Software & Updates not automatically checking

Support & Help Requests
1

A few months ago, I installed Ubuntu Mate 18.10 from a USB stick to my Lenovo laptop. All seemed to be working well. A month or so later, I installed Ubuntu Mate 18.10 from the same USB stick to my Mac Mini. After getting that working, I noticed that the two machines had different kernel versions: 4.18.0-17-generic on the Lenovo and 4.18.0-21-generic on the Mac mini. I checked "Software & Updates" on the Lenovo and it was set to check daily and display weekly. I have not had a single notification, though!

I googled and figured out how to do it manually, and did: sudo apt-get update, then: sudo apt-get upgrade, finally: sudo apt-get dist-upgrade. This took a while, but now I have the same kernel versions on both machines.

My question is, Why did I have NO notifications of updates available?

One thought I had: perhaps it likes to check at 2 in the morning, or something. I never have my computer on then. I could't find a "Check Now", button in the "Software & Updates" app.

Thanks

2

If this helps ...
System > Administration > Software Updater will update your system.

3

Under Start-up Applications, there is a start up item called "Update Notifier" that should be enabled. This is the Software Updater (as @pavlos_kairis points out) that appears minimised when there are pending updates to install.

You may want to double check if the Mac Mini was also set to automatically download & install the updates, which likely didn't show Software Updater.

4

"Update Notifier" is enabled in Start-up Apps on both machines. Both are set to automatically check and install security updates and notify weakly for other updates.

I ran the Software Updater on the mac, today. It found some security updates and some others.

The "Update Notifier" seems not to be running automatically on either machine.