Comments on: Why Must I Reboot With Every Apple Update?

By: Richard Dalziel-Sharpe

Richard Dalziel-Sharpe — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 11:22:09 +0000

I have no knowledge of the inner workings of OSX so I just do what Apple recommends because I figure that they do know what is necessary. In addition to this I always repair permissions after any software installation that requires me to enter my login password. My theory here, right or wrong, is that if it wants my password it is probably doing something in one of the Libraries and might stuff up permissions somewhere. Continuing the theory, the few minutes a reboot and permisssion repair take might save me a lot of hassles later.
The only time I have had to reboot in the last eight months or so have been for software installs so I dont find it much of a bugbear.

By: Tim

Tim — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 00:19:19 +0000

I don’t mind having to restart… after all, restarting every once in a while cleans out the ‘cobwebs’ and updates are about the only time I do that anymore.

By: Sven

Sven — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 23:14:03 +0000

jhg, I only “whine” because I’ve seen it not necessary elsewhere. OSX is the best desktop operating system in the world and it’s always been a wonder to me why Apple dings it with this annoyance. That’s why I found it worthy of a blog entry. Since others have debated this problem long before me, I would have to say that there a lot of us girls in this world.

By: Shmo

Shmo — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 22:51:29 +0000

jhg (#1) has it.
Other dependencies make it the easiest option (at least right now)

Another question: Why must you whine like a little girl and feel that’s blog worthy?

By: apollyon666

apollyon666 — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 19:48:38 +0000

I just use Force Quit on the sotfware updater after installation, when it won’t let you quit w/o forcing a restart. I do this all the time.

By: anon

anon — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 19:26:06 +0000

Probably has to do with the objective-c runtime’s inability to unload a shared library (e.g., bundle) once it’s been loaded. I have a feeling apple will eventually get around to addressing that, because lord knows it’d be nice to unload a plug-in as easily as you can load it.

By: Pecos Bill

Pecos Bill — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 19:06:21 +0000

It’s because Apple is lazy. QuickTime is used at the core of A LOT of things. They probably figure they would have to bounce so many applications to get them to use the new code that it’s simpler just to restart. Heck, I’d be happier with a logout but again, what to do about the other active users (fast usersw)…

By: jhg

jhg — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 18:53:08 +0000

Using HUP reloads a process but not all processes behave predictably when they’re reloaded.

I think given the state of flux of multitasking system, it’s much simpler to reboot than to sort out all the dependencies that could exist.

I know from experience that some devices may be loaded that would prevent file system processes from reloading properly. It could be worked out but rebooting is usually the fastest way to regain sanity.

In the case of Quicktime, the Finder seems dependent on it (at least from the playable thumbnails I can see when I browse my drive). I think relaunching the Finder would be necessary at minimum. But there could be other dependecies that make rebooting the easier option.