Automatic update problems

[Oliver]

Hi,

as some people have noticed, the automatic updates of the product to version 6.0.9.1 had problems. There are several reasons why, including technical problems and a "storm" of update requests which the servers couldn't handle timely and where the updater wasn't properly prepared to try several times with random waiting intervals.

There seem to be several different levels of the problem and all we can do is offer a description of how to mitigate each one of them:

• Updater finished properly. All is fine, no further action is needed.
• Updater finished, but failed to download the big upgrade package. In this case there will be another automatic attempt after reboot.
• Updater finished downloading but was rebooted just during removal or installation because of "no apparent" progress.

The last one leaves F-PROT either half-uninstalled or half-installed. No matter how you see it, in the best case, a manual installation of the 6.0.9.1 package will solve it, in the worst case you will have to remove the house-keeping stuff Windows Installer keeps in the registry. I'll return with a method to achieve this later today/tonight.

Apologies for the problems caused by this. Feel free to comment or ask if some details are unclear.

[hcethatsme]

Hoping for clarification: if a computer has shown the "automatic updating, feel free to click OK" pop-up, I should assume it is downloading the big update and just be careful NOT to reboot until I get the "reboot required" message? I have a whole bunch of computers in various stages, so I am eager for the registry fix as well. Thanks, Oliver!

Hilary Caws-Elwitt

[Bartolo]

It has now been around 24 hours for this outage. Although I was able to download the version suggested this morning by Tech Support, I cannot update the virus defs. The update runs for several minutes with the green bar slowly advancing but at the end it says that the download failed. Since I am running on defs from 28 April I feel vulnerable.

Anyone else have any ideas?

[Bartolo]

Oops, it now seems to be fixed - 1555 EDT. My defs update finally worked and are up to date.

[davebert]

I got all mine working by downloading and manually installing the 6.0.9.1 version over the existing version. Then reboot. Then just wait as the FPROT updater downloads the update and after a few hours of being connected to the internet, you can double-click on the icon in the task bar with the exclamation point on it and in the window that opens click on the update button. It should then realize its done and the second icon in the task bar disappears and all is back to normal.
db

[Oliver]

Hoping for clarification: if a computer has shown the "automatic updating, feel free to click OK" pop-up, I should assume it is downloading the big update and just be careful NOT to reboot until I get the "reboot required" message?

That's right. If you're unsure about whether it is still running, try looking in task manager. Since this gets started by Windows installer, the program name should be "MSI*.TMP" with "SYTSTEM" as the user account it is running under.

I have a whole bunch of computers in various stages, so I am eager for the registry fix as well.

I am working on it, but if you need it ASAP, please follow these manual steps:

• Kill the "MSI*.TMP" process described above.
• Kill FPAVServer.exe unless net stop FPAVServer does the job.
• Download the Microsoft Tool described here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301 (download link).
• After installing it, run the installer (MS doesn't allow redistribution, so this is the only way to do it), run the tool.
• The tool will present a dialog with a selection of installed products. Select the entry for "F-PROT" and click remove. This will clean out the MSI house-keeping information.
• Install the version 6.0.9.1.

Oops, it now seems to be fixed - 1555 EDT. My defs update finally worked and are up to date.

Good to hear. Would you be so kind as to send me the output of the following command as a private message here on the board and also mention your IP:

tracert files.f-prot.net

I'll then run a tracert from the server (i.e. files.f-prot.com) this may help narrowing down this problem. But right now I think it is not related to the other issue. I can't see how, at least.

I got all mine working by downloading and manually installing the 6.0.9.1 version over the existing version. Then reboot. Then just wait as the FPROT updater downloads the update and after a few hours of being connected to the internet, you can double-click on the icon in the task bar with the exclamation point on it and in the window that opens click on the update button. It should then realize its done and the second icon in the task bar disappears and all is back to normal.

Actually this icon in this case is purely cosmetic. It "thinks" there is still one downloaded (but not yet installed) item in the update-queue. This is due to the nature of the fix which was fine for some, but didn't work for others as it seems.

[hcethatsme]

Worked like a charm, thank you, Oliver! And two other computers I thought were hosed & needed the fix actually healed themselves. The others can wait until tomorrow. Thanks a million!

Hilary

ps modified to say--one computer which seemed like it was updating (after pop-up) was not, with neither MSI*.TMP nor FPAVServer.exe processes running at all. MS tool & re-install fixed it.

