Software just gets better. It makes stuff simpler and easier with every passing year. In any business or personal life, software has eliminated huge chunks of boring admin that previously ate up our time.
Not only has software gotten better in the past; it will continue to get better. In London this year, a grocery store opened where shoppers can pick up what they need without needing to scan anything or visit a till on their way out. NASA is investing in software to survey the moon and beyond, in the context of increasing momentum towards relocating Earth’s heavy industry out of the way into space.
Amazon Go convenience store no lines, no checkout advertisement inside the retail location. Just Walk Out Shopping experience. – London, United Kingdom
More frequent updates
As software becomes increasingly integral to more aspects of existence, releases are becoming ever more frequent, with an accelerating trend towards daily and weekly release cycles.
Not only are software updates more frequent; they’re also way more complicated. Many managers in charge of large estates have despaired about dependency hell, whereby certain software relies on specific versions of other software.
As an IT manager, whichever sector you’re working in, the world’s acceleration in release frequency and complexity will have affected you. Keeping on top of everything to deliver maximum computer performance to your organisation is a bigger job than it used to be. The pace of change means that packaging together MSIs, then testing, rebuilding and retesting, consumes a large number of person hours every time there’s an update; and that’s before we get onto versioning.
Covid-19 complications
The size of the task was already increasing when Covid-19 came along and complicated it significantly. The days when all the computers were in the same building will not return in most workplaces. With the permanent arrival of hybrid working, it’s harder to keep track of which version of which software is being run in which location.
Windows updates are more consistent and predictable, but still need careful management to avoid soon ending up with out of date, insecure computers.
Software updates made easy
Happily, we can help. Our easy-to-use patch management tool offers total control over all your software installation and updates.
When setting up your policy in Faronics Cloud Deep Freeze, our Software Updater module presents you with a list of 103 common applications. All you have to do is select the ones you need and schedule a maintenance period, for example 2am to 3am on Thursdays. If you need any applications not on the list, it’s easy to slot them in. Your software will be kept up to date without you needing to think about it any more. No longer will you be putting together all those update packages: we take care of everything.
The Application Update Status report allows you to keep track of exactly which version of what is installed where.
Windows Updates are equally straightforward. Just select the categories of Windows Updates you wish to install, and when you’d like your maintenance period.
The clickable, drillable Windows Update dashboard offers an at-a-glance overview of statuses across your estate.
You can stay even more on top of Windows Updates with customisable alerts that you can choose to receive via the cloud console, and/or email, and/or push notifications on your phone through the app.
Software updates could dominate your working life – or you could spend five minutes a week on them. To find out more, watch our webinar.
