4

I have MacUpdate installed (which I got with their Spring Bundle).

I noticed that it tries to check for updates every hour for some reason. The app itself is not running so it must be some agent or daemon.

Here's example log entry (with network off):

06/04/2011 22:33:00 MU App Search[1916] APP KEY 447266 
06/04/2011 22:33:00 MU App Search[1916] Checking Updates
06/04/2011 22:33:01 MU App Search[1916] APP KEY 26968 
06/04/2011 22:33:01 MU App Search[1916] Contacting Updates Server
06/04/2011 22:33:05 MU App Search[1916] found manual scan, no last notification 2011-04-01 09:17:54 +0200
06/04/2011 22:33:06 MU App Search[1916] APP KEY 6.282815 
[...]
06/04/2011 23:33:00 MU App Search[2036] APP KEY 447266 
06/04/2011 23:33:00 MU App Search[2036] Checking Updates
06/04/2011 23:33:01 MU App Search[2036] APP KEY 26968 
06/04/2011 23:33:01 MU App Search[2036] Contacting Updates Server
06/04/2011 23:33:03 MU App Search[2036] found manual scan, no last notification 2011-04-01 09:17:54 +0200

I was looking for a setting that could determine the frequency (ideally switch it off completely) but didn't find anything.

Using Lingon I found one Agent that's suppose to run every day at 0:35 which would be fine, but as you can see from the log, it's seem to be run hourly.

Any ideas?

UPDATE

Did some testing and these are my findings...

After disabling the MacUpdate LaunchAgent it gets re-enabled by MacUpdate Destkop app every time it launches. Same happens if I delete it altogether.

Improve this question
1
  • 1
    thanks for posting this. I too find that when somehow MU Desktop gets active every time I come back to a supposedly idle MacBook Pro, I find it whirring away hot with CPUs at near 100% shared between Dock and MU App Search. MU App Search does not even show up in my Console messages. But, sure enough, for 20+ minutes it is using 86-96% CPU, so the explanation earlier does not appear fully accurate. Thank you. Imran
    – user6613
    May 20, 2011 at 0:32

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
0

The background scanning is used to both keep your updates cache up-to-date and also to display notifications about new updates that are available. The preferences can control how often the notifications are displayed, and the notifications will not display if you have recently run a manual update check and are viewing the recent list of updates available.

The process does run for about 5-10 seconds every hour (as you can see in your logs - it ran in 6 seconds) and is designed to be resource friendly and unnoticeable.

Improve this answer
4
  • 3
    It would be really nice to turn it off. I run the updater when I want to know whether a new update is ready or not. I don't want to waste my resources (battery, CPU) on unwanted updates.
    – KARASZI István
    Apr 20, 2011 at 20:16
  • Although this doesn't directly answers my question, it does explain what is actually happening hence the accept.
    – Michal M
    Jul 20, 2011 at 10:38
  • 1
    DP88, are you from MacUpdate, by any chance ? Your answer sounds like a selling speech. Curiously, the users here have encountered the opposite. Checking updates every hour is crazy.
    – Nicolas Barbulesco
    Jun 30, 2013 at 11:20
  • 1
    Downvoted for the poster's undisclosed affiliation.
    – DavidRecallsMonica
    Jun 27, 2020 at 19:41
1

You can disable the update mechanism in the preferences. And you can even set the update frequency (weekly, daily, hourly).

preferences window

Update: this is not enough. It won't notify about new updates, but in the background it runs the updater in every hour. I'm looking forward to have an answer for this question as well.

Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    In this case, this software is not only crazy, it also lies to its user.
    – Nicolas Barbulesco
    Jun 30, 2013 at 11:33

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .