Stage Patches to the vCenter Server Appliance

Before you install available patches, you can stage the patches to the appliance. You can use the software-packages utility to stage patches either from a local repository by attaching an ISO image to the appliance, or from a remote repository directly by using a repository URL.

Prerequisites

If you are staging patches from an ISO image that you previously downloaded from https://my.vmware.com/group/vmware/patch, you must attach the ISO image to the CD/DVD drive of the vCenter Server appliance. You can configure the ISO image as a datastore ISO file for the CD/DVD drive of the appliance by using the vSphere Client. See vSphere Virtual Machine Administration.
If you are staging patches from a remote repository, verify that you have configured the repository settings and that the current repository URL is accessible. See Configure URL-Based Patching.

Procedure

Access the appliance shell and log in as a user who has a super administrator role.
The default user with a super administrator role is root.
Stage the patches.
- To stage the patches included in the attached ISO image, run the following command:
```
software-packages stage --iso
```
- To stage the patches included in the current repository URL, run the following command:
```
software-packages stage --url
```
  By default the current repository URL is the default VMware repository URL.
  
  If you want to stage only the third-party patches, use the --thirdParty option.
- To stage the patches included in a repository URL that is not currently configured in the appliance, run the following command:
```
software-packages stage --url URL_of_the_repository
```
  If you want to stage only the third-party patches, use the --thirdParty option.
If you want to directly accept the End User License Agreement, use the --acceptEulas option.
For example, to stage only the third-party patches from the current repository URL with directly accepting the End User License Agreement, run the following command:
```
software-packages stage --url --thirdParty --acceptEulas
```
In the process of staging, the command validates that a patch is a VMware patch, that the staging area has enough free space, and that the patches are not altered. Only completely new patches or patches for existing packages that can be upgraded are staged.
(Optional) To see information about the staged patches, run the following command:
```
software-packages list	--staged
```
Each patch includes a metadata file that contains information such as patch version, product name, whether a restart of the system is required, and so on.
(Optional) To view a list of the staged patches, run the following command:
```
software-packages list --staged --verbose
```
(Optional) To unstage the staged patches, run the following command:
```
software-packages	unstage
```
All directories and files generated by the staging process are removed.

What to do next

Install the staged patches. See Install vCenter Server Patches.

Important: If you staged the patches from an ISO image, keep the ISO image attached to the CD/DVD drive of the appliance. The ISO image must be attached to the CD/DVD drive of the appliance throughout the staging and installation processes.