windows update cache

Sat Sep 29 01:51:56 UTC 2007

On Fri, Sep 28, 2007, Joe Johnson wrote:

> test the loads and see how much he can pull from WSUS before it craps
> out or test squid to see if it causes even more update headaches with
> Automatic Updates.

Well, I'll announce when the Squid "static content pretending to be
dynamic content" patches are officially in on the squid blog
(http://squidproxy.wordpress.com/) . It'll also cache other stuff besides
Windows Updates. Now, you might think "Why would I bother?" but then
most small to medium sized networks generally haven't a clue whats actually
going on -on- their network and don't realise what fraction of their traffic
is or could be windows updates and the like, especially in particular
environments like dormitory networks where the rush to grab patches can
and does hurt.

Caching still makes sense. I'll post more numbers as I get these things
deployed. The silly thing is that people -are- using Squid and the like
-very- successfully these days and still see 30% byte savings in some
places - but never really talk about it.

(It also works for stuff like caching Linux updates too; that works Real
Well(tm) when you're running a farm of all the same Linux boxes and
don't want to run a local mirror.)

WSUS is a great idea if you control the client PC. Please don't take me
back to the days where clients manually configured proxy servers on their
machine and then changed ISPs, only to call you when your proxy server
denied them the internet.

Adrian