A system and a method are disclosed for automatic installation and maintenance of hardware and/or software in the system nodes of a distributed computer system, in particular in a distributed automation system, comprising a system installation and/or system maintenance tool that can be activated from every system node of the distributed system. The system installation and/or system maintenance tool (WZ) selects a software package and/or a functional component, and automatically executes the maintenance steps of the selected software package and/or of the selected functional component as regards the distribution, installation and/or configuration of the software package and/or of the selected functional component in a defined sequence on the system nodes (SK) of the distributed system.