Reboot an endpoint to complete an update

Some patches require a system reboot to successfully install. If you have applied a patch that requires the target system to reboot you will see a badge in the patch status for the system on the overview page at https://patchdeck.com/patch_management/: 

You can also see if a system is in need of a reboot on the detail page for the system.

You can always trigger a reboot by clicking on this button: 

How reboots are handled depends on the operating system.

Windows

For Windows endpoints running at least version 2.0.0 of the Patchdeck agent you can configure reboot options to better control the reboot messaging for the enduser. You will see the following settings if an endpoint runs a supported agent version: 

Message for reboot warning: You can set a customized message to show to endusers in the reboot dialog. If you leave this blank the default message will be shown: “Your organisation administrator has applied an update to your system. To finish the update process your system needs to be restarted. Please save your work and then click ‘Yes’ to initiate the restart. If you want to be asked again later, select ‘No’.”

How often is the user allowed to postpone the reboot: Set the number of allowed reboot deferrals here.

Duration (in minutes) for each reboot postponement: Set how long each reboot postponement should last.

Example: You want to allow endusers to postpone a reboot 3 times for 60 minutes each. For this you need to configure the following settings:

• How often is the user allowed to postpone the reboot: 3
• Duration (in minutes) for each reboot postponement: 60

The remaining reboot deferrals are shown to the enduser in the warning message.

You can always edit the currently active reboot settings for a system by clicking on the button:

Endpoints running Windows Server are rebooted without user confirmation.

Linux and Mac

We currently do not support enduser notifications on Linux and Mac endpoints and these systems are rebooted right away as soon as you trigger the reboot request.

You can always check which systems are still waiting for a reboot by choosing the corresponding filter on the patch management overview page: 

Reboot Policies

If you want to automate the rebooting of your systems you can configure a reboot policy.