Microsoft AutoUpdate Not Working?

Anonymous
2021-03-18T10:48:49+00:00

Over the past few days, I kept receiving the notification from Word that it needs updating, however, when I go to update it, I get the message

'Update error...Updates are temporarily unavailable, please try again in a few minutes.

Shortly after, this is followed by another pop-up that states 'There was a problem with the Microsoft Update Assistant and your recent work might be lost. We apologise for the inconvenience.' 

It gives me the option to restart the update assistant, which I have done a number of times, however, I just get exactly the same problem over and over again. Is there anything I can do to fix this?

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Anonymous
2021-03-20T00:29:39+00:00

Did you use a tool like CleanMyMac the remove "universal Binaries"?

I had that a couple of days ago, downloading and re-install it from the Microsoft AutoUpdate Release history page: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/officeupdates/release-history-microsoft-autoupdate

Good luck!

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  1. Anonymous
    2021-05-28T04:10:32+00:00

    If you are seeing the Update Error (updates are temporarily unavailable) message in Microsoft AutoUpdate in Mac OS on MAU v4.35.21051700, please try executing the below commands in a terminal and check. This solution was shared by Microsoft support (Thank you Keno) and it worked for me.

    launchctl stop /Library/LaunchAgents/com.microsoft.update.agent.plist

    launchctl unload -w /Library/LaunchAgents/com.microsoft.update.agent.plist

    launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchAgents/com.microsoft.update.agent.plist

    You may see errors for some of the commands, especially the unload cmd, but thats fine.

    After executing all the commands above open Microsoft AutoUpdate and click retry. Try clicking retry a few times, if it doesn't work the first time.

    Hope this helps.

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  2. Anonymous
    2021-03-25T11:33:33+00:00

    Yes, your first reply was useful, but CleanMyMac appears to have nothing to do with it.

    I have also seen the same problem in the last couple of days and fixed it by re-installing the package from the URL you supplied (thank you):

    https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/officeupdates/release-history-microsoft-autoupdate

    I've never run CleanMyMac and I'm sure nothing had touched my auto-update Mac app so I think it's safe to conclude that it somehow manages to break all by itself and then gives a badly misleading error message. My guess is that re-installing is more than is really necessary, but in this case the  installer is small and fast so that's a fine solution.

    There's good reason to suppose that the real problem is a bug introduced by Microsoft so let's hope they fix it soon or, if they can't figure it out, put in better handling of the error that AutoUpdate detected - really we shouldn't even notice when it happens.

    Cheers

    Greg

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  3. Anonymous
    2021-05-22T00:50:24+00:00

    Same issue, re-installed AutoUpdate and a fresh install of 4.35 (also tried earlier versions). 

    Same issue with AutoUpdated saying "Updates are temporarily unavailable .."

    😒

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  4. Anonymous
    2021-03-25T10:52:08+00:00

    Hello Josh,

    No, i don't use a cleaning tool.  

    I downloaded and installed the latest MAU and it works again.

    Thanks for the tip !

    best regards,

    Hans

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