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The initial installation of any operating system or productivity application is only the beginning. Applying updates and patches is a never ending activity for administrators. The Automatic Update (AU) features available under Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 should significantly lessen this burden. Automatic Updates is a proactive service that enables individuals with administrative privileges to download and install Windows updates on a computer. Updates are downloaded to the user's computer in the background, although the user is notified prior to installation and given the opportunity to postpone it because the installation might require restarting the computer. This feature also includes:
Detection: Automatic Updates uses the Windows Update control to scan the system and decide which updates are applicable to a particular computer.
Downloads: AU uses its innovative bandwidth-throttling technology for downloads. Bandwidth throttling uses only idle bandwidth so that downloads will not interfere with or slow down other network activity, such as Internet browsing.
Install: AU uses the Windows Update control for installing downloaded updates.
Security: The AU service checks user security privileges on each method call. It will process calls coming only from administrator user sessions.
Resolving user collisions: The service will allow the automatic update client to run only for one administrative user at a time.
The AU feature provides the following for clients:
User interface: All dialog boxes, notification balloons, and icons perform in "intuitive" ways, and the user has the choice of the classic or the new view (discussed in Chapter 4).
Security: It will perform security checks so that it can run only in an administrative user session.
The AU features begins when a user with administrative privileges logs on, but it can also be manually launched by invoking Start 
Control Panel Performance and Maintenance System Automatic Updates.
NOTE
Windows Server 2003 has the Dynamic Update feature, which provides application and device compatibility updates, some driver updates, and emergency fixes. This is used for setup operations. Microsoft periodically posts updates on the Internet when Dynamic Update requirements such as security fixes are warranted. When installing or upgrading the operating system from a CD, invoking the Dynamic Update feature during setup will search Microsoft's Web site for the latest and greatest patches. This guarantees that a new installation is current.
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