How to update SAP HostAgent on multiple systems automatically

We have numerous SAP systems running on AIX and Linux. It can be time consuming to update the HostAgent on all these systems.

All our SAP systems running on AIX and Linux mount a common NAS filesystem called /usr/sap/basis.

I have two folders created

/usr/sap/basis/HostAgent/AIX

/usr/sap/basis/HostAgent/Linux

A hidden file “.delay” is created in /usr/sap/basis/HostAgent/AIX. This is to prevent all SAP host from updating the HostAgent at the same time.

ls -l .delay

-rw-r–r–    1 smdadm   sapsys           12 Feb  3 08:21 .delay

cat .delay

20random20

The latest versions of the SAP HostAgent are downloaded and put in the respective folders above.

On every host running SAP, a soft link ‘new’ mapped to “/usr/sap/basis/HostAgent/AIX” is created in the /usr/sap/hostctrl folder

Example for an AIX host :

directory /usr/sap/hostctrl ; ls -l

total 16

drwxr-x—    2 root     sapsys         4096 Feb  3 08:47 exe

lrwxrwxrwx    1 root     system           28 Sep 27 2011  new -> /usr/sap/basis/HostAgent/AIX

drwxr-x—    5 sapadm   sapsys         4096 Mar  7 23:38 work

After 30mins, all the SAP Systems HostAgent is updated to the latest version and restarted.

SAP Note 1031096 has an attached document that provides additional infornation on updating the SAP HostAgent package.