On Tue, 9 Jul 1996, Susie Rolland wrote:
 
> Has anyone used the new Patch/iX?  How was it?  Can a novice (like me) use
> it?  I have to do powerpatch 5 plus some extra patches this weekend ...
>
 
I used Patch/iX to install PowerPatch 5.  Comments from the response
center indicate that Patch/iX is "not quite ready for prime time."  A
couple of example problems I encountered might illustrate potential
problems for you.
 
We own Transact/iX with rights for both compatibility mode and native
mode.  As Patch/iX went through our system identifying those products we
have installed to qualify which patches from the PowerPatch tape it will
apply, it qualified the compatibility mode patch, the native mode patch,
and a patch which supported both native and compatibility modes.  While
I was waiting for a callback from the response center, I perused the
descriptions of the patches which qualified (something you would not
necessarily assume you need to do for a "standard" patch process).  In
doing so, I noticed a warning in the text describing these patches that
only the combined patch should be applied because it included all of the
other two and multiple patches trying to update the same files would
cause the patch process to fail.
 
Later, trying to track down some problems that showed up after the patch
installation, a response center engineer suggested that I needed to add
some reactive NS patches, partly because Patch/iX doesn't qualify some of
the NS patches that are required for our LanLink/3000.  Patch/iX assumed
that those patches applied only to customers owning the more complete NS
services product.
 
It does seem that it is an improvement in the patch process, but still
has some bugs which remain to be worked out.
 
-- dave ([log in to unmask])