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Comment by frik | Hacker News Reader

The Windows update used to be okay in Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7 and 8. But Windows 10 with its forced update that has negative wait effects after every reboot is unbearable. Also Linux don't need a reboot for 99.9% of its updates and updates only the files that have changed. Something like Threshold 2 update for Win10 and all its problems like downloading 2+GB, doing a complete OS re-installation (WTF), loosing drivers and applications and settings is laughable in 2015. Also the new OldNewThing blog software isn't that great.

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> The Windows update used to be okay in Windows XP

Nostalgia much? How many times did e.g. .NET updates force XP computers into endless loops, or just killed the OS?

Windows Update has always been a barely functional, embarrassing mess. It's just that seems to be stuck in 2001, while others finally managed to sort their crap out.

> It's just that seems to be stuck in 2001, while others finally managed to sort their crap out.

Those others do not include Apple as anyone who's been indefinitely waiting for "installing" OSX updates can confirm - and the OSX fixes needed have the same weird incantation like qualities as the fixes for Windows updates (i.e. remove update, then restart, then run again, then panic, redo-sequence). No particular hate meant for Apple or MS.. but seriously, learn how to write a basic update mechanism that do not include random-fail-over.

I've managed a ton of Macs and can't say I've ever come across the need to remove an update, or really any issue with updates failing, but maybe I'm lucky?

I manage Macs for myself and my family, as well having used many through my employer over the years. I have never seen what you describe.

I manage Windows and Mac networks. Mac updates may take up to 5 minutes to discover necessary updates, resulting in 5 - 10 package downloads, even on machines that haven't been regularly updated. Windows, depending on the version can take upwards of 20 - 30 minutes, with up to 50-60 package downloads, and on machines that haven't been updated recently, 1 - 2 hours, and hundreds of package retrievals.

> OS X fixes needed have the same weird incantation like qualities as the fixes for Windows updates

I find your statement inaccurate. Even if the update operations are fairly similar in Windows and OS X, the latter's update system seems fairly efficient. OS X doesn't have the libraries and dependences hell that windows does. The update model fits well in to the OS X environment, not well at all in Windows.

Also, Mac updates that update system files are 'rare' and usually only require one reboot. Windows often requires 2 or 3 reboots. Again, I believe this is because of the dependancies and libraries Windows is forced to maintain and keep up to date.

Mac's don't hang on update or install, frankly, Ever, unless there is something very wrong.

The update procedure works fine, the newly updated OS X seldom so. Far too often updating OS X means having something break.

There has definitely been a trade off. I recently had to install Win 8 on a Surface, and had all but forgotten the days of a fresh install needing 100+ updates, which require multiple download/install/reboot/repeat cycles. Win 10 has less flexibility for deciding how the update happens, but I also almost never reboot anymore. I can probably count the number of times I've had to reboot for Win 10 on one hand, whereas it was a given for nearly every update pre-Win 10. Having said that, your point about needing a reboot at all is well taken.

> updates only the files that have changed

No linux system that I ever used worked that way. The only system I've seen that did that was solaris, and that patching software was a disaster.

Systems like dpkg and rpm replace the entire contents of a package when there is an update. The benefit of this is that if things are very out of date or a package is corrupted, the only thing you need to do to get things up to date is (re)install the latest package.

Packages on linux are fairly granular, so in practice doing full individual package updates is not a huge problem. I have 2300 packages or so installed on my laptop and all but 100 or so are under 10M.

Google did a lot of work optimizing chrome package updates, but I'm not sure if most distributions are prioritizing this sort of thing anymore.

Correct of course, however at least Fedora does delta RPM updates now a days so full rpm downloads for updates are rare. Most drpms turn out to be few hundreds of KB.

That's interesting.. I looked up how it is implemented.

They seem to pull down the updated bits, merge them with what is currently on the system to reconstruct the new package, and then install that.

That would save bandwidth, but not make the actual operation of installing the new package any faster.

Yes, that is basically an in place upgrade, but Pro users can defer it (this is called CBB). And when a new build is not being installed, the amount of time spent on each reboot should be much less due to less processing being required after each cumulative update.

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