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Persistent FOTA Issues: Sync Errors, "Update Pending" Loops, and Artifact Failures

TS
Thomas Seiler
Bison Schweiz AG

Hi everyone,

I am currently struggling with several issues regarding the ZEBRA OTA Service in MobiControl 2024.1.2 and wanted to reach out to the community to see if others are experiencing similar roadblocks.

We are seeing the following behaviors across our fleet:

  • OTA Device Sync Errors: Frequent synchronization errors when communicating with the FOTA service.

  • "Update Pending" Stalls: Devices remain in an "Update Pending" state for an extended period. In most cases, they never actually start the update and eventually flip to "Update Failed."

  • Artifact Download Failures: For certain firmware versions displayed in the console, the installation fails completely. The error logs usually indicate that the artifact could not be downloaded, even though the version is listed as available.

What we’ve tried so far:

  • Restarting SOTI Services (multiple times).

  • Attempting to reset the OTA Service (which often gets stuck on "Reset is in progress").

My questions to the community:

  1. Have you seen this "Update Pending" loop recently? If so, did you find a way to "nudge" the devices to start the download?

  2. Are there specific network requirements or firewall exceptions for the artifact download servers that might have changed recently?

  3. Is there a known stable MC Agent version that handles FOTA more reliably for Android Enterprise?

I would appreciate any tips, workarounds, or experiences you can share!

ota fota
Edited yesterday
SOTI MobiControl
ANSWERS
RS
Rafael Schäfer Platinum Contributor
yesterday (edited yesterday)

I guess you are talking about the Zebra FOTA.

And yes we saw the same several years ago when it was implemented but we didn't investigate to solve it as when it came to life, we already were looking forward to not use Zebra devices anymore (not because of this issue, just because of other deciding aspects/use cases).

But the picture is overall the same (most likely the pending and failed state), i thought overtime this has gotten to be more stable and reliable.

I the case what you describe i would recommend:

  1. Investigate together with Soti support
  2. Use profiles or file sync for updating instead, atr least until it's solved.
M
MiKe Bronze Contributor
21 hours ago

Hi, just curious - what aspects/use cases do you have in mind?

Regarding the original topic - Zebra FOTA doesn't seems to be reliable (probably because it just adds another party to already not quite reliable part - Google Play services)

TS
Thomas Seiler
21 hours ago

We primarily use FOTA for staging ZEBRA MDE devices in order to upgrade devices delivered with Android 13 from the distributor to Android 14 and the latest Lifeguard version before the devices are shipped to the field.

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