[kdarby]

Support emailed me back saying it was a minor issue and not to worry as FProt would still be running and protecting us.
This seems very unlikely as F-Prot could not be opened on any of our 15 computers, you got the message that the FPAVServer was not online.
Had to uninstall and reinstall all 15 with several reboots on each.
F-Prot don't seem to have taken this anywhere near as seriously as they should.

[Kari]

@kdarby: I was the one who wrote that response. The reason was not that we weren't taking the problem seriously, as I said elsewhere, it's been our only concern for the last 48 hours or so. We just didn't want people to panic.

We're hoping everything is settling right about now. How are you guys? Has it blown over for you?

[mmark]

Well , I have 90  machines with F-Prot ... And I am not happy
to manually uninstal older and install new version.

Moreover, this is not only problem with update to 6.0.9.1 .
The 6.0.9.1 , freshly installed - still have  a problem with update.

Looks like there are 2 different procedures of update - one
with own instance, show as second FProt icon on  bar, and the second,
invokdt from the main program . This procedures behaves differenty ..

To make 6.0.9.1 working, i have to use  set update in main 
program to manual mode, check for updates manually  ....
Tere is a big update downloaded ( strange as 6.0.9.1 is newest )
but the message "There is updates to install ' is still on ...
Then I have to check updates 2-3 times from  'standalone'
updater - second icons of fprot vanish - and THEN i can swith to auto  mode
again ...

It takes time, escpecially when there is 90 machines to go  ( 

[linxd]

The problem has solved by itself in my own notebook PC,
I guest after 24 hours, it finally downloaded all and update it correctly.

As in the Windows Server 2003 which work as an email server,
it caused a terrible problem, my Email system can not work,
it pop up windows for all users to type in password again and again.

I do not know what happen in the first place, because I am using
clamav for my email server anti-virus,  and F-prot is only a second
antivirus program for server own protection purpose. so I did not
expect this email server problem is caused by F-prot.

After 2 hours struggle through remote control, I prepare to drive
to 20km away data center to reinstall the whole email server system,
if I do that, it will take me at least 10 hours, and my customers
complaints will pour in.
Then I realise this F-prot update maybe the problem
as all email account's password are saved in the registry, and the
endless updating may cause some problem in the windows registry.
So I just uninstall the F-prot from my server, then reboot the server,
everything goes back to normal.

The major problem is due to a simple mistake: when click the F-prot
upgrading icon with a yellow excalmatory mark, it pops up a small
windows, gave a false information: The download is completed. 
If the download is not completed, it should simply telling the truth
like data centre is busy, still downloading.
 
And while the download has not yet completed, the update program stop the provious
version, let PC/Server unprotected.  When user find out that  an anti
virus program is not working, and the upgrading progress is clearly saying
upgrade is just completed,  the only logic action they will do is to reboot
the system, hope the anti-virus can start working, and this bring them into
 terrible nightmare.

[kristjan]

I can now confirm that the automatic update problem has been fixed  . To get the latest update, all you have to do is restart your computer and F-PROT will download and install the latest version.

We do apologize for all the problems that people have been having with this.

[mmark]

Can't confirm this . Got 3x message that update need reboot machine, but nothing
changed  . Thy only way to bring FP to life is  manual remove previous version, then install
new, reboot, manual update till icon with exclamation will vanish ..

[Speedy]

I found a solution to the unending update. This is what you need to do: Log in to your client account and download fpav-windows-x86-hc-en-6.0.9.1.msi. Locate a folder named C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\FRISK Software\F-PROT Antivirus for Windows\tmp. Paste fpav-windows-x86-hc-en-6.0.9.1.msi into this folder. There will already be a corrupt copy of the file already in the folder. Overwrite it. Start the update procedure in F-Prot again. F-prot will detect the good copy and complete the update immediately.

I read that this problem was fixed. It wasn't for me. I spent hours trying to complete the update. Only the above procedure would work.

[JackNaylorPE]

Can't confirm this . Got 3x message that update need reboot machine, but nothing
changed  . Thy only way to bring FP to life is  manual remove previous version, then install
new, reboot, manual update till icon with exclamation will vanish ..

That's what I did, removing all settings and everything.  Was disappointed yet again though that there's no opportunity to install the program on the partition or folder I'd like to have it in.