IBM SPSS & Amos

We're also seeing this tool being used more in our organisation.

Apps without public download URLs or are behind a paywall or login present challenges for us at PMPC as we don't always have access to the downloads. The particular app may be better suited for our Custom Apps feature.

Here is the information requested of new submissions for SPSS Statistics. (Much of this information applies equally to SPSS Amos.) Hopefully this can help Patch My PC staff better understand the scope of the work needed to support this app and how it could be accomplished.

Why is it useful, who would benefit from it, how should it work?

Why is it useful?

From Wikipedia:

SPSS is a widely used program for statistical analysis in social science. It is also used by market researchers, health researchers, survey companies, government, education researchers, marketing organizations, data miners, and others. The original SPSS manual (Nie, Bent & Hull, 1970) has been described as one of “sociology's most influential books” for allowing ordinary researchers to do their own statistical analysis. In addition to statistical analysis, data management (case selection, file reshaping and creating derived data) and data documentation (a metadata dictionary is stored in the datafile) are features of the base software.

Who would benefit from it?

Many of Patch My PC’s higher education customers likely subscribe to this product. See https://www.google.com/search?q=spss+edu&num=100. The Wikipedia overview above mentions other customer sectors that are likely subscribers.

How should it work?

The software is available to customers for download via IBM’s Passport Advantage Online for Customers website. IBM does not provide a publicly-available download link, though. Patch My PC would have to rely on customers providing their own installation files as is the case with several other products like Palo Alto GlobalProtect.

Customers can subscribe to product notifications about new versions under IBM Support > My Notifications. I cannot find a publicly-available release notification facility, though. The product documentation page is publicly available and lists the five most recent major versions. By navigating to the latest version (29.0.0) and then to Help > Core System > Overview, an article showing the latest minor version releases is available, which reveals that the latest release is v29.0.2.

IBM releases major and minor versions of SPSS Statistics that can coexist on a PC if they are installed into different folders; a new version replaces the existing version if the installation folder is the same. Researchers may not want their software major version to change in the middle of an academic study. Therefore, each major version should be a separate product in Patch My PC (e.g., SPSS Statistics 29), and a minor version should replace the previous minor version under that major version. For example, considering the past three major versions, the following shows the upgrade paths.

In the Patch My PC Publisher interface, these would be listed by major version, and each minor version would replace the previous one under the same major version. There should also a “latest” app representation that always installs or updates to the latest major and minor version as well. This would be better for organizations where users are not concerned about major version and feature changes occurring during a study. For example, PMPC already provides this for Palo Alto GlobalProtect: “GlobalProtect Latest (MSI-x64)”.

• SPSS Statistics 27: 27.0.0 →27.0.1

• SPSS Statistics 28: 28.0.0 → 28.0.1

• SPSS Statistics 29: 29.0.0 → 29.0.1 → 29.0.2

• SPSS Statistics Latest: … → 28.0.1 → 29.0.0 → 29.0.1 → 29.0.2 → …

Each major and minor version is packaged as an independent Windows Installer (MSI) file, so upgrades to a new major version (e.g. 27.0.1 → 28.0.0.0) and upgrades to a new minor version (e.g. 29.0.1 → 29.0.2) both function as “major upgrades” in Windows Installer.

FYI but not relevant to Patch My PC, in my opinion, regarding fix packs:
IBM also provides “fix packs” on its Fix Central website, which is publicly accessible. These are small updates to resolve specific functionality bugs or security vulnerabilities, and they are not packaged for deployment. Each is provided as a ZIP file containing loose files and instructions for where in the installation folder structure to copy those files. These are incorporated into the next minor release. Patch My PC should not attempt to support these fix packs. If a PMPC customer needs to deploy specific fix packs, it can use a post script.

SPSS Statistics has three licensing models:

• Authorized User: Requires that the user supply an authorization code.

• Concurrent User: Connects to a customer-hosted licensing server for authorization.

• Subscription User: Requires that the user sign in with an IBMid.

This is irrelevant to the delivery of the software and its updates because the authorization codes are supplied independent of the installation process. PMPC customers could supply the AUTHCODE property or the LSHOST (license server host) property as an additional command-line argument if desired.

Choose a category for this idea

Application Request

Product Name (New Application Request Only)

SPSS Statistics

Vendor Name (New Application Request Only)

IBM

Download URL (For New Application Request Only)

(dynamic URL behind authenticated customer website)

Release Notes Page (New Application Request Only)

https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/release-notes-ibm%C2%AE-spss%C2%AE-statistics-2902

Previous Version Download URL (New Application Request Only)

(dynamic URL behind authenticated customer website)

Silent Install Switches (New Application Request Only)

Normal MSI switches.

Which Product is this Request for (New Application Request Only)

Patch My PC

My organization subscribes to both of these products (SPSS Statistics and SPSS Amos), and I have access to the installation files and documentation. I would be happy to collaborate with Patch My PC staff to get these added.

Hey can you please get this added in soon. Please and Thank you

Can we get this added It would be very helpfull to add the full IBM software as our labs use them

Change log for "Fix Packs" available here:

Version 28.0.0.0: https://www.ibm.com/support/fixcentral/swg/selectFixes?parent=SPSS&product=ibm/Information+Management/SPSS+Statistics&release=28.0.0.0&platform=Windows+64-bit,+x86&function=all&source=fc

Version 29.0.0.0: https://www.ibm.com/support/fixcentral/swg/selectFixes?parent=SPSS&product=ibm/Information+Management/SPSS+Statistics&release=29.0.0.0&platform=Windows+64-bit,+x86&function=all&source=fc

Patches are packaged as MSI, though an account is needed to download them.

Switching this back to Submitted. We'll take another look at this app in the near future.

Is this app still considered "Incompatible" now that the manual content respository is being used for other licensed applications?

Would it be possible to add support for SPSS via the manual local content repository feature?
https://patchmypc.com/local-content-repository-for-licensed-applications-that-require-manual-download

I don't believe IBM allows downloads without a license, so this one would be challenging for us. Please let us know if they have public download links and we can look more into it, but I'll be marking this one as incompatible for now.

I just wanted to let you all know we haven't forgotten about this request. We are working through some others at the moment that more unique customers are following. If any others come across this idea, please vote it up if it's one you would like to see added.