It seems that wuauclt /reportnow does not really seem to be doing anything even though it is supposed to make the clients report their status.  Is there anything that can be done to force an immediate status report?

I also notice that wuauclt does not seem to display errors.  I can type wuauclt /detttecknow or wuauclt /klsdjlkfjds and it won't display an error.

Hi,

There is no functionality inside the WSUS to force an immediate status report.The wuauclt /reportnow command is only useful when an actual event has occurred and the reporting of that event is currently pending (e.g. there are reporting events in the queue waiting to be uploaded to the WSUS server).

As for how to use the wuauclt Utility: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc720477(v=ws.10).aspx


Regards,

Clarence

Is there anything that can be done to force an immediate status report?

Run wuauclt /detectnow

Review the WindowsUpdate.log to confirm the detection event has completed.

Run wuauclt /reportnow

I have tried the wuauclt /reportnow command before and it does not seem to be doing anything that actually speeds up client reporting.

It looks like they still report whenever they get around to reporting and running the command doesn't make it faster.

I have tried the wuauclt /reportnow command before and it does not seem to be doing anything that actually speeds up client reporting.

It looks like they still report whenever they get around to reporting and running the command doesn't make it faster.

The /reportnow function is a very tricky beast, and it somewhat requires an understanding of the natural behaviors of the WUAgent.

When the WUAgent performs activities, it queues up all of those completed activities as 'events'. When the WUAgent quits working, an idle timer is engaged, and when the WUAgent has been idle for ~20 minutes, it invokes a call to the ReportingWebService. You can see these calls in the WindowsUpdate.log and compare their timestamps with the entries just previous.

If the /reportnow action is invoked after the WUAgent becomes idle and before the regular call to the ReportingWebService, an immediate call to the ReportingWebService will be invoked. You can also see this in the WindowsUpdate.log.

However, the call to the ReportingWebService is not the end of the line. Those events reported in that call are loaded into a buffer, and the WSUS server then processes those events asynchronously. If the WSUS server is also busy doing other things or other clients are also reporting at the same time, there will be an additional delay until the results are visible in the WSUS console.

The real thing to remember is that, at best, the /reportnow task isn't going to save you much more than 20-30 minutes, so usually just waiting is the more efficient approach to the whole thing.

Do you know if there are any plans to make WSUS able to be more real time in the future?

Do you know if there are any plans to make WSUS able to be more real time in the future?

One must learn patience when using WSUS. The detection inverval is ~22 hours + or - 4 hours.

Do you know if there are any plans to make WSUS able to be more real time in the future?

For an event that only occurs once a month for most organizations (Patch Tuesday), what "real time" capabilities are you looking for.

There already exists methodologies to make a WSUS client do almost anything near instantaneously, and there are third-party products that will literally give you the ability to do anything with WSUS absolutely instantaneously if that's what you really need.

It has been awhile and I have learned to do most everything I need, (thanks in great part to you Lawrence:) It would be great to see a list of the "methodologies to make a WSUS client do almost anything near instantaneously".

Also, some of the "third-party products that will literally give you the ability to do anything with WSUS absolutely instantaneously".

Hi Corey,

there are some open-source projects and scripts on codeplex that might be of interest. One paid product is Patch Manager by SolarWinds, this can make WMI calls out to the WU Agents on the remote machines to push out updates on demand etc (full disclosure, I work at SolarWinds)

I for one call BS. I need to know what servers still need patches before I can send an email and go to bed. /Reportnow is not instantaneous. For something that is only needed once per month why would it work well? 

I dont know why I would expect ReportNOW to report its approved updates VS its installed updates to WSUS so I can run the computer status report. I guess IM not getting it right??