Unattended Updates for Ubuntu 24.04 Server

Automated configuration for unattended upgrades on Ubuntu 24.04 Server.
Security patches, apt updates and weekly maintenance — fully automatic.

Set it once → it updates itself.

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Automatic Defaults

Setting	Enabled
Security & package upgrades	✔
Weekly unattended execution	✔ Sundays @ 04:00
Interactive prompts	❌ None — unattended mode

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Cron Job Location (Important)

This script does not create a user cron via crontab -e.

Instead, it deploys a root‑level update scheduler here:

/etc/cron.d/updatesystem

Meaning:

✔ runs as root
✔ independent of user accounts
✔ persistent across reboots
✔ zero interactive maintenance needed

Modify schedule:

sudo nano /etc/cron.d/updatesystem

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Optional Features (toggle inside script)

Feature	Default	Enable by uncommenting
Auto-remove unused packages	✘	Remove-Unused-Dependencies = true
Auto-reboot if required	✘	Automatic-Reboot = true
Reboot even with logged-in users	✘	Automatic-Reboot-WithUsers = true

Reference inside script:

# sed -i '/Remove-Unused-Dependencies/ s/^\/\/\s*//' "$config2"
# sed -i '/Automatic-Reboot/ s/^\/\/\s*//' "$config2"
# sed -i '/Automatic-Reboot-WithUsers/ s/^\/\/\s*//' "$config2"

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Install

git clone https://git.x-files.dk/server/auto-update-ubuntu.git
cd auto-update-ubuntu
sudo ./auto-update-ubuntu

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Verify Status

systemctl status unattended-upgrades
journalctl -u unattended-upgrades -f

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Logs

/var/log/unattended-upgrades/
/var/log/apt/history.log

Latest upgrade entries:

grep "Packages that were upgraded" /var/log/unattended-upgrades/unattended-upgrades.log

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Reboot Check

/var/run/reboot-required

Exists → reboot recommended (optional autoreboot available)

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More Information

More guides and documentation can be found on wiki.x-files.dk

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License

Licensed under the MIT License.

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