Collector-Local Firmware for Upgrades

Upgrade workflows need the OS image on hand so it can be copied to the device. For a device Versus reaches through a collector — one on your own network, often only reachable on its LAN — the image is usually already on-premises next to that device. Rather than upload a multi-gigabyte ISO up to Versus and back down again, you can register an image that already lives on the collector and let the collector copy it to the device directly. The large file never transits Versus.

When to use this

• The device is collector-managed (added under a site, reached via a Versus Collector) and typically not directly reachable from Versus.
• The image is large — a BIG-IP ISO is several gigabytes — and you'd rather not push it through the browser and the Versus service.
• You want the image to stay inside your network: the bytes only ever move from the collector to the device on your LAN.

If a device is directly reachable from Versus, the normal Upload New Image path still works exactly as before — this is an alternative for the collector case, not a replacement.

Step 1 — Place the image on the collector

• Default location: a firmware folder inside the collector's state directory — for example C:\var\lib\versus-agent\firmware on Windows or /var/lib/versus-agent/firmware on Linux.
• Override: set the VERSUS_FIRMWARE_DIR environment variable on the collector to use a different path.

The file name must match the format the Firmware Library expects — for F5 BIG-IP that is BIGIP-<version>-<build>.iso, e.g. BIGIP-17.5.1.6-0.0.25.iso. The collector picks up new files automatically; there's nothing to restart.

Step 2 — Register it in Versus

Open Versus Platform → System → Firmware Library. Below the upload form is Register Image from Collector, listing every file your collectors have reported. Find your image and click Register.

It appears in the image list immediately, tagged with a Collector badge so you can tell at a glance that it lives on-premises rather than on the Versus server.

Step 3 — Run the upgrade

When the workflow reaches the Copy Code step it detects the collector-local image and, instead of pushing the file from Versus, asks the collector to copy it to the device. The workflow log shows the hand-off and a running byte count while the collector transfers the file over the LAN.

The copy is idempotent — if the image is already present on the device at the right size, the collector skips the transfer. From there the upgrade proceeds normally. See the F5 Firmware Upgrade Workflow for the full standby-first upgrade sequence.

What travels where

The credential the collector uses to push the image is resolved locally, exactly as for every other collector operation — see Collector Security Architecture for how the three vault modes handle credentials. Note that on F5 BIG-IP the SSH / file-transfer account is root; the admin account is for the management UI / REST API and typically has no shell access.

Troubleshooting

• My file isn't in the "Register Image from Collector" list. Confirm it's in the collector's firmware directory (default <state_dir>/firmware), that the collector is online, and that the name matches the expected format. Collectors report about once a minute — use Refresh.
• The Copy Code step fails with an SSH / authentication error. The copy uses the device's SSH credential. On F5 BIG-IP that must be the root account with a valid password; verify the SSH credential set on the device.
• The copy is slow. A multi-gigabyte image takes a few minutes to transfer even over a LAN; the workflow logs a byte count roughly every 30 seconds so you can watch progress.