VikingOSX wrote:
What terminology would you use to qualify pushed Apple security updates that are not presented via customary visual update interfaces?
Apple uses the term "background updates" - About background updates in macOS - Apple Support
My use of "silently" had no clandestine portent at all, and was my own choice of word for operating system events that occur unannounced to the user.
I didn't mean to imply that your "use" of the term had any ulterior motive. However, I really don't think it was your own choice. It was a term adopted exclusively for Apple updates and you, like many other people, simply adopted it. But the problem is that when one adopts someone else's terminology, they are implicitly supporting that specific, contextual use of the word.
Here is an example Google search:
The first two hits are from Apple, where the world "silent" does not occur at all. The next hit is a popular Mac site that flat out tells people this is something to be stopped. Then we have Howard Oakley, who doesn't know how these updates actually happen, but claims they are actually a security vulnerability.
The last one from 2014 is quite interesting. This is one of the first times this term was used in this context. In the article, they compare it (favourably) to Windows' "automatic updates" where, unlike on Windows, these updates don't require a restart.
I'm not trying to pick on you. I'm just using you as an example. Even if someone doesn't subscribe to the Apple fear-mongering, if they use that terminology, then it implies support. Even if you were using the term first, it has been co-oped to mean something sinister.
