Software update questions - How Software Updates Work!

[boogie]

I am curious and have some questions about software updates for the Netflix Player. This is directed at the Roku* technical people and hopefully they will answer (as much as they can). Here goes...

If the box is left powered off for an extended period of time then powered back on, will it always try to update to the latest software version during boot? I am wondering if a box can become too out of date to function.

Related to the above, are software updates cumulative or incremental? That is, say my box has 1.0.0 but while it is off (or unable to update) you release 1.0.1 then 1.1.0. Now it is able to update, will it update once (to 1.1.0) or twice (to 1.0.1 then 1.1.0)?

If the box cannot reach the update service for whatever reason (local or remote network outage, etc), how often will it retry? Is there any kind of random timer or backoff algorithm?

Are there plans in place to post new version release notes somewhere? I am wondering if and how us "power users" (aka geeks) will know what changed and when bugs we've run into are fixed.

Is the software download checksummed or signed in some way to prevent accidental or malicious tampering with the update transfer? I am more concerned about the possibility of data corruption damaging the update.

Again related, if/when a software update process fails (say due to a power outage during it) then will it "brick" the box and make it unusable? I am wondering if I should put the box on a small Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS), beyond a surge suppressor.

Thank you.

[TaylorH]

As of the release 1.0 build 830:

The player checks for new software randomly every 18-24 hours.
When the player boots, it checks for software almost immediately after boot, then schedules a check for 18-24 hours later.

If the auto check fails to contact the server, it should check again at the next schedule of 18-24 hours.
If a software download fails, it will time out and silently abort. It will try again the next time it contacts the server (and subsequently told to download new software.)

The software update happens silently and automatically in the background. If you press play it will cancel any software update that is going on in the background and re-schedule.

When it does download new software automatically, it waits for the box to be idle for over 30 minutes, then will reboot to the new software.
When you do a manual update, you're prompted to reboot immediately.
Also if you do a manual update and get the "reboot/ok" prompt, you can unplug it instead. It won't hurt it.

You can always check for new software manually by going to to the info screen. It will say "software is up to date" if there is no new software.

Releases should be cumulative and you should not need to download several incremental versions to become up to date. You should be able to go from version 1.0 to version 15.1 in one update without having to go through intermediate versions.
That being said, there always remains the unexpected possibility that we could have to force an intermediate upgrade situation. But that is certainly not the plan and would make the effort to not require it.

At some point in the future the Netflix service might notify you if you're too out of date and to upgrade. This could happen if they make changes to protocols or DRM, for example, that aren't backward compatible.

We will likely post release notes on new software updates. I don't know exactly if, how, or what, but we know people want them so it's likely we will.

Don't expect really frequent updates. It's no small feat to upgrade the entire user base so we make them count. Even just a few bug fixes takes a significant amount of testing not to mention load scheduling the roll out of the updates over a period of time.

Can you brick the box? Short answer is no. For months I have tested pulling the power while upgrading merely to prevent a complete upgrade during testing. This should never brick the box.
There are two software partitions and new software is always installed to the other partition. That way if you download, reboot, and fail to boot, it should reboot back to the previous version.
This could happen if there's some corruption during writing to the NAND flash memory. It does rarely happen from time to time.

If after downloading software the box appears to hang during boot, then after power cycling it does boot up, this is an indication that the new software likely failed to boot and you likely got kicked back to the previous version. Things other than corruption can cause a failed boot to new software like networking failure which we might not handle properly and cause a crash.

Software is signed. If it has been corrupted or tampered with during an update, it will fail to boot and kick you back to the previous version.
After download, before accepting the new software and rebooting, it also does a hash checksum on the binary to make sure it has not been corrupted. If it is, it will ignore the download as if it didn't happen (allow you to try again.)

There is a boot loader that can also be updated. But for this there is no back up, so we never plan to upgrade the boot loader. Even though during thousands of test it never failed. Still it's considered a risky update because there is no fall back.

If you do have your box unplugged for 4-12 months, just manually check for an update so you know you have the current software. Updates shouldn't take more than about 2 minutes.

I see no need to have it connected to a UPS. Even if power failed during an update it shouldn't affect the box.

[devrdander]

Sticky This

[gwhite1]

Wow, what a great post and great information! Thanks!

[Tarantulas]

This is the sort of communication that makes me want to sing the praises of the Roku box to every netflix user I know

[lovemytoys]

I second that - great post!

I have never seen a company so connected to their customers. Harvard Business School should use you for a case study. I have made reading this forum part of my daily routine.

Cant wait for the upgrade to HD.

[boogie]

Thank you RokuTaylor for the detailed answers to my questions. I really appreciate the technical insight and candor about how the software update process works.

I am very happy to hear that what you have in place is very robust and not prone to failure. Also if the process does fail, that there is a backup and automatic fall-back. I can only imagine how difficult a new software version roll-out would be, so I appreciate that you don't take it lightly.

This all being said, I wish the Roku team the best on the Netflix Player software updates! And of course you can count on us to give you helpful and useful feedback as we move forward.

[BuddhaChu]

If you do have your box unplugged for 4-12 months, just manually check for an update so you know you have the current software.

Yeah, like we're ever going to let that happen...

Excellent post Taylor BTW.

[Gallon_Jug]

Seems I may be out of luck.

Bought the Roku box and first time we sued it had 2 on quality... movie paused once after 2 minutes then played flawlessly.

That was Nov. 12th or 13th. Since then all have been Q1 and most play about 3-5 minutes stop and buffer then play and stop and play and stop. And then shifts to only playing about 1 minute then buffer etc.

Makes no difference if I am using the Wireless link or direct 1000/mbs LAN cable directly to the router.

Recently most “watch instantlyâ€

[nathug]

Try forcing the update. You try the update between 3 - 10 times and it should update. This should help, if there is anything that can help you.

Oh and by the way the Roku box and the PC use different streaming system, so you can't compare the two.

Nate

[DoomsDay]

[quote="Gallon_Jug"]Seems I may be out of luck.

Bought the Roku box and first time we sued it had 2 on quality... movie paused once after 2 minutes then played flawlessly.

That was Nov. 12th or 13th. Since then all have been Q1 and most play about 3-5 minutes stop and buffer then play and stop and play and stop. And then shifts to only playing about 1 minute then buffer etc.

Makes no difference if I am using the Wireless link or direct 1000/mbs LAN cable directly to the router.

Recently most “watch instantlyâ€

[johanmavis]

Doomsday you say that the problem is with the isp not being fast enough. Is there anyway to speed it up because I'm having the same problem where it plays for a couple of minutes then takes ages to buffer up. Thanks.

Johan

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[jeffrok]

To speed up your ISP, you need to call them and tell them you'd like to upgrade your internet speed.

[billc124]

Satellite internet also has terrible terms of use policies. See the link for hughesnet below. You will very, very easily exceed your cap with streaming video.

http://consumer.hughesnet.com/faq/fair- ... policy.cfm

[DustoMan]

What about updates to the channel store? Are all channels stored on the device in firmware or can the store be updated dynamically without the need of firmware updates?