[pca] Setting up PCA patch server

[Martin Paul]

Lisa,

Others have already described various options you have. As for my 2 cent: Take a 
look at the PCA documentation, especially the parts about setting up a local 
patch server (in your situation, a PCA local caching proxy might suit best, and 
there are detailed step-by-step instructions in the docs) and about creating 
patch reports for remote machines.

As seen in other follow-ups, many people use PCA just as one tool in their 
patching framework. Therefore I kept PCA as general as possible, and you'll have 
to find your own way that fits best to your surroundings.

> I'm having a hard time getting my head around the fact that pca is very
> system-dependent.

It has to be. A system may have any set of packages and patches installed, PCA 
won't assume that any two systems are exactly the same. So it sees what's 
(already) there, and tells you what's missing. If you as an administrator know 
that two systems are equal, it's fine to download the patches only once on one 
fo them and re-use them later on the second system.

Martin.