Managed Firmware Upgrades is the Kio Cloud Device Management feature that schedules over-the-air (OTA) firmware upgrades for Kontakt.io Tag and Infrastructure devices through your Portal Light infrastructure. You choose when upgrades occur, so they happen at times that are least disruptive to your staff and operations.
Where it fits
Managed Firmware Upgrades requires a Portal Light infrastructure. Portal Lights receive their own upgrades from Kio Cloud over the local Wi-Fi network. Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) devices such as tags, badges, Beams, and Beacons receive their upgrades from a nearby Portal Light.
Deployments without Portal Lights apply upgrades at the device with the Kio Setup Manager app. See Local firmware upgrades with the Kio Setup Manager app. Deployments integrated with Cisco Spaces manage device firmware from Cisco Spaces. See Upgrade Kontakt.io device firmware via Cisco Spaces.
What you can control
- Firmware Upgrade Window: The days of the week and the hours in each day when scheduled upgrades can occur.
- Timing of each upgrade: Devices receive a scheduled upgrade during the next Firmware Upgrade Window, or immediately.
- Which devices upgrade: Schedule an upgrade for all devices in a category, for a filtered subset, or for a single device model. Use a small subset to evaluate a firmware version before you upgrade the rest.
- Whether window-scheduled upgrades occur: Upgrades scheduled for the next upgrade window occur only while Managed Firmware Upgrades is turned on. Turn it off during a planned no-change period. Upgrades scheduled for immediately still proceed while it is off.
Device requirements
A device receives a scheduled upgrade only when all of the following are true:
- The Portal Lights in range of the device are installed, online, and connected to the local Wi-Fi network and Kio Cloud.
- A BLE device is currently detected by a Portal Light, with a signal strength (RSSI) of at least -85 dBm. Devices with a stronger signal upgrade first.
- The device has no pending configuration update. A pending configuration is applied before a firmware upgrade.
- The device model supports over-the-air upgrades. Older Smart Beacon, USB Beacon, and Sensor Beacon models do not.
Note: Nano Tags and Sticker Tags never receive firmware upgrades. They are non-connectable devices, so their firmware is set when they ship.
How a scheduled upgrade runs
One version at a time. A scheduled upgrade moves a device to the next available firmware version, not directly to the latest. If a device is two versions behind, schedule an upgrade for each version in turn. For example, if the latest version is 3.0 and the device is at 1.0 with 1.5 and 2.0 in between, schedule the upgrade to 1.5, then to 2.0, then to 3.0. Keeping devices current avoids this.
The window applies only to window-scheduled upgrades. An upgrade scheduled for the next upgrade window occurs only during the time periods you set. An upgrade scheduled for immediately can occur at any time.
Unfinished upgrades carry over. Devices that do not finish within a time period are queued for the next time period in the window, until every device has upgraded. For example, with 200 devices scheduled and a window of Monday through Wednesday, 12 AM to 3 AM, the devices that do not finish on Monday are queued for Tuesday.
Failed upgrades retry after 24 hours. When an upgrade attempt fails, the device shows a failed-upgrade indicator and is not tried again for 24 hours. The schedule stays in place, so the retry repeats every 24 hours until the upgrade succeeds. To clear the error and retry sooner, schedule the upgrade again. See Troubleshooting: a scheduled firmware upgrade didn't apply.
A device is unavailable while it downloads. A device does not transmit or receive data while it downloads a firmware upgrade. Schedule upgrades for your Firmware Upgrade Window so downloads happen at the least disruptive time.
A scheduled upgrade cannot be cancelled. Turning Managed Firmware Upgrades off pauses upgrades scheduled for the next upgrade window while it is off. It does not remove them, and it does not stop upgrades scheduled for immediately.
How to tell it is working
In the Tags and Infrastructure lists, the Available Firmware Upgrade column shows which devices have an upgrade available, and the Scheduled Firmware Upgrade column shows which devices have one scheduled, and which have failed. As an upgrade progresses, devices drop out of the scheduled filter one by one as they finish. Each device's General tab shows the same details and who scheduled the upgrade. See Firmware columns in Device Management.