On 5/13/2016 5:09 AM, Terry Coombs wrote:
Don Y wrote:
On 5/12/2016 6:55 PM, Terry Coombs wrote:
After installing around 50 updates - including all security
updates for IE8 - manually I am now able to access windows update
online . The comp is now downloading 104 security updates from M$ .

The wsoffline tools should have had all of the "required" updates.
Did it NOT install all of them?

Also, you should review each update as MS's idea of
"security"/required may differ from yours!

The updates are there but I found no way to install them except one at a
time . Tht gets old after the first 15 or 20 ...

There are two programs involved.

UpdateGenerator.exe gives you a dialog that lets you decide which
updates you want to download (fetch) from Microsoft. You "tick" boxes
for all of the updates that you want and it chugs along for ages
getting all of the files.

Once you have the updates on a "local disk", you run UpdateInstaller.exe.
This lets you decide which updates you want to *install*. Again, you
"tick" boxes in a dialog for things like:
- C++ runtime libraries
- Security Essentials
- Remote Desktop client
- .NET frameworks
etc.

There are two boxes in this dialog that you "always" want to tick:
- verify the updates (ensures the files that you PREVIOUSLY downloaded
are intact and genuine/signed)
- show log file

Once you begin, it sorts out which updates you NEED to install based
on your "ticked" choices. Then, it figures out what prerequisites
each of those require (it does this by examining a file that it
downloaded previously that declares these prerequisites). It usually
takes a long time (several minutes, depending on CPU speed) to sort
through this "prerequisite list".

[The prerequisite list says things like: install update KB345039
before KB998744, install update KB747463 if .NET4 is present, etc.]

Then, it chugs through the hundred plus updates applying them
in the "correct" order -- and only those that SHOULD be applied.

While this is happening, you see a DOS box (text screen) that
just rattles off all of the files that it is installing:
"Installing update 1 of 115
Verifying integrity of \blah\blah\update1's_real_name
Installing \blah\blah\update1's_real_name
...
Installing update 47 of 115
Verifying integrity of \blah\blah\update47's_real_name
Installing \blah\blah\update47's_real_name
Installing update 48 of 115
Verifying integrity of \blah\blah\update48's_real_name
Installing \blah\blah\update48's_real_name
..."

When this is done, it will either say, "Done" or "Please reboot and ReRun".
The latter happens when the update process requires a reboot before it
can continue.

In either case, when you reboot, you end up seeing a (notepad?) window
that displays a log of all of the actions that it did. You can save
this so you can have a record of its actions -- which updates it
installed, etc. You can run the UpdateInstaller.exe again to
select other updates and this log file just grows.

So, if you are only interested in updating XP, ...
and, given that XP no longer has any NEW updates, ...
once you have downloaded all of the updates with UpdateGenerator.exe,
you NEVER need to talk to MS again!

Build a new machine? Install XP using your XP CD (with sp3, preferably).
Then, run UpdateInstaller.exe with the files you downloaded.

I.e., your machine has NEVER talked to MS and you have all of the
updates in place.

Repeat for the next machine...

Said another way, before your machine is ever exposed to the ugly/nasty
Internet, you can have all of the security updates in place!