app store update page looks strange

I engaged with apple support about 5 weeks ago and they knew about the issue then, told they were not in any hurry to sort the issue out - the consequence of having a very old laptop and that I should rather engage in this forum to find a solution. Alas, I’m not hopeful that Apple are going to prioritise a solution any time soon

"We can do nothing".

Sorry, I don't give up that easily, not even with multi-nationals like Apple.

Apple have crossed the line here, and I won't accept it, you shouldn't either.

There's a principle/fundamental issue at stake here.

High Sierra is out of support, Apple may no longer offer updates for High Sierra, but (and this is the crux) the page that tells you and millions of Apple users that informaton should show this clearly for the life of the machine. This version of macOS is currently operating against a string of UK laws including the UK's Equality Act.

The whole thing makes a mockery of the UK's National Cyber Security Centre for a start, why I brought it to their attention.

What's the point of having a very expensive high profile Government funded body to mitigate the effects of viruses and alike, when on the other side of the coin, we allow companies like Apple to causually trash the formatting of the App Store Update page, which means many non-techical types will just either not bother applying the updates that are there through this garbled mess or worse, be subject to one of those telephone tech scams.

For any Cyber security policy to work at the National level, uou have to have these two policies connected, and this shows they aren't.

As said, I won't let this lie.

Even if it means writing to both NCSC and the Competition and Markets Authority, because this also can be seen as an 'anti-competitive action' against third party resellers of second-hand Apple Equipment, making their job harder, by having macOS show garbled update pages, once a version of macOS is out of support, giving rise to those customers purchasing said equipment, returning the items in belief they are infected with a virus.

As others have pointed out, this is the perfect exploit to take advantages of non-technical folk, where people will be cold-called and they explain that the update page can be repaired remotely for a fee. An actually even technical folk, because I spent more than a week on this trying as many different scenarios, to attempt to resolve it.

Apple need to put this right NOW, this is no joke, it's a serious fundamental issue. Apple have crossed the line here.

Time is running out for Apple to correct this because as time carries on, it will be seen as deliberate by the regulatory authorities.

Hello Macerooni, thanks for your reaction.

I called support 3 months ago. Then the answer was: we are not aware that this is happening, first we'll see how far this issue has been spread. Well, the thread is growing every day.

The day before yesterday I called support again, this time the answer was: "This has been brought to my attention (he meant through his job) and we are aware that resolving this is up to us. I cannot tell you exactly when it might take a while, but please call back in a few weeks."

The kind man in Ireland told me the same about the CSS file, and he also assured me the page still works. You can even use the option Update All on the strange-looking page.

The answers from support suggest they are at least talking about it, and this discussion also has their interest so thanks for writing!

Hello adamjarvis, thanks for your reaction.

I still have hope they will do something about this. Please look at my answer to Macerooni where I give a few more details. In short: I called twice with support, once 3 months ago and once the day before yesterday. 2 very different reactions: 3 months ago: we are not aware, first we want to see how far spread this issue is.

Day before yesterday: It has our attention, we will have to reinstall the CSS file, we don't know exactly when but please call back in a few weeks. I received an email with the case number so I get the same guy again.

We'll see.

Henry, Henry,Henry....

In all most likelihood, unless by miraculous happenstance - you won’t talk with the exact, same person. Not even in a possible transferred call situation.

If you were to talk with the same person... generally... it would be done with a “call back,” and they would be from a different, higher level of support.

And if by chance the person provided you a (quote/unquote) ...”direct” number, perhaps also an extension? ...you’d only get voicemail, which then again, by default, would result in a call back.

Now you’ve officially been, what they call -“LOOPED.”

But then... next week, everything I said will have changed. That’s an Apple thing, too. Apple will say they don’t have “policies,” but they do... and can change with less than a days notice.

Just trying to set your expectations accordingly. <— Hey that’s an old Apple “line,” too. The randomness is real, and the venue of communication, with no actual given time line ... is always in Apple’s control.

Believe me - sadly, this comes from a former Apple employee.

*AND*.... if I’m wrong regarding current events and the state of operations —

I will default to one of my “idioms” that... Apple policies and operation formats can change within less than a day. Im saying this and also with my very last post - in fun.

But deliriously /seriously we should set our expectations pretty low with this one. Obviously - Apple already has.

Ya just have to laugh at the situation, that’s all. Or you’ll go bonkers going in circles with Apple.

Hello Berry with an A,

The only thing I have against this is this:

My name is not Henry but Harry. (with an A)

Even so pleased to meet you!

But all the rest must be true I am afraid. I have little or no expectations for myself since I am working on a mid 2009 Macbook - running El Capitan - that's a laugh in itself, but it's a shame I read comments here by people who run updates all the way up to 2015 and even younger machines - and they have the same issues? Well, if you are a former Apple employee or know one who told you this it's sad - however, it's interesting to read all this and see how this has grown from just a handful of people 3 months ago to more than 300 now.

