that everyone else is also that's so
annoying." - Vila & Avon

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Paul in Houston TX writes:
[]
I examine every update and do them by batches of 10-15, W7 all security ups,
then Office 2003, Office 2007, lastly are no security and optional.
(Three versions of Office reside more or less peacefully together on each machine.)
[]
Why do you do this (have multiple versions of Office)?

(At a _guess_ - you _prefer_ one of the older ones, but keep the newer ones so you can
read - and convert - files people send you. But, unless the very latest versions don't
support files produced by some of the older ones, I still can't see why _three_ versions ...)

You are correct. It's both personal preference and work related.
My home computers have only 2003 but the two enterprise units have
full 2003, 2010, much of 2007, parts 2013 and MS cloudy office, etc.
I really don't like 2007 and up. The ribbon is horrible. But I have to
use newer versions for Cloudy Outlook, Skype for Business 2015, Sharepoint,
and other MS related business programs. All work programs are enterprise.
Also, about 1/2 of the vendors that I communicate with still use 2003.
Most are small companies or individuals and have not updated.
Software is not their thing... they are more interested in keeping
the refineries and pipelines operational.
It's easier to use 2003 for file creation than to create with
newer versions and save as version 2003 so the vendors can read them.
Generally though, if someone sends a MS.???X file I respond in kind.

I also have to have SQL Server 2005, 2008, & 2012.
SQL programs created in 2007 may or may not work on SQL 2008 or 2012,
and one created for 2012 may or may not work with earlier versions.

In message , Paul in Houston TX
writes:
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
[]
Why do you do this (have multiple versions of Office)?

(At a _guess_ - you _prefer_ one of the older ones, but keep the
newer ones so you can
read - and convert - files people send you. But, unless the very
latest versions don't
support files produced by some of the older ones, I still can't see
why _three_ versions ...)

You are correct. It's both personal preference and work related.
My home computers have only 2003 but the two enterprise units have
full 2003, 2010, much of 2007, parts 2013 and MS cloudy office, etc.
I really don't like 2007 and up. The ribbon is horrible. But I have to

When we first had forced on us a ribbon at work (I think we went from
2003 to 2010), I looked into the turn-back-ers; there are more than one.
I found one - I think it was a Swiss (.ch) one - which did quite a good
job of returning original non-ribbon menu (in Word and Excel at least -
not sure about the rest of Office), while still providing access to most
of the new features (some of which I, grudgingly, admit are worth
having, though not most). I've more or less grown used to the ribbon
though (though I still use old key sequences that are in my
subconscious, which it still supports). The Swiss (?) one is free for
home, but isn't supposed to be for work except for evaluation, hence my
learning the ribbon.

use newer versions for Cloudy Outlook, Skype for Business 2015, Sharepoint,
and other MS related business programs. All work programs are enterprise.
Also, about 1/2 of the vendors that I communicate with still use 2003.
Most are small companies or individuals and have not updated.
Software is not their thing... they are more interested in keeping
the refineries and pipelines operational.

I find this XP machine does all I want to do too! (I take this w7 'group
to keep abreast - a little - and to support friends.)

It's easier to use 2003 for file creation than to create with
newer versions and save as version 2003 so the vendors can read them.
Generally though, if someone sends a MS.???X file I respond in kind.

Interesting; why - would they even notice if you sent them a .??? file?
I thought the later versions read earlier ones no problem.

I also have to have SQL Server 2005, 2008, & 2012.

)-:

SQL programs created in 2007 may or may not work on SQL 2008 or 2012,
and one created for 2012 may or may not work with earlier versions.

)-:
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Another lively meeting of thr 1922 Committee - the secret gathering of BBC
presenters that gets its name from the fact that no one is sober after
twenty-past seven. - Eddie Mair, RT 16-22 April 2011

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Paul in Houston TX writes:
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

When we first had forced on us a ribbon at work (I think we went from 2003 to 2010), I
looked into the turn-back-ers; there are more than one. I found one - I think it was a
Swiss (.ch) one - which did quite a good job of returning original non-ribbon menu (in
Word and Excel at least - not sure about the rest of Office), while still providing access
to most of the new features (some of which I, grudgingly, admit are worth having, though
not most). I've more or less grown used to the ribbon though (though I still use old key
sequences that are in my subconscious, which it still supports). The Swiss (?) one is free
for home, but isn't supposed to be for work except for evaluation, hence my learning the
ribbon.

I've tried several brands / versions of turn-back-ers but have not found one that I like.

It's easier to use 2003 for file creation than to create with
newer versions and save as version 2003 so the vendors can read them.
Generally though, if someone sends a MS.???X file I respond in kind.

Interesting; why - would they even notice if you sent them a .???X file? I thought the
later versions read earlier ones no problem.

My boss notices and makes fun of me! He is up to date on everything.
Has all sorts of phones, pads, nbooks, laptops that swivel, etc.
He likes to carry them around with him when he travels.
They are always beeping and chirping.

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


WTF is this?



--

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety,
deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Ben Franklin

In message , G.
Morgan writes:
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


WTF is this?


It's a geek code. For generic notes, see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geek_Code; for the UMRA-specific one, see
http://www.lowfield.co.uk/archers/geek.html.

--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

All that glitters has a high refractive index.

On 01/21/2016 03:07 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , G.
Morgan writes:
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


WTF is this?


It's a geek code. For generic notes, see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geek_Code; for the UMRA-specific one, see
http://www.lowfield.co.uk/archers/geek.html.


I've seen a whole message full of that junk. IIRC, I replied that I only
answer questions in English.

--
Mark Lloyd
http://notstupid.us/

"I don't mind those who are born again, just as long as they don't think
that they get twice as many rights."

In message , Mark Lloyd
writes:
On 01/21/2016 03:07 PM, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , G.
Morgan writes:
J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


WTF is this?


It's a geek code. For generic notes, see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geek_Code; for the UMRA-specific one, see
http://www.lowfield.co.uk/archers/geek.html.


I've seen a whole message full of that junk. IIRC, I replied that I
only answer questions in English.

Yes, people can go overboard (-:! In my case, it's less than one line,
and in my signature (so much software won't quote it anyway).
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

* SLMR 2.1a #113 * Tits like watermelons, sparrows like bacon rind.
- 03-22-97 Dave Beecham (quoted by
Gene Wirchenko, in alt.windows7.general, 2012-10-16.)

Steve Hayes wrote:

On Wed, 20 Jan 2016 23:33:51 -0600, G. Morgan
wrote:

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:

UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


WTF is this?

Part of his sig, so if your reader is any good it would not be
quotinmg it in a reply.

I use Agent, so it does snip properly formatted sigs. I posted it on
purpose to ask what form of shorthand it was.


--

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety,
deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Ben Franklin