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I am managing 2 SharePoint servers 2013, which are installed inside windows server 2008 R2, as follow:-

  1. Dev Farm. Which have both sql server & SharePoint on the same VM.
  2. Live Farm. Which have 2 VMs; SharePoint & sql server.

Now I am facing this problem:-

  1. Our system admin patch our servers each month.
  2. What they do is that they install the patches from this link https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin , which contain windows, office & SharePoint security updates

  3. And this is part of our security policy to make sure our servers Dev & live have the latest security updates.

  4. My problem is that these patches sometimes contain SharePoint security updates, and installing these updates will mainly update some SharePoint features which might cause un-expected problems.
  5. Mainly because some SharePoint security updates such as https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2965219 , include non-security fixes.

Currently I am approaching these patches as follow:-

  1. I inform our system admin to install the patches on our Dev machine first.
  2. Then I run the SharePoint product configuration wizard.
  3. After that I test all the site collections + managed services (we have managed Meta data & search) + layout.
  4. If I find any problem, we will not patch the live server unless I fix any problem on Dev.if my test did not find any problem , we patch our live server, then I run the product configuration wizard , do a smoke test..

The problem of my current approach:-

  1. It is really time consuming, sometimes I spend 2 days to do full test on dev.
  2. Sometimes SharePoint security updates will change the farm build number. For example in our case , the last time I install a full CU was on October 2014 (since it contain fixes to problem we were facing) and I got this farm build number 15.0.4659.1001. after that i have never apply any full CU. but we have been patching our servers each month and this result in upgrading our farm from 15.0.4659.1001 (Oct 2014) To 15.0.4763.1000 (Oct 2015). So now our farm have Oct 2015 farm build number 15.0.4763.1000, although we have not installed the related full CU.

So can anyone advice on these points:-

  1. Is it a valid and recommended approach to install all the security patches from this link https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin , each month. Or we should exclude SharePoint updates?
  2. Do I need to install full CU after any SharePoint security patches? Or my current approach is valid ?
  3. will my farm get corrupted or hard to track, if i keep installing SharePoint security updates in this way ?
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  • One tip I'd add is to beware Office updates. It's not a good practice to have Office desktop applications installed on your SharePoint servers anyway, but if you do, Office updates have been known to break SharePoint in the past. I believe this has been remedied since SharePoint 2007, but it's worth being aware of any way. Feb 29, 2016 at 16:28
  • @StevenMulkerrins but why you are assuming that sharepoint is not being treated as part of office,, now we do not have any office application installed inside our server,, but there are office components that need to be updated
    – John John
    Feb 29, 2016 at 17:12
  • The problem is that it can overlap with Office desktop applications. There was an issue where an update intended for the Office desktop applications updated a shared DLL which was also used by SharePoint, which then caused problems in SharePoint. This was with SharePoint 2007, and I believe that later versions do not use any shared resources, but I still always recommend that customers do not automatically deploy standard Office updates to SharePoint servers. Feb 29, 2016 at 17:19
  • SharePoint Security Updates are mostly delivered in the Office-Category in WSUS. John already mentioned that his company-policy forces him to install these, so excluding this category is not an option for him (even if i agree to your recommendation, Steven). A lot of customers have an Office-Component installed on their SharePoint-Servers without really realizing that: SharePoint Designer! If it's installed, a lot of Office related Updates get installed which can cause errors described by Steven. If SharePoint Security-Updates need to be installed, SP-Designer should not be installed on SP.
    – MHeld
    Mar 1, 2016 at 13:56

2 Answers 2

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+150

You already found out a lot of stuff regarding security updates, CUs and version number increments. There's nothing wrong in your post, but i would like to add some comments especially to your questions:

  1. It is valid to install security-patches for Windows including SharePoint specific security-updates (if there's one available that month). Theoretically this shouldn't break things. But Microsoft is not perfect in providing patches, and sometimes they publish buggy updates. One example just occured some weeks ago. Security-Patch MS16-004 broke a lot of farms at our customers. More information on that example can be found here: http://www.toddklindt.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=616. So testing is also recommended for security-updates. Or wait with installation until others did that for you :-)

  2. You do not have to install a CU after applying security updates, even if they increment your Farm-Version. If you want to install a CU, you should use one that increments your Farm-Version again. I have seen problems with the version check if you do not so (i.e. if you install a security fix that brings your Farm-Version to January 16 CU level, you should minimally install February CU to be fine).

  3. As described, your way to patch the farm is valid. But because of the possibility of a buggy patch, things might break unexpectedly.

One EXCELLENT source for SharePoint patches is the list from Todd Klindt: http://www.toddklindt.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=346. Read 'Bugs, Notes and Regressions' to find the errors that hurt a lot of people.

My standard-recommendation is to install only CUs one or two times per year and to exclude SharePoint security-updates in the monthly patchday (just install 'Windows-generic' security updates). SharePoint security-updates can mostly be excluded via WSUS if you exclude the 'Office' category for your SharePoint server. But i can understand if your company-policy forces you to update your servers AND applications shortly after a hotfix is released. A lot of people also apply this policy if they publish their farm to the internet. Then you have to live with that unsureness or take the time for testing.

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  • now seems there is not a perfect way to manage this, as each approach will have its own side effects ..and balancing between security and stability is the key.. in our case our farm is not exposed to the internet but still monthly server patching for security updates (windows and application) is required,, unless we faced problems on test server then the patch will not be applied to live or will be postponed,, and this what happened in our case when we install the MS16-004 , it breaks some views on test and till now we did not apply it to live ..
    – John John
    Feb 26, 2016 at 14:01
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While recommended to install security updates as soon as possible, you will need to evaluate the security risk of not installing a particular security patch. This is something we will not be able to help you with.

You do not need to install the Cumulative Update if you do not wish to install it.

Yes, some non-CUs increment the farm build number due to an updated copy of Microsoft.SharePoint.dll. Other security patches may only deploy new JavaScript or ASPX files, etc. which would not increment the farm build number.

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  • ok great,, but can i ask you to read my "Currently I am approaching these patches as follow:-" steps and adivce on them ? now again our system admin says that patches are required ,,, but they mentioned that they are ok with not patching live server until i confirm the patch on dev server... so can you adivce on my current approach (the 4 steps after .. "Currently I am approaching these patches as follow:-" ).. second question if we keep patching out SP server in this way , will this cause problems , or my approach is valid ?
    – John John
    Feb 18, 2016 at 16:46
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    Yes, it's fine.
    – user6024
    Feb 18, 2016 at 16:49
  • so technically speaking let say a patch contain 2 SharePoint security updates,and from my test on Dev i realized that one of the SP security updates will cause problems ,while the other will work well, so is it ok to skip one security update and install the other on live ???or either i need to install all or none ?
    – John John
    Feb 18, 2016 at 16:52
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    You can install whatever you want. If you have further questions, create a new question as this isn't an appropriate way to ask further questions on StackExchange.
    – user6024
    Feb 18, 2016 at 16:54
  • i would say there is no a rule here, sometimes i create a new question if i want further explanations,, but i realized that my new question is being marked as duplicate :) and thanks for the useful replies..
    – John John
    Feb 18, 2016 at 16:56

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