Firmware update issues

[Brian Bergin]

I beg you guys to reconsider how firmware updates are handled. They used to notify us when they were available and were made directly from Cisco. Now, unless I really missing something, one has to first know a new firmware is available and then manually download the firmware to one’s local machine (that’s one trip from cisco.com servers), then sign into the OP Portal, upload the firmware to the customer (that’s two trips to cisco.com servers), then it has to send the firmware to the OP device which, in turn, uploads the new firmware to the customer’s device (that’s 3 trips of the same file). This is a waste of bandwidth and time and it’s a royal pain as the VAR has to keep track of every Cisco device customers have and download firmware for all of them. I strongly urge Cisco to reconsider this. Some of the new firmware have gotten to be in the ~63MB range (at least for one new beta unit and I expect that it will stay that big when it ships). That’s 190MB of bandwidth for a 63MB file, not to mention that upload speeds from cable/DSL is far slower than download speeds, uploading a 60+MB file and then waiting for it to download yet again to the customer location is just going to get more and more painful.

[jiyeung]

Hey Brian,

This is something we've been giving a lot of thought to for the same reasons you have listed above.  We want to make the firmware library into something that's dynamic and will give you the proactive notifications/options to upgrade directly from newly released code.  It would be great to be able to offer recommendations on options for SW PSIRT and Field notices as well.

We are on the path to make these type of improvements to help make the overall workflow through the tool more useful.  We appreciate all the great feedback you've provide and please do keep it coming!

-Jimmy

[Brian Bergin]

The confusing thing is when Thunderbolt first shipped it had this functionality built in from the start, then it was pulled for some reason. The initial designed worked great. You got a highlighted icon indicating there was new firmware and it just updated it. Nice, clean, and simple. I hope that’s where you’re heading back to.

[Marc Bresniker]

Hi Brian, the original trial of OnPlus (project Thunderbolt) used a few networking devices to test and validate functionality. With a simple small business switch or access point, when a new version of firmware became available it was easy enough to notify the user and wait for a confirmation to push it to the device. There were only a few models to keep track of, so easy to track firmware announcements.

As we launched the official service, this concept of putting the devices in Auto-pilot mode for firmware is more complicated with some additional rules to be put in place. As we broaden the list of supported devices, determining what firmware version is the right one is more difficult as some products have multiple firmware options. Additionally, some products require entitlement from the Cisco software center in order to obtain the software.  To automate the push, without creating a duplicate software center, requires some additional engineering.

We are working on a recommendation capabiltiy in OnPlus, where Firmware recommendations will be one of the key outputs. This would take into account the broad Cisco SMB portoflio and provide notifications and suggestions of what firmware options should be considered.

So yes, it is heading back into that direction of what you saw in the Thunderbolt Trial. Hopefully you will be able to seepreviews of that and provide more feedback.

-Marc