"softwareupdate" Processes - Update System and Apps

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∟"softwareupdate" Processes - Update System and Apps

This section describes 'softwareupdate' processes, which are created by the operating system to check, download and apply updates for system software and applications.

What are "softwareupdate" Processes? - "softwareupdate" processes are created by the operating system to check, download and apply updates for system software and applications.

Here is what I did about "softwareupdate" processes.

1. View "softwareupdate" processes with "ps" command.

herong$ ps -A | grep softwareupdate

  307 6:35.94 /System/Library/CoreServices/Software Update.app/Contents
    /Resources/softwareupdated
  743 0:00.31 /System/Library/CoreServices/Software Update.app/Contents
    /Resources/softwareupdate_notify_agent
  ...

2. Check CPU and memory usages of "softwareupdate" processes using "top" command. They are not using very much memory.

herong$ top -pid 307 ...

PID  COMMAND      %CPU TIME     #TH  #WQ  #POR MEM    PURG CMPR  PGRP PPID STATE
307  softwareupda 0.0  06:35.96 4    1    111  2996K  0B   62M   307  1    sleeping
743  softwareupda 0.0  00:00.31 2    1    72   880K   0B   2100K 743  1    sleeping

3. If you are concerned about security risk of updating the operating system and applications, you can try to disable "softwareupdate" processes.

3.1. On macOS 10.14 and newer, go to "Apple > System Preferences > Software Update > Advanced", and uncheck the following:

[ ] Automatically keep my Mac up to date

[ ] Check for updates
[ ] Download new updates when available
[ ] Install macOS updates
[ ] Install app updates from the App Store
[ ] Install system data files and security updates

3.2. On macOS 10.13 and older, go to "Apple > Apple Store > Preferences", and uncheck the following:

[ ] Automatically keep my Mac up to date

[ ] Download newly available updates in the background
[ ] Install app updates
[ ] Install macOS updates
[ ] Install system data files and security updates