Background

On 26 October 2019, I acquired a Nokia 9 pure view phone model TA1087. This is the model that supports duel SIM cards. It was running Android 9. On about the 15th of November, Nokia released the November security patch which I downloaded and installed. On 05 December 2019, the much anticipated update to Android 10 rolled around. However, when I checked my phone for updates, I was told that I was on the latest version of Android.
I then continued checking for updates until January 2020. No updates were available. I contacted the nokiamobile account on twitter. I was asked to check the Nokia website and to wait. I followed up with them towards the end of December and was asked to take the phone to a Nokia service center. I tried Nokia India chat support who told me that Android 10 had not been released for my phone.
Meanwhile, I was checking the news and Android 10 was out. There were a few reports of late updates but nothing significant.
This is when I got suspicious that there was something seriously wrong. I went on a holiday to Sri Lanka where I tried updating the phone. No go, I “was still running the latest version of Android.”

Towards the solution

I asked on xda-developers without much success.
The solution came in the form of a developer who goes by the name of Hikari Calyx. He has Nokia stock roms on his website. I contacted him over twitter and he was able to tell me which updates to apply.
The first thing to do is to navigate to the following website.
Downloads for : HMD Global Nokia 9 PureView
You then need to download the following files.

1. AOP-513C-0-00WW-B01-427G-0-00WW-B01-update.zip
2. AOP-513D-0-00WW-B03-513C-0-00WW-B01-update.zip

Get these zip archives to where you can side load them via the android debug bridge. You will need to side load both zip archives. I will not go into details about installing the android debug bridge also known as adb because it is well documented on the internet. The fun starts once you are ready to flash the files after installing adb. Do ensure that the drivers for the Nokia 9 are installed from its read only drive. This is found on the phone when you access the phone as a cd drive via the “this computer” icon.

1. Backup your phone. Be careful about on device contacts. I am not sure if they survive operating system changes. I suspect they do but it is not worth taking chances.
2. You need to boot into recovery mode. An easy way to do this is to connect your phone to the pc and use the command adb reboot recovery
3. If you use this approach, you can skip the next steps that give you an alternative way to get into recovery mode. You can resume following the steps from the point where you need to select the option to side load the updates. I have not tested the booting into recovery mode via adb in detail because I learnt about them after publishing this post hence I cannot supply more detail.

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4. Power off your phone.
5. Plug it into a computer so that you can hear notification beeps from the computer. I have a desktop that runs Windows 10
6. Hit the power and volume buttons together.
7. Release the power button when you feel the phone vibrate.
8. Keep holding the volume up key. You will eventually hear a desending tone from your computer after which things will fall silent.
9. You will probably be at a screen that says “no command”. If you are a screen reader user, use sighted assistance to determine this.
10. Release the volume button and hold down the power button.
11. Hit the volume key again and then release it.
12. Release the power key.
13. You should be in recovery mode. This mode has a number of menu options.
14. If you are a screen reader user, you will need sighted assistance here because talkback does not work. However, the option nyou need is called side load via adb or something similar and it is the third option in the menu. Hit the volume down key twice to reach that option. The cursor is at option 1, called “reboot”
15. Press the power button to activate the option.
16. On your computer, enter the following command.
    
adb sideload AOP-513C-0-00WW-B01-427G-0-00WW-B01-update.zip

17. You will be able to see a read out in percentages. If you are using a screen reader, you may have to use its screen review functions.
18. Once the update is completed, reboot the phone by hitting the power button.
19. If you had talkback running, it will come up now because this is a regular boot of the phone.
20. You need to repeat the above process with the file AOP-513D-0-00WW-B03-513C-0-00WW-B01-update.zip

Once you have completed the update process with both files, you are on Android 10 and you should now be able to apply all the over the air (ota) updates without problems.
As of this writing, I do not know why I have had to do this or what Nokia has done to the TA1087 model of the Nokia 9 that it needed this treatment. The phone is Google Play certified. I bought it from amazon but as far as I can determine, the phone is genuine.

Note

• The above steps will work for other Nokia models like the TA1082.
• There is also a telegram channel for these updates. The channel is at the following link. telegram channel for nokia updates