Need to force Flash Player installer to work even if it's out-of-date.

[brandonLancaster]

There are many PCs in our company network that have Flash Player version 11.1 installed on them. We were trying to push out version 18 to all of these PCs, when Adobe released another update and suddenly the installer we were using to push the update will no longer work. We need to be able to pick a single installer, and work with it until all users in our system are up-to-date--regardless of whether or not Adobe releases yet another updated player in the meantime. Is there any way to force the installer to work even though it is not the ABSOLUTE latest version? Otherwise, our users won't be just ONE version behind--they'll continue to stay DOZENS of versions behind. I know Adobe wants to force us to use the latest player to enhance security, but in cases like this it actually results in less security.

Any suggestions? Thanks for listening.

-Brandon

[_maria_]

Hi brandonLancaster,

I'm not sure what you mean by 'the installer will no longer work".  Which installer are you using (file name)?  How are you distributing Flash Player within your organization?

When you say 'work even if it's out-of-date' are you referring to the browser displaying the 'plugin is out-of-date' message when you attempt to view Flash content?  If so, this is the browser vendor that is doing this and not Adobe.  We cannot control when a vendor marks a plugin as out-of-date or not.  Or are you referring to something else?  If so, please provide more information.

--

Maria

[brandonLancaster]

Hi, Maria.

  Thank you for your response. The installer file name we are using is “install_flash_player_18_active_x.exe.” I got this file from the distribution site on June 11 so I suppose it installs version 18.0.0.160. I gave the file to my I.T. group to push out to all of the hundreds of PCs in our corporate network, many of which are still running version 11.1. I don’t know what technology they are using to push out the updates, but for whatever reason it takes quite a while (a couple weeks) to push it out to everyone. By the time the auto-installer ran on my own machine, I got this message:

Of course, most of our users will likely just hit “Quit” whenever they see this message, rather than go to the Player Download Center to download the latest version. Do you have any suggestions as to how we would need to push out a single version of Flash Player if the installer is only good for 2 weeks or so, and it takes our I.T. group at least that long or longer to get the job done?

Thank you for your time,

-Brandon

[brandonLancaster]

Hi, Maria.

I just found out the distribution software being used is Enterprise Desktop Server Management (EDSM).

I hope that helps!

-Brandon

[_maria_ · Accepted solution]

Hi brandonLancaster,

Flash Player's normal release cadence is once-per month, on the second Tuesday of the month.  Out-of-band releases occur when there are high-risk security bug fixes, which we've had recently.  What appears to have happened is some client machines were updated to the latest version, while you are attempting to push out a previous version to those systems. We can verify this by looking at the FlashInstall.log file on an client machine that is returning this error.  The FlashInstall.log file is located at following location:

• 32-bit: C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash
• 64-bit: C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash AND C:\Windows\SysWOW64\Macromed\Flash

You can either post the contents of the file in your reply, or upload it using the instructions How to share a document and post the URL to the uploaded file(s) in your reply.

To prevent this same scenario from occurring in the future, you disable updates on your client machines and then only deploy updates via your EDSM system.  To do this you would need to deploy a custom mms.cg file with updates disabled to the client systems.  The Flash Player Admin Guide discusses various deployment strategies in Chapter 3.  Chapter 4 discusses managing features related to security, privacy, use of disk space, and so on, and the section on AutoUdpates is on page 31.

Also, you can sign up to receive Security Bulletin and Advisories here Security Bulletins and Advisories.  When an bulletin/advisory is posted you would receive an email notification and can then go download the latest version when it is posted and push it out to your client machines.

--

Maria

[brandonLancaster]

Maria, you are absolutely right…the reason I was getting that message on my PC was that I already had a higher version of the Flash Player installed. That error message is very misleading to me. It would be more helpful to know that the installation failed because I already had a higher version installed, but instead it only tells me that a higher version is available on the Adobe website—which suggests that I need to take further action in order to update my player, when in reality I do not.

I performed a test by un-installing my existing Flash Player, and then attempting to re-install the 18.0.0.194 player (which is the version we committed to push out to our population). Sure enough, the installation was successful—no errors, and I confirmed the player was successfully installed by visiting http://adobe.com/software/flash/about.

I performed a second test by un-installing the Flash Player again, and then re-installing the latest player (18.0.0.203), and then attempting to install the .earlier 194 player on top of it. I got the error message again, confirming your assessment.

Now I know that our distribution efforts should be successful—and if anyone in our company gets that error message, it’s probably because they already have an updated player. Also, thank you for all of the helpful information you included in your reply. I will be sure to check out that chapter in the admin guide, and also sign up for the security bulletin.

Kind Regards,

-Brandon

[_maria_]

Hi brandonLancaster,

Thank you for the feedback on the error message.  The installed version may or may not be the most recent version.  At installation, the installer checks to see if a version already exists on the system and if so, what version is it.  If it's a version higher than what's attempted, then the error is returned.  At this time there's no way of knowing if the version installed is the latest version or not as the installers do not check Adobe servers to compare the installed version to the most recent version.

--

Maria

[brandonLancaster]

Hi, Maria.

I understand what you are saying--if only the error message were just as clear as your explanation! It would be nice if the error message were more specific, such as the following:

"The installer could not complete because there is a more recent version of Flash Player already installed on your machine. To ensure that your installed Flash Player is the latest and most secure, please visit the Player Download Center."

Just my two cents, for what it's worth. 🙂 I'm very happy for the solution you've provided me. Have a great day!

-Brandon