This is a very interestion blog by Wictor Wilén posted the
8th September. Wictor was a speaker at the European
SharePoint Conference in Berlin.

A couple of days ago the SharePoint 2010
Cumulative Update for August 2011 was released. Always a good time
to see some things fixed and some things break. Installing a
Cumulative Update is always a risky business, and you should only
install them if you any experience problems that the CU resolves
and only when you thoroughly tested it.

One CU to rule them all!

Without going into details about the content and fixes in the
August 2011 CU there is one other thing that is of real interest –
and that is how MIcrosoft has changed the packaging process for
the Cumulative Updates. Since the release of SharePoint 2010 there
has been talk and discussions about über-packages. That is Server
Cumulative Packages that contains both the Server hotfixes as well
as the Foundation hotfixes, which makes the update process a bit
easier and faster – you only need to install one package. Up until
now there has been mixed messages on the über-packages and caused
some confusion. The recommendation has been that you need to
install both SPF and SPS CU’s on a SPS installation and all three
if you’re using Project Server.

Since yesterday (that’s when I noticed it at least) the SharePoint Updates page on MSDN has been
updated with new information regarding this packaging with
this:

The packaging of cumulative updates changed as of
August 31, 2011. […] As a result of the new packaging, it is no
longer necessary to install the SharePoint Foundation cumulative
update and then install the SharePoint Server cumulative
update.

It looks like we have a new guidance in town!This has been
“promised” before and I hope that it will work as planned this
time, only time will tell. For more history and information read Spencer Harbars post on the SP1 and June CU
discussion.

• SharePoint Foundation 2010, contains SPF CU (KB253050)
• SharePoint Server 2010, contains SPF + SPS CU (KB253048)
• SharePoint Server 2010 with Project Server 2010, contains SPF +
  SPS + Project Server CU (KB253049)

This will save you a couple of minutes/hours downloading and
you’ll save a few minutes installing multiple CU’s on each
server.

Note: The correct version of this CU
should be 14.0.6109.5002, if you were really quick
you might have downloaded the 14.0.6109.5000
build.

But…there’s always a but. Please, please, please test all
CU’s, SP’s, patches, hotfixes, shoes and whatever very
thoroughly!

Click here to check out Wictor’s Blog’s.