Get it while it’s hot. After being available for two years now, the formerly CLI-only firmware-tools now has a pretty slick GUI, called ‘inventory_firmware_gui’.
Firmware-tools is available in the Dell Software Repository. Installation instructions on setting up the Software Repository are here: http://linux.dell.com/wiki/index.php/Repository/software
Once you have firmware-tools installed, you probably want to be able to actually use the new GUI to update something. In that case, you can set up the firmware repository, information is here: http://linux.dell.com/wiki/index.php/Repository/firmware
Other information worthy of note:
— All of the firmware tools binaries now have a “-f” option which puts the tools into testing mode (it will list fake data and fake updates.) You can use this to run through the GUI tools without worrying about messing up your system. (the screenshots below show off this fake data.)
— Some client systems do not have BIOS updates in the firmware repository. For those that I know of, there is a wiki page which documents which ones and why: http://linux.dell.com/wiki/index.php/Oss/Firmware_Tools/bugs
— The firmware-tools project information page is here: http://linux.dell.com/wiki/index.php/Oss/Firmware_Tools
And without further ado, Screenshots!
