Downgrade a Citrix ADC standalone appliance

You can downgrade to any earlier release on a standalone Citrix ADC by using the CLI. Downgrading using the GUI is not supported.


Loss in configuration might occur when downgrading. You should compare the configurations before and after the downgrade, and then manually reenter any missing entries.

Procedure to downgrade a standalone Citrix ADC

Follow the steps given below to downgrade a Citrix ADC standalone appliance running release 12.1 to an earlier release.

In this procedure, <release> and <releasenumber> represent the release version you are downgrading to, and <targetbuildnumber> represents the build number that you are downgrading to.

  1. Open an SSH connection to the Citrix ADC by using an SSH client, such as PuTTY.

  2. Log on to the Citrix ADC by using the administrator credentials. Save the running configuration. At the prompt, type:

    save config

  3. Create a copy of the ns.conf file. At the shell prompt, type:

    1. cd /nsconfig
    2. cp ns.conf ns.conf.NS<currentbuildnumber>

    You should backup a copy of the configuration file on another computer.

  4. Copy the <releasenumber> configuration file (ns.conf.NS<releasenumber>) to ns.conf. At the shell prompt, type:

    cp ns.conf.NS<releasenumber> ns.conf

    Note: ns.conf.NS<releasenumber> is the backup configuration file that is automatically created when the system software is upgraded from release version <releasenumber> to the current release version. There may be some loss in configuration when downgrading. After the appliance restarts, compare the configuration saved in step 3 with the running configuration, and make any adjustments for features and entities configured before the downgrade. Save the running configuration after making the changes.

    Important: If routing is enabled, perform step 5. Otherwise, skip to step 6.

  5. If routing is enabled, the ZebOS.conf file will contain the configuration. At the shell prompt, type:

    1. cd /nsconfig
    2. cp ZebOS.conf ZebOS.conf.NS
    3. cp ZebOS.conf.NS<targetreleasenumber> ZebOS.conf
  6. Change directory to /var/nsinstall/<releasenumber>nsinstall, or create one if it does not exist.

  7. Change directory to build_<targetbuildnumber>, or create one if it does not exist.

  8. Download or copy the installation package (build-<release>-<targetbuildnumber>.tgz) to this directory and extract the contents of the installation package.

  9. Run the installns script to install the new version of the system software. The script updates the /etc directory.

    If the configuration file for the build that you are downgrading to exists on the appliance, you are prompted to load that configuration, as shown in the following figure.

    Figure 1. Downgrade menu if configuration file exists


    If the free space available on the flash drive is insufficient to install the new build, the Citrix ADC aborts the installation. Manually clean up the flash drive and restart the installation.


login: nsroot

Password: nsroot

Last login: Mon Apr 24 02:06:52 2017 from


> save config

> shell

root@NSnnn# cp ns.conf.NS10.5 ns.conf

root@NSnnn# cd /var/nsinstall

root@NSnnn# mkdir 10.5nsinstall

root@NSnnn# cd 10.5nsinstall

root@NSnnn# mkdir build_57

root@NSnnn# cd build_57

root@NSnnn# ftp

ftp> mget build-10.5-57_nc.tgz

ftp> bye

root@NSnnn# tar -xzvf build-10.1-125_nc.tgz

root@NSnnn# ./installns

installns version (10.5-57) kernel (ns-10.5-57.gz)




Copying ns-10.5-57.gz to /flash/ns-10.5-57_nc.gz ...

Changing /flash/boot/loader.conf for ns-10.5-57 ...

Installation has completed.

Reboot NOW? [Y/N] Y

Downgrade a Citrix ADC standalone appliance