Open the Mac App Store Updates Section from a URL

The next time you’re trying to tell someone how to update apps from the Mac App Store, why bother with a walkthrough when you can just send them a URL? Yup, you can send someone directly to the Mac App Store’s “Updates” portion just by using a link instead. This is a great trick for troubleshooting and for helping people to update their apps, and it works like any other link structure.

Try it out yourself, if you click here to launch the Mac App Store’s Updates or use the URL below, the Mac App Store application will launch and go directly to the “Updates” tab.

The URL for launching the App Store Updates section in OS X is as follows:

macappstore://showUpdatesPage

You can use that link in web pages, tweets, instant messages, and emails, as long as the recipient has the Mac App Store installed the URL will immediately launch the App Store and go directly to the Updates section (no, it won’t actually update anything without user input).

Not only is this helpful when fielding those family tech support phone calls and emails, but it’s really useful for developers too, and in fact it has a pretty cool story behind it. It turns out, that aforementioned MAS Updates URL is a result of Panic Software wishing to be able to provide their users with an ability to quickly update apps with a click:

This is where I tell you something amazing: I filed a bug with Apple and made this specific feature request, even proposing the URL format, and Apple added it to the App Store a couple versions later. The system worked!

How neat is that? This works in all modern versions of Mac OS X too.

There are a variety of other URL structures to launch apps and perform functions in Mac OS X too, including send messages, open specific apps, and more.