Ever wonder how Google autoupdates its software? | Hacker News Reader

Ever wonder how Google autoupdates its software?

omaha.googlecode.com

39 pointsspeek13 comments

I love Paint.NET's update system, which I've rarely seen implemented. It asks you if you want to update... as you're quitting the program, not before you launch it. This is such a spectacular idea I can't believe so few people implement it.

It's a good idea because a) it gives me a choice whether I want to update or not b) when I don't need to wait for the update in order to use the software

Yup. Quite a few indie Mac programs do this, too, or similarly will ask on startup, but one of the dialog box's buttons reads "Install on quit".

I've always wondered about auto-updating software being flagged as a virus. That has always been troublesome for me. So I haven't really explored it, but it seems to be relatively smooth sailing for Google.

The one thing that I have preferred about interactive updating is that it lets users know that things may break during the update. And sometimes, you just prefer running an older version because it works better for you than the newer version.

The problem I have with auto-updating software, including Chrome, is that when big changes are made, I have no point of reference to test, and there is very little I can do to reject a version upgrade. Of course, this has its benefits since you know all users will be forced to upgrade Chrome and you know that you only have to test your site against one version of Chrome.

This is an interesting use of .NET ClickOnce. It is probably the largest Clickonce app I've ever used.

Personally I find giving this much control to any software on my system (to essentially install anything at will) is too dangerous. I've actually stopped using Chrome and moved to the buggier Chromium because of this worry.

Interesting technology though.

On the Mac side, Google uses http://code.google.com/p/update-engine/

I don't particularly care for this solution because an update engine is started when the user logs in, and thus is running even if no Google application is. If you know what you're doing you can disable this and Google apps will still be able to update themselves when they are running.

Fortunately, I've not seen Update Engine used outside of Google apps. Most Mac apps use http://sparkle.andymatuschak.org/ which I think is a far less intrusive solution.

It's not necessarily intrusive just because it's running. I bet it's just swapped to disk and using ~0% of the CPU most of the time.

There is no configuration for the update engine. It periodically checks for updates, and in the background will download and install those updates. There may situations where I don't want it doing so: e.g., if I'm on a low-bandwidth link. I can maybe understand this if I've got a Google application running, but to do so w/o any Google applications running is unacceptable.

To be clear, I think auto-updating software is a fine default. But every other Mac app I have (since they almost all use Sparkle) will only update itself when running, and further, give me a preference to disable the auto-updates as well as specify how often I want update checks to occur. It is un-Mac-like to silently update in the background and w/o providing the user any control.

Great that is it open source and liberally licensed. Auto updating desktop software is a difficult problem to solve, esp with supporting Win95+ and even more difficult once you attempt to support Mac, Linux etc.

There were solid open source solutions until Omaha, even Firefox used a commercial solution until recently.

The one feature request I would have is support for SSL and client certificates, to prevent DNS poisoning and having the auto-updater download, install and execute any arbitrary code. Otherwise, this is fantastic.

For me I like having Chrome auto-updated in the background on my Mac, because it always works whenever I need it, and I don't have to think about it at all. However I can understand not wanting auto-updates for software that is less likely to work properly after an update...

I wish that I could set most of my applications to silently auto-update, and then set a few back to manual if I ever decided one had an issue. Auto-updating is an awesome idea for browsers and for frequently updated things like Chrome.

Clever as this is, it seems that this should be something provided by the operating system rather than each app doing its own thing.

And I definitely want the option to manage and disable updates. As a sysadmin, Chrome is a nightmare because I never know which version my users are running.

What is Google Chrome for Enterprise? Is it a different build than the Google Chrome I install from google.com?
Google Chrome for Enterprise is just Google Chrome. Every Google Chrome has the same features, so it's equivalent to the Google Chrome you can download from google.com.
What enterprise features does Chrome offer?

Support for group policy and centralized configuration, a specialized MSI installer, and control over auto-update frequency.

http://www.chromium.org/administrators/frequently-asked-ques...

You can get the source code here:

http://code.google.com/p/omaha/

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