Robot Software Maintenance

Learn how to schedule and apply robot updates

Doug Ayers avatar
Written by Doug Ayers
Updated over a week ago

Beacon's robot software maintenance ensures your robots stay current with the latest features and security patches for Beacon. Updates are conveniently applied at a time that suits your operational schedule.

Contents

Overview

Beacon empowers you to designate a weekly window for updates that might require a robot reboot, such as updating the Beacon URCap. The beauty here lies in flexibility – you decide when these updates happen.

How It Works

  1. Flexibility and Control: Pick a two-hour window weekly for potential updates that suits your operational needs.

  2. No Unnecessary Downtime: While not every week requires maintenance, if needed, it occurs within the scheduled window. Your machine won't be offline the entire time; it’s just a timeframe for potential updates.

  3. Notification on the Go: Beacon keeps you informed with a clear notification on the robot record whenever maintenance is scheduled.

  4. Reschedule Anytime: Life is unpredictable, and we get that. Beacon allows you to reschedule maintenance, accommodating your evolving schedule.

Safety Considerations

Your safety and the safety of your operations are our top priorities. To ensure a secure environment during updates, we've implemented the following safety measures:

  • Program Priority: A reboot won't happen if a program is actively running, ensuring that ongoing operations are not disrupted.

  • Robot Arm Safety: When maintenance begins, the robot arm powers off, preventing unexpected movements during the update process.

Scheduling Maintenance

By default, a robot's maintenance window is Sunday between 2am - 4am UTC. You are welcome to change that schedule on a per-robot basis.

  1. Navigate to your robot within Beacon

  2. Open the Configure tab

  3. Click the Maintenance Window row

  4. Select your preferred Day of Week and Start Hour for a two-hour window

  5. Click Update Maintenance Window

Resources

To further familiarize yourself with robot software maintenance, explore these other articles that guide you through manually updating and rebooting your robot.

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