You can see that it’s flagging CleanMyMac X, Google Chrome, and (Zoom) as needing updates. Download it, run the program (it’ll request a few permissions to be able to access the entire Mac drive, allow them), and it’ll quickly show a helpful list of every app on your computer and their update status: You can download a copy for your own Mac system at corecode.io/macupdater. The new version is commercial, but it turns out you only need a license if you want it to actually apply the updates. It’s version 3 and from a different developer than the original MacUpdater, which apparently was developed by a Ukrainian company that was acquired pre-Covid and never updated the original. There’s a great application called MacUpdater that is well worth knowing about when you want to get a faster overview of what apps on your system have available updates or not. SMARTER: MACUPDATER AUTOMATICALLY TRACKS ALL YOUR APPS ” menu (top right of the app window, not the menubar), then “About Chrome”, at which point it checks for updates and automatically applies any it finds.You’ll need to launch the popular browser, then choose “Help and Feedback” from the “ Some applications are a bit more complex to check for updates, like Google Chrome. Or am I? We’ll come back to this particular program in a moment or two. When I check it reports I’m running the very latest version: It has a “Check for Updates…” option right on the app menu: For example, I’m a huge fan of GraphicConverter, a fantastic graphics editor that I use every day. The best of them check every time you launch the app, but sometimes I find that I leave applications running for weeks on end, which means I won’t know about updates. Most applications nowadays have the ability to check for their own updates, though it’s typically something you need to check manually. Good to have things up-to-date, for sure!īut what about applications that you didn’t get through the App Store? CHECK FOR UPDATES WITHIN YOUR APPS You can see that the most recent app to get an update through the App Store is the Kindle app, and that was just about a week ago. That also tends to happen automatically, so it’s common for you to check just to see what’s been recently updated rather than any pending updates. UPDATES THROUGH THE APP STOREįor most Apple applications and a fair amount of other programs you’ll install on your iMac, MacBook Air, even Mac server, the App Store can identify updates and apply them. If there is an available update, apply it, then restart your Mac system before proceeding. Generally, these auto-updates should be invisible though.Īt any time you can check to see if your MacOS is the very latest and greatest by going to □ > System Settings… > General > Software Update. Most Mac systems are configured by default to auto-install critical security updates, which is why you occasionally find your system has rebooted itself overnight. Apple isn’t too zealous about endless incremental updates, but when there is a small update, it’s often related to system security and therefore very important to apply soonest. FIRST OFF, UPDATE MACOS ITSELFĪrguably the most important application to keep updated is MacOS itself. The secret? You can use these commercial apps to keep track of updates for free, then manually update the apps to keep everything running smoothly. Turns out that there are a number of different solutions, ranging from teaching yourself to manually check for updates for all your favorite apps (easy, but easy to forget about too) to commercial applications that do a great job with this task, but require a license for full functionality. What about everything else? Shortcuts: MacOS Update | App Store Updates | Apps that Update Themselves | MacUpdater 3 | CleanMyMac X Sure, you can use “Update” in the Apple Store app (as I’ll show), but that only updates applications you’ve originally downloaded from the Store. Throughout the history of Mac operating systems, however, there’s never been a really good universal application updater tool. It was rather quite a while ago (the original Mac was introduced back in 1984 in what was to become one of the most memorable advertisements in Super Bowl history). In fact, my first Mac was a 512K “fishbowl”, the very first generation of Mac systems, and an Apple II before that. I’ve been using a Mac system since the very beginning.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |