Tentacle upgrade forcing a server restart

Legacy Execution
1

We recently upgraded from 3.7.7 to 3.11.11. This included initiating a tentacle upgrade from the Portal.

The install on one of the Tentacles seemed to have some issues with restarting the service. The installer then seemed to decide it should restart the system. I’ve included the relevant event log entries below. This is obviously a concern. We were just lucky that it wasn’t a live production server it happened on. Is there any way to prevent this from happening? Thanks.

From the application event logs

  • Beginning a Windows Installer transaction: C:\Octopus\Upgrade\20170628213237-NQTU9\Octopus.Tentacle-x64.msi. Client Process Id: 25412.

  • Application or service ‘Octopus Deploy: Tentacle’ could not be shut down.

  • Windows Installer requires a system restart. Product Name: Octopus Deploy Tentacle. Product Version: 3.4.5. Product Language: 1033. Manufacturer: Octopus Deploy Pty. Ltd… Type of System Restart: 1. Reason for Restart: 1.

  • Product: Octopus Deploy Tentacle – Installation completed successfully.

  • Windows Installer installed the product. Product Name: Octopus Deploy Tentacle. Product Version: 3.11.11. Product Language: 1033. Manufacturer: Octopus Deploy Pty. Ltd… Installation success or error status: 0.

  • Windows Installer requires a system restart. Product Name: Octopus Deploy Tentacle. Product Version: 3.11.11. Product Language: 1033. Manufacturer: Octopus Deploy Pty. Ltd… Type of System Restart: 1. Reason for Restart: 0.

  • Ending a Windows Installer transaction: C:\Octopus\Upgrade\20170628213237-NQTU9\Octopus.Tentacle-x64.msi. Client Process Id: 25412.

  • The Windows Installer initiated a system restart to complete or continue the configuration of ‘Octopus Deploy Tentacle’.

Also from the System logs

The process msiexec.exe has initiated the restart of computer OLSWINDRDB01 on behalf of user NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM for the following reason: No title for this reason could be found
Reason Code: 0x80030002
Shutdown Type: restart
Comment: The Windows Installer initiated a system restart to complete or continue the configuration of ‘Octopus Deploy Tentacle’.

2

Hi Daniel,

Thanks for getting in touch.

I think this provides the biggest clue:

Application or service 'Octopus Deploy: Tentacle' could not be shut down.

I’ve created an issue:https://github.com/OctopusDeploy/Issues/issues/3612. I will add the /norestart argument to Tentacle upgrades which will hopefully resolve.

Cheers,
Shane

3

Thanks for the quick turn around. We’ll be sure that our next upgrade will be to at least 3.15.0.

4

Just a thought. I imagine that in these cases, the server will still need to be restarted to complete the upgrade. Would it be possible to ensure that Octopus Admins can be aware of any such servers. The MSI reports back saying a restart is required, so we can plan a restart at an appropriate time?

5

Hi Daniel,

I agree, it would be great to know if a server needs a restart in order to complete the upgrade. I’m hoping you will get an error or warning back from the installer indicating that a restart is required or at worse Tentacle will remain on the previous version which would indicate that something went wrong. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to reproduce the issue so I’m not sure what is going to come back from the Tentacle.

If the next time you upgrade and a Tentacle restart is required but there is no indication in the Tentacle Upgrade log, send me your logs and I will implement the changes required to show a warning.

Cheers,
Shane

6

Seems like it’s a pretty rare occurrence (though with potentially disastrous consequences if it reboots), as with probably thousands of tentacle upgrades, this is the only one we’ve noticed. I can check the output if one happens to crop up again in the future after we upgrade. Thanks.