installing windows updates before packer build is complete

[Jason Reeves]

I am to the point where I cannot figure out how to automate the installation of windows updates before the vm is shutdown.  Has anyone else attempted this or have ideas on how?

I have been dabbling with get-wuinstall but I am not getting too far.

[Shawn Neal]

packer-windows supports this out of the box. It can take a _long_ time for all the updates to be applied.

[Jason Reeves]

Great, thanks!  I can't believe I missed this!

[Mischa Taylor]

Another approach to consider is to slipstream updates into the install media - I use this approach in lieu of downloading and applying updates while generating the packer basebox, and just have an automated build that trickles them to an ISO build: http://www.pcworld.com/article/239634/how_to_speed_up_windows_7_installs_with_slipstreaming_and_usb.html

[Jason Reeves]

That wouldn't quite work with what I am trying to accomplish but I appreciate the response.  I am trying to build a 'factory' for versioned templates to choose from.  So the build needs to be fully automated and run after patch Tuesday to create a new updated template.

I haven't had a chance to try out what Shawn suggested but I have a feeling that it will work exactly as I need.

[Tim Tharratt]

Hi,

 I had similar problems, the only way I could get this to work was to invoke it as a scheduled task running as System. I created a couple of scripts perform the update as part of the build :-

https://github.com/eltimmo/packerWindowsUpdate