Is it important to update an Operating System?

OS

Many people ask this Question, especially newcomers who bought new laptops or desktops, Or freshers in software industry. They always ask — “If company is releasing Operating system, they release this with full package, then why do we need to update Operating system?“

To understand this, first we need to understand — “Why do companies release an update?”. There are many reasons for companies to release an update. Let’s understand by an example.

I started working on a product and released it within timeline. What next? I always need to understand that nothing is perfect. Means, I need run some regular checkups according to market standard and update the product to make it sustainable into market.

This is the same case, we can pick up in case of Operating systems. Once Manufacturer release the software, they regularly run some health checkups, their business team comes up with some new ideas to improve, security team comes up with some security issues that can be improved, Performance team comes up with some performance issues.

These all can be cover in many updates. Team prioritise each and every task and then start working on it. After each successful and stable build team release an update. And, that is the main reason why we need to update the operating system.

# Fix Security issues

Specially, for the user who uses Windows system without antivirus, they are at risk. These days we have seen too many attacks on windows systems.

Read also : “Locky Ransomware: Indian Govt released an advisory

Every time a manufacturer sense an attack on Operating system, they release security updates. These updates are too important, because they are specific to that particular security issue. Apart from this, if there is no outside security threat but if manufacturer’s security team find any loophole, that might come in security update.

That’s why it is important to install ever security update coming from OS manufacturer.

# Enhance Performance

Manufacturer’s team always run code analysis and code refactoring process. Each time they find any performance issue they optimize it and release an update.

This also covers memory, cache and process management. Multitasking, Job scheduling and job handling can also be part in this performance update.

# Bug Fixes

Many times it happen that, there are some bugs found in operating system. Manufacturer’s testing team always test to find some bugs and as they find any major or minor bug development team prioritize them, fix and release them in update.

This may cover network issue or any functional issue. So it is important to update operating system on every update.

# Conclusion

To keep our computer safe and to perform better, it is very important to keep our system updated.