trakked reports security vulnerabilities more quickly and updates run even more reliably

Unfortunately, the frequency of new security vulnerabilities has increased dramatically. That is why, with immediate effect, trakked will now check for security alerts every 30 minutes. Previously, this took place twice a day, alongside the automatic update of your installations’ system information.

If trakked detects a newly reported security vulnerability, the app updates the system information for the affected installations specifically. As a result, the vulnerability appears much sooner in your overview and in your notifications. This allows you to react more quickly and apply the necessary update without delay.

Until now, trakked has sent a separate email for every newly detected security vulnerability. trakked now bundles these notifications. Here’s how it works:

• Automatic updates twice a day. You’ll receive one consolidated email per organisation. It’s sent out as soon as all your organisation’s installations have been processed.
• Manual updates via "Update system information". trakked will continue to report new security vulnerabilities immediately, with one email per installation.

The security emails sent during update preparation and after the update have been discontinued. trakked will only report a vulnerability that has already been reported again if it has since been fixed and then reappears.

This allows you to see all new security vulnerabilities and the affected installations at a glance. This makes it easier for you to plan the necessary updates and ensures fewer emails in your inbox.

You may also have noticed that the emails themselves have changed recently. Smaller headings and a simpler layout make them easier to read.

For versions of Contao for which support has expired – such as Contao 4.13 – security updates are no longer released. Receiving an email about every new security vulnerability won’t help you with these installations. That’s why trakked no longer sends out emails about security vulnerabilities for these versions.

However, you won’t lose track of these installations. In trakked, you can still recognise them by the red logo, and they’ll also be included in the weekly notification. This means you can see at any time which installations need upgrading to a current version of Contao.

You can find out more in the security documentation.

If there’s one thing that really gets on our nerves, it’s when our tool doesn’t work 100 per cent flawlessly. Perhaps you’ve experienced it yourself: an update that unexpectedly cuts out. That’s why Yanick has looked into a number of special cases during the update process and implemented numerous optimisations, making the update process even more robust.

A quick bit of background. trakked is your control centre, but it’s the Contao Manager on your website that installs the updates. To do this, trakked needs an active connection to the Contao Manager. If this connection is lost at the wrong moment – for example, when the update is starting – the Manager may already have accepted the task, but trakked may not yet have received confirmation.

It is precisely for this scenario that we have overhauled the entire update process, from preparation right through to the post-update tasks. trakked now keeps track of which steps have been completed and which tasks the app has already issued. Following an interruption, trakked first checks what the Manager has already carried out.

• If trakked can confirm the status, the app resumes the update at the appropriate point.
• If the status remains unclear even after several checks, trakked terminates the attempt, providing a specific reason for the error.

This means trakked will not start a second update whilst the first one might still be running. So you no longer need to check Contao Manager yourself to see if anything is still active.

You still decide for yourself when a prepared update is installed. Before trakked carries out the update, the app checks once again whether it is compatible with the current state of your website.

You’ll find that this not only makes your updates run more smoothly but also significantly faster.

When updating the system information, trakked carries out several tasks. The app checks the connection to Contao Manager, retrieves the installation data along with the packages, and imports the logs. Depending on the installation, this process used to take quite a long time. Now the tasks run separately.

• Faster feedback. If you click on ‘Update system information’, the installation data takes priority. The log import continues to run in the background. If you connect to a Contao Manager, you’ll receive immediate feedback, just as before.
• Errors remain in the affected area. If a task fails, it does not hold up the update of the package data. If the connection is established but the installation data could not be retrieved, you will see this indicated separately.
• Targeted retries. If trakked retrieves the installation data again, the app does not restart the remaining tasks. The log import remembers its progress and continues from where it left off after an error occurred during the last successful import.

trakked now also handles automatic updates more reliably. trakked updates installations grouped by organisation, resumes interrupted tasks and better coordinates simultaneous access to the same Contao Manager. As before, both automatic and manual updates trigger all tasks.

To keep the update history clear, trakked automatically clears older update attempts. trakked removes failed attempts and preparations with the result ‘already up to date’ after 30 days of inactivity. All successful updates and the latest result for each remain in the history.

You can find out more in the documentation on the update history.

The improvements are already being rolled out across all your installations. Log in to trakked and take a look at the new bulk email in the next security update.

If you notice anything unusual in the security updates or during the update process, please get in touch. Your feedback will be incorporated directly into our next improvements.

But that’s not all. We’re working flat out on new features, and I’ve heard that Father Christmas already has something in his sack.

Best regards,
Andy, Yanick, Alex, Bjarke and Christian