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I have software updates set to check weekly, but it seems to happen at random times during the day. I'd really like to have it run at a specific day and time - say 4:30 on Friday - so that I can just let it run on my way out the door, rather than having to let the computer restart in the middle of a workday. Is it possible to schedule the software update that granularly? Obviously it can't be done via system prefs, but maybe there's a hidden setting somewhere (or a utility I can download) that I'm not aware of as a Mac newb.

EmmyS
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3 Answers3

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If you goto the Software Update preferences, you can set it to daily, monthly or weekly. Obviously, this a very basic update scheduler. If you want to update weekly at this time just goto preferences and select weekly, now.

You can also do it using an Apple script + softwareupdater as described here.

karmatic
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  • As I said I already have it set to weekly. I'm looking for more specific control over the day and time. Thanks for the link; I'll look at the link when I have a few minutes to process it - I've never worked with AppleScript. – EmmyS May 19 '11 at 14:41
  • I just read the article and set up an agent using Lingon as suggested. Simple and easy; just need to see if it actually runs tomorrow! Thanks. – EmmyS May 19 '11 at 15:02
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Emmy - if you want to automate this without a user approving the changes, see this thread. How to silently update OS X and reboot if necesary?

Otherwise just use iCal to schedule and set an alarm to open the file 

/System/Library/Core Services/Software Update.app

as shown below: iCal alarms

There are tons of ways to script this, but iCal is really simple for this task.

Community
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bmike
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You can automate this by date and time using 'launchd' here's an article about it. Note: This will download the updates in the background automatically, you won't see the apple software update window. So you won't have to push any confirm to install buttons.

joopmicroop
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