TECH NEWS – A company analyzes the automatic updates of the OS.

Whenever possible, Microsoft tries to update Windows 10 automatically, without the user having to intervene, and that should simplify things, right? Well, a recent study indicates that although these updates get good results when it comes to keeping the equipment protected, they are also confusing for the user. The problem, in part, is that we are not aware of the level of control we have. Researchers at University College London surveyed 93 users of the operating system, and only 28% of them were aware of the “Active hours” functionality, which prevents Windows from restarting when installing automatic updates.

That’s why the researchers comment: “Half of the participants say they have suffered unexpected restarts, while half of them worry about their device if the update process takes a long time. Participants with bad past experiences felt less able to control updates. ” In the end, the responsibility seems to fall on the user, but as this chart shows, the Microsoft system is not as clear as it should be:

The authors compiled this organizational chart as observed in a virtual machine with a system image of a new installation of Windows 10 Home. As Microsoft released new updates, they restored the system image to be downloaded and updated by the virtual machine. Thus, they could observe several possibilities, and although the organization chart is complex, it is not completely complete. It is clear that the study does not intend to squander the automatic updates of Windows – in fact, it concludes that they work – but it does show that there is a lot of room for improvement, especially with regard to restarts and “active hours”.

It is a particularly interesting study in the framework of the failures caused by the October 10, 2018 update of Windows 10 . Microsoft is committed to launching two major updates a year, along with monthly security patches, so we should be aware of this system.