Organizing patch catalog content using smart groups

Smart groups are a dynamic means of organizing content within the patch catalog according to user-defined criteria. These criteria are used to filter content both during initial creation and later, as new payloads are added to the catalog.

This topic includes the following sections:

Out-of-the-box smart groups for patch management

A newly created patch catalog automatically has the following, out-of-the-box, smart groups predefined:

For this platform

The following smart groups are defined

Microsoft Windows

Bulletins, Hotfixes, and Irrelevant Patches

For more information on how to exclude smart groups from a Patch Catalog of a Windows servers, see Managing-patches-through-the-analysis-results-view.

Solaris

Patches, Clusters, and Irrelevant Patches

AIX

Filesets and Irrelevant Patches. A third smart group, determined by the type of filter defined for the patch catalog, is one of the following:

  • Technology Level
  • Service Packs
  • APARs
  • PTFs
  • Critical Fixes Package
  • Security Fixes Package
  • Latest Fixes Package

Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Erratas, RPMs, and Irrelevant Patches

SUSE Linux Enterprise

RPMs and Irrelevant Patches

Oracle Enterprise Linux

RPMs and Irrelevant Patches

Ubuntu

Patches and Irrelevant Patches

All patches added to your catalog appear in one of these groups. You can create others as needed; for example, a smart group could contain all critical patches.

To view the contents of a smart group

Smart groups appear as part of the hierarchical tree in the patch catalog. If you expand the smart group, you can view the contents in the left pane. For any patch in the smart group, you can right-click and select Open to view properties of a particular patch as well as any associated patches.

To copy and paste the contents of a smart group

NewAs an Administrator or operator, you can now copy and paste a smart group in a patch catalog.This is helpful while creating a copy of the old smart group and work on the copied smart group without having to recreate a new smart group.

For example, if you have created a smart group for a Windows 2012 Server patch catalog with the following conditions and you want to create a similar smart group for Windows 2016 Server patch catalog, then you can copy-paste the smart group from Windows 2012 Server patch catalog to Windows 2016 Server patch catalog.

Any Hotfix Where ??CVE_ID*?? does not equal Null AND
Any Hotfix Where ??Date_Posted*?? after 2019-01-01 12:26:49 AND
Any Hotfix Where ??VENDOR_IMPACT*?? equals Critical

Perform the following steps:

  1. Open any patch catalog and navigate to the smart group you want to copy and paste. Select the folder.
  2. Right-click and select Copy from the pop-up menu.
  3. Right-click a patch catalog and select Paste from the pop-up menu. 
    The smart group appears in its new location. You cannot paste into a smart group. 
    When you paste, a dialog box tells you that a copy is occurring in the background.
  4. Right-click and select Refresh from the pop-up menu on the newly pasted smart group or catalog to see the updated content.

Where to go from here

Performing-patch-analysis

 

Tip: For faster searching, add an asterisk to the end of your partial query. Example: cert*