Anyone who uses Microsoft Windows is probably familiar with this annoyance. The little yellow shield in the systray pops up the old familiar “Updates are ready” tooltip… you give the system the go-ahead to install… and next thing you know you’re getting a visit from the Restart Nag Fairy.

Updating your computer is almost complete. You must restart your computer for the updates to take effect.

Do you want to restart your computer now?

You’re in the middle of stuff, so you hit Restart Later. As you do, you mutter to yourself for the thousandth time, “Why isn’t there a ‘Do not remind me again’ checkbox?” Because five minutes later, up pops the nagging dialogue box, symptomatic of the paternalistic MS Windows mindset.

“Oh noes! The smarts, you might not has them! Helping kitteh is helping!”

If you have the Pro version of Windows XP, here’s what you do.

Enter the Group Policy Editor.

1. Click the START button.
2. Click “Run.”
3. Type “gpedit.msc” and hit Enter.

Once in there, navigate to…

• Local Computer Policy
• Computer Configuration
• Administrative Templates
• Windows Components
• Windows Update

Here you’ll find the setting Re-prompt for restart with scheduled installations. This will be equal to the number of minutes until nemesis pops up and reminds you again. You can set it as high as 1440, so that you only get reminded once every 24 hours.

You can also enable No auto-restart for scheduled Automatic Updates installations. If your computer has been restarting itself without a by-your-leave from you, this’ll put a stop to it.

(Thanks to Coding Horror and Lifehacker for this tip. Oddly, the Windows Annoyances website was silent on this issue.)