June, 2011

Yesterday Service Pack 1 (SP1) for SharePoint 2010 was made available. SP1 contains a number of important fixes that improve the SharePoint experience for our customers. With the recommendation to install SP1 for SharePoint came a recommendation to ALSO deploy the June Cumulative Update (CU) for SharePoint simultaneously.

It’s worth explaining this recommendation in detail and answering some common questions about how / why we made this recommendation.

First, to explain the difference between SP1 and the June CU.

• SharePoint 2010 SP1 contains all SharePoint updates published through the April 2011 Cumulative Update in addition to other fixes that were applied specifically to SP1 during its development. SP1 is a baseline, and that baseline is tied to our Service Pack Life Cycle Policy. We recommend applying SP1 to your SharePoint environment because it resets the baseline for your entire SharePoint environment, and prepares your environment for future releases such as the June CU.
  
• The June Cumulative Update is the first Post-SP1 build released to customers. It contains new fixes to issues raised through various escalation channels and through our support organization. The June CU is based on Service Pack 1, but it adds new updates to some of (not all)  the packages that SP1 installs.

The recommended approach is to apply Service Pack 1 and the June CU into an environment together. Because the packages changed by the June CU supersede SP1, the order of installation isn’t critical. If you install the CU before SP1, the packages that the CU updated won’t be overwritten by SP1. Because the June CU is from a later build than SP1, many will be comfortable installing SP1 first, and then applying the CU.

A separate topic of conversation is the order in which you should apply SharePoint Foundation vs. SharePoint Server Updates. Per the guidance from the SharePoint team, when applying SP1 or the CU it is recommended to apply the Foundation packages before applying the server packages.

The recommended order of installation is as follows:

Update Foundation first:
SharePoint Foundation 2010 Service Pack 1
Service Pack 1 for SharePoint Foundation 2010 Language Pack
June 2011 CU for SharePoint Foundation 2010

Then SharePoint Server:
SharePoint Server 2010 Service Pack 1
Service Pack 1 for Server Language Pack 2010
June 2011 CU for SharePoint Server 2010

You can then run the Configuration Wizard (PSConfig) one time on all boxes.

Some links which will help in planning and executing your SharePoint 2010 SP1 and SharePoint 2010 June CU deployment:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/ff800847.aspx – Updates for SharePoint Products
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff806326.aspx – SharePoint Foundation Updates
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff806329.aspx – SharePoint Server Updates
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2510766 – List of all SharePoint Server 2010 SP1 Packages
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2532120 – Technical Details about the SharePoint 2010 SP1 and Office Server 2010 releases
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2536599 – Description of the June CU for SharePoint Server 2010
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff806338.aspx – Install a Software Update for SharePoint Server 2010

We are thrilled to announce the availability of Service Pack 1 (SP1) for our 2010 family of products.

The SP1 release is important because it provides us with an opportunity to address customer feedback as well as the security, stability and performance of our 2010 wave of products. The release underscores our commitment to improving the quality of our software over time. We are grateful to those customers and partners who have taken time to provide us the feedback that makes our products and services better.

SP1 contains all Cumulative Updates and Public Updates for 2010 that have already shipped. SP1 also contains new fixes for areas of each product. For those of you seeking a complete list of changes for each product contained in SP1, please visit this Excel Workbook – this is a very handy reference for those building test / evaluation plans for Office Client SP1. The workbook containing the changes for SharePoint Server 2010 is located under this link. The KB Articles referenced below will be updated throughout the day to include the live links to the published articles.

Beginning tomorrow, various Office teams will update their respective team blogs with additional information on SP1. Today you can hop over to the SharePoint Team Blog to read a bit more about the SP1 release.

Today SP1 is available from the Download center. The Downloads Table below provides links to the new packages for SP1. If you have installed all Office Automatic Updates, you will also see SP1 available as a manual download from Microsoft Update. After a 90 day grace period, SP1 will be offered as an automatic update through Microsoft Update. Customers using the Office Click-to-Run technology will have SP1 streamed to them beginning in July.

For SharePoint customers planning to deploy Service Pack 1, it is also recommended to install the June 2011 Cumulative Update for SharePoint when it becomes available in the coming weeks.

Download Links for 2010 Service Pack 1

The June Public Update release for Office is now live and available for download. This release contains 2 security bulletins and 6 non-security updates.

The following Security updates were released for:

Microsoft Security Bulletin MS11-045

• Security Update for Microsoft Excel 2002 (KB2541003)
• Security Update for Microsoft Excel 2010 (KB2523021), 64-Bit Edition
• Security Update for Microsoft Excel 2010 (KB2523021), 32-Bit Edition
• Security Update for the 2007 Microsoft Office System (KB2541012)
• Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2003 (KB2541025)
• Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (KB2541007)
• Security Update for Microsoft Office Excel Viewer (KB2541015)

Microsoft Security Bulletin MS11-049

• Security Update for Microsoft Office InfoPath 2007 (KB2510061)
• Security Update for Microsoft InfoPath 2010 (KB2510065), 64-Bit Edition
• Security Update for Microsoft InfoPath 2010 (KB2510065), 32-Bit Edition

Joining the security bulletins were a handful of non-security updates:

• Update for Microsoft Office 2003 (KB2543854) which decreases installation failures for updates installed on Microsoft Office 2003.
• Update for Microsoft Office 2003 (KB2539581), Update for Microsoft Office 2007 System (KB2539530), Update for Microsoft Office 2010 (KB2523113), 64-Bit Edition, Update for Microsoft Office 2010 (KB2523113), 32-Bit Edition which add support for the new Indian rupee currency symbol.

As with normal cadence, Outlook Junk Email Filter for Office 2003 was also updated.

A common question we’ve been getting is “How come my third party tool says that a file needs to be updated, but when I go to Microsoft Update, I see ‘There are no new updates available for your computer’?” This is because Office updates utilize Windows Installer technology to determine if a file needs to be updated. When you click “Check for Updates” in the Windows Update app, the Windows Update agent determines which Office updates are applicable to your machine based on the products that are installed. This is done by evaluating applicability rules as defined for each update. To learn more about applicability rules used by the Windows Update agent, review this article: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb902473(VS.85).aspx

Using Windows Installer to detect applicability has several benefits over file based detection. This includes the ability to update multiple products, repair functionality for missing files and components, and support for reliable uninstallation of updates. To learn more about Windows Installer, review this article: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310598

Other tools that use file based detection utilize a list of expected file versions when scanning a machine to determine which files need to be updated. This can sometimes be problematic since an Office update may no longer contain a specific file after support for an old baseline (e.g. Service Pack) has been removed, but the file based detection tool still expects the files to be at that specific version. Thus providing you with a false positive result from the scan.

Using Windows Installer to Inventory Products and Patches: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa369558(v=VS.85).aspx

To learn more about tools that can be used for detection, review this article: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961747