Let's do what you suggest and take it with a laugh.

Thanks for writing!

My apologies. There's a large A/V meeting company in my area that's actually called "Henry V" - so Henry was stuck in my head.

But while I'm here on the forum -- I can confirm one of our other Mac we keep in separate spare work area running El Capitan has the same issue, so we'd never noticed. But hey - No surprise there!

I just wonder if this is going to start being issues with other macOS's? We have other olde Macs running Catalina (no longer updatable) and are just bracing for Apple to neglect those versions of Mac and macOS. [sigh]

Has Apple moved from "elegant simplicity" to "elegant duplicity"? I hope not.

I'd like to think that it is an honest mistake that some bozo Apple engineer made – i.e. removing a very simple CSS file from s.mzstatic.com.

I just bought a mid-2010 white MacBook from a rummage sale. The owner said they did a fresh install of El Capitan. When I brought it home and booted it up, the first thing I checked was the appearance of the Updates tab in the App Store. It was messed up, just like my four other Macs running High Sierra. The first update that the App Store called for stated that "this El Capitan update will ensure compatibility with future App Store versions." Wow, that sounded promising.

I updated and restarted, but the Update tab retained the same goofy appearance.

It's clearly evident the the App Stores in 10.11.x, 10.12.x and 10.13.x cannot find the missing CSS (cascading style sheet). That is what you call a server-side issue (Apple's resource server). It is NOT a client-side (user) issue.

This is an embarrassing, inelegant bug that could be fixed in 8.32 minutes (I know, I am a web developer). But Apple can't seem accelerate a fix for a mess they created by their own hand.

Hi all, this is happening to me since the first update I did a month ago or so. I upgraded from 10.9 Mavericks to this 10.13 High Sierra in my old early 2011 MBP, and after de latest update It showed me up this behavior in the updates tab. So its pretty clear that this is a problem for all High Sierras running out there.

Same issue here. I just completely erased the SSD and re-installed High Sierra from scratch via option-command-R on my MBP 2011. Same issue.

I can see this also appearing on an old iMac running the latest version of High Sierra.

Hi mwarner712, I called support not so long ago, no app updates are available at the moment; they assured me that the way the page looks does not interfere with updates; in fact, in the thread of this conversation there are some answers that indicate that updates were possible to just about a week ago You can always check for safety updates using Terminal:

1). Open Terminal.app

2). Type softwareupdate -l then hit <enter> This will list all available updates.

3). To install all updates type softwareupdate -i -a --restart then hit <enter> This will install all available updates and then automatically restart.

4). After a reboot, follow step 2 and 3 again until no more updates are available.

Looks like the problem is growing by the day. Also looks more and more like they will do nothing about it.

I am using a MacBook medio 2009, on which I reinstalled El Capitan looking at this video:

El Capitan: No packages were eligible for install-Fix

there's a trick that might work for you or maybe similar solutions for High Sierra or others.

Here is the link to the video that helped me a few months ago, or rather the most recent version, cause this man keeps updating about this every few months:

https://youtu.be/qg1t1mhsAzM

So let's start a search on youtube too for "App Store Update page looks weird" or something along those lines.

But for the users of old Mac machines future looks bleak. I thought in my case (2009) it's about time to think of a new(er) machine. If machines with "young" updates (2015!?!?) are suffering from this it's a crime.

The video link is very recent: this Update Page thing was already going on on January 20, but if this works for El Capitan there may be similar solutions to re-install later versions.

There have been updates done with the page looking funny, apps have been updated. There have been no updates for a month or so now. Here is a way to check for OS updates, only security, no app updates, can be done using Terminal.

1). Open Terminal.app

2). Type softwareupdate -l then hit <enter> This will list all available updates.

3). To install all updates type softwareupdate -i -a --restart then hit <enter> This will install all available updates and then automatically restart.

4). After a reboot, follow step 2 and 3 again until no more updates are available. 

This works, unless there is nothing to update.

Oh man!!! More posts???

With all the unnecessary posts in this topic - I HAVE to unfortunately unsubscribe from the topic.

Temporary solutions that have already been provided don’t need to be perpetually repeated. What info there’s been — its been provided, Thats the purpose & function of a forum string.

There’s nothing going to be done or changed until Apple does something, - which may never come.

Hopefully… if and when Apple ever provides a real solution - someone will have posted it here for other users to find, but there’s no real answer herein as of yet

Good luck all.

…moving on

— unsubscribed

Just to update my post from yesterday in case there are others like me with relatively new Macs that need to get out of High Sierra and have this app store problem. I realized that I was trying to access the Apple OS download site that I mentioned in my previous post from Firefox. This leads to a request to open iTunes which then tells me that the Catalina download is not available in the U.S. I then tried to download the Catalina installer from Safari and got the same error message again, but the second attempt via Safari led to a successful download. So, I'm back in business and have Catalina running on the iMac now and all is well again.