Updating the Cisco 6100 Series System Software

This chapter presents the information and procedures necessary to download new software images to the Cisco 6100 Series system. With the current release of this feature, you can download new software images to any of the following modules:

ATU-C or STU-C module
LIM controller module
Network interface (NI) module
SC module
DS3 subtend host module (STM)

14.1 Procedures Overview

A system software download is the method by which a Cisco 6100 Series system can upgrade the software in each of the modules that support downloading to the module. The software download procedure requires a TFTP server. Cisco recommends that you use the TFTP server on the same workstation as the ViewRunner servers. The TFTP server must be configured correctly on the workstation. The TFTP IP address and TFTP path are configured during ViewRunner installation.

The wizard validates that the images are present in the TFTP path on the ViewRunner server workstation, even if another workstation has been selected as the TFTP server. If images are not found, a warning message displays and you are given the choice to cancel or continue.

Software download can be used to update the software in an entire network of Cisco 6100 Series system DSLAMs. Operators are not required to attend the node during the download process, yet it provides progress and failure notifications.

During software upgrade, when moving to a release that supports new subscriber data that is not supported in the release being upgraded from, defaults are taken from the vrconstants.conf file instead of relying on node defaults. This allows you to upgrade software and get default subscriber values set to the site defaults. Otherwise, if the node default does not contain the desired values, you would have to modify each subscriber manually after the upgrade. For new nonsubscriber data, the values are left in their default states.

ViewRunner for HP OpenView supports software downloads to nodes that are being managed through the inband channel, provided that both the current system controller software version and the system controller version listed in the release definition file (RDF) file support inband upgrades.

14.2 Software Upgrade---Things to Remember

Following are some things to remember when upgrading your software images:

Software download automatically does a save or restore of configuration information when the system controller image is being changed as part of the download. If the system controller image is not being changed, no save or restore of configuration is performed. However, as a fail-safe measure, you should use the configuration save wizard to store the current NVRAM configuration for later retrieval in case it becomes necessary.
If the TFTP transfer for the system controller image succeeds, but TFTP for other images fails, the operation is not aborted. In this case, the software download completes with exceptions that you can view by double-clicking on the node in the wizard or by looking in the vrNetMon log file. The images that failed should be fixed and the software download should be repeated. This is to ensure that the configuration is properly saved and restored.
After a software download, it might take a few minutes for the modules to load the new images. You need to do a configuration synchronization after the download if you are not receiving traps on the ViewRunner server workstation. This is so that the 6100 Chassis View displays the modules with the proper status color.

14.3 Release Definition File

The software images are grouped by system software release number. The RDF identifies, for a given software release, the software that is compatible with each hardware module or revision. ViewRunner uses the RDF to download the appropriate images required to update the modules in its configuration. A new RDF is released with each Cisco 6100 Series system release.

The RDF file is located in $VRS_HOME/RDF. The images must be located in the directory specified by the TFTP path that is configured during ViewRunner installation. ViewRunner can upgrade to any supported release as long as the RDF and corresponding images have been installed.

14.4 Download Procedures

Note Use the Save Configuration wizard to save the current provisioning information and system configuration to a file. This is so that you can recover your configuration as quickly as possible if it becomes necessary.

Following are the procedures to download new software images to the Cisco 6100 Series system:

Step 1 In the ViewMap dialog box, click on the icon of the Cisco 6100 Series system whose configuration you want to upgrade.

To upgrade more than one Cisco 6100 Series system's configuration, click and drag a selection box around the icons for the systems whose configurations you want to upgrade. Additional Cisco 6100 Series systems can be selected before the operation is started by pressing the Control key and clicking on the icons for those systems.

Step 2 Select Download System Software from the Configuration menu on the ViewRunner Submap dialog box to begin the software download.

Step 3 Alternatively, you can select Download System Software from the Configuration menu on the 6100 Chassis View window, as shown in Figure 14-1.

Figure 14-1: Configuration Menu

Step 4 The first window that appears, as shown in Figure 14-2, provides you with instructions and a list of the Cisco 6100 Series systems selected to have software downloaded to
them. The list includes the current software release information. Read the instructions
and verify that you want to download new software images to these Cisco 6100
Series systems.

Figure 14-2: Software Download Wizard

Note If you have a BOOTP server present, the system controller image that is used is the one specified in the BOOTP table, not the one in the RDF.

Step 5 Click Next to continue to the next window, as shown in Figure 14-3, where you choose which software version to download.

Figure 14-3: Cisco 6100 Series System Software Images

Step 6 Once you select the software version you want to download and click Next, you are asked to confirm that you want this version downloaded to all the Cisco 6100 Series systems you selected, as shown in Figure 14-4. If so, click OK.

Figure 14-4: Software Upgrade Confirmation

Step 7 If the images to be downloaded are not on the TFTP path configured during ViewRunner installation, you get a warning message telling you that the images needed for the download are not where expected. You are given an opportunity to cancel the operation and place the images where they are expected.

Note If the images or the TFTP server are not available, the software download operation fails.

Step 8 Once you click OK, the software download starts. You can get a detailed status of the download progress for any Cisco 6100 Series system in the Status column by double-clicking on that Cisco 6100 Series system.

Step 9 Double-click the status line of the Cisco 6100 Series system that shows a software download failure to get a log of the exact problems encountered that caused the failure.

Figure 14-5: Software Upgrade Progress

The software download continues. If you try to cancel the download before it completes, you get a message similar to Figure 14-6 warning you that there are still operations in progress. If you click Yes, the wizard closes, but the operations that are already in progress (not those still pending) are
not cancelled.

Figure 14-6: Interruption Notice

You also receive a warning if you try to add Cisco 6100 Series systems to the list after the download process has begun. This is not allowed.

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