[t_hah]

I just had a conversation about a the following topic...
There has been rumors in the past about Apple building a new version of the Software Update application, allowing other software on a users computer to download newer releases.

Has anyone heard anything more on this?

I was just playing around with the idea today...and wondering about your ideas about this. How would it be possible to still keep the security tight of the system if this was allowed. Would some kind of a system help, where developers would have to send their programs through...get themselves registered...and only those software that passed, would show up in an end users Software Update panel.

What do you guys think?

t

[zachs]

I have heard that there is indeed a new version of Software Update in the latest build of 10.3.4. A while ago, some news site(s) reported that in the "Localizable.strings" file in the SWU app, there were placeholders for things like "Price", etc.

In terms of how it would be set up, don't think it could be something like VersionTracker or MacUpdate, where pretty much anyone can put their apps up (even with the "approval" process). That would only cause confusion for less experienced users. Maybe it could be apps at www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/. Apple screens those apps more carefully than VT or MU.

[philzilla]

i always said Unsanity should have something similar to SU for their Haxies

[Diggory Laycock]

Balls - the update mechanism should not be in the control of one party - it should be open and distributed:

See here for my ramblings:
http://www.monkeyfood.com/blog/archives/000107.html

[fireside]

i'd rather have a Software Update API that developers can put into their own software to update.

[mitchell_pgh]

I would be comfortable with Apple building in 3rd party software update.

It's not like Apple would force the traditional way out...

[oscar]

Renew http://myndlinksw.com/renew.php offers third party support of a software update type app.

[Developer]

Originally posted by Diggory Laycock:
1 - developers add another entry to their applications' info.plist that is a URI.
2 - this URI points to an address on the web. At this location is an XML file.
3 - the XML file contains standardised meta-data about the current version of the application.
4 - Sites such as VersionTracker and MacUpdate should accept URIs of these files as updates. They can use the data from the XML file to update their databases.
5 - Update Application developers can now have an open market where they know that they get all apps update info without having to beg the developers to support their app.
6 - Because of the standardisation all update apps will be "compatible" - so users can choose whichever update app suits them.
7 - App developers only have to create one XML version file and then send the URI of that file to the Update web sites - sending a URI is a lot less pain than filling in a form several times. This could even be extended - developers could have RSS feeds for their XML Version files - and the update sites could subscribe to these feeds.
http://www.monkeyfood.com/blog/archives/000107.html

That's exactly what Shovel does. It already exists.

http://www.zathras.de/programming/my_applications.php