Updating

An exe installed with the one-line installer (Linux, macOS and Windows; see Getting Started) is a release, named for its date, such as 2026.10.09. Software Update moves this machine to the newest release from the desktop, and exe update does the same from a shell.

What you get

• See what is new before you take it. The window names the release that is installed and the newest one, and shows what changed in it.
• Update from where you are. It works from the desktop, on a phone as well as at a desk. The update runs in the daemon, so you can close the window, or the browser, and it goes on.
• Know what a restart costs. exe restarts to finish, which stops the running VMs and starts them again. The alert names them first, and afterwards the window says how each one came back.
• One command for a script or an agent. exe update -check only says whether a newer release exists, and exe update -y installs it and restarts without asking.

Which release is this

exe version says which release is installed, and so does the daemon log when it starts. In Apple menu → Software Update…, the Installed line says it too.

Update from the desktop

1. Choose Apple menu → Software Update…. The window says which release is installed and which is the newest, and shows what changed in it.
2. Press Update Now. It asks first, since exe restarts to finish and a restart stops the running VMs and starts them again; the alert names them.
3. Press Update. exe downloads the release, checks it, replaces the binary and restarts.

All of that happens in the daemon, so you can close the window, or the browser: the update goes on. A second Update Now from another device joins the same update, and the window says where it stands whenever it is opened again.

The window shows what the newest release changed. Every release's notes, back to the first, are on one page: What Changed.

After the restart

When exe is back the window names the version that runs now and, for a quarter of an hour, each VM that was running before and how it is doing.

On Linux, when the release changes the root-owned network helper, the two sudo lines that install the new one are shown there too.

When exe looks for a newer release

• The desktop looks when it loads, and the daemon passes the question on at most twice a day.
• Opening the Software Update window looks again when the last answer is more than ten minutes old, and Check Now asks at once.
• A daemon no desktop is open on asks nothing.
• Looking is asking where the newest release is: nothing about this machine is sent.

A diamond beside the Apple, and beside Software Update… in its menu, says a release is waiting.

Installed but not yet running

A release that is installed but not yet running (a restart you put off in a shell, say) shows as such, and the button is Restart Now. From a shell, exe daemon restart restarts into it.

Update from a shell

exe update          # move to the latest release
exe update -check   # only say whether there is a newer one
exe update -y       # move to it and restart without asking

exe update downloads the release, checks it against the release's checksums and replaces the binary. The daemon goes on running the old one until it restarts, and a restart stops and starts every VM, so it asks first; -y answers yes ahead of time. Run where nobody can answer, in a script or by an agent, it installs the release and leaves the restart to you.

• The extra apps the installer brought follow the release, except one you edited or removed.
• On Linux, when a release changes the root-owned network helper, the update prints the two sudo lines that install the new one.
• On Windows the binary that was running is moved aside as exe.exe.old, since Windows does not let a running program be replaced, and removed by the next update.

Related commands

An exe built from source

An exe built from a checkout has no version and is updated there: git pull && make build. Software Update says so, and still names the newest release.