Today, Ctrl+Alt+Del in Windows brings up the Task Manager rather than rebooting a PC. Weird named processes run within with names like “svchost.exe“, “jusched.exe”, and “ctfmon.exe”. Today we’re going to speak about the jusched.exe process. Some process names will be immediately understandable such as, “iexplore.exe” if you are running an instance of Internet Explorer, but others look shady with weird names don’t they? Probably you’re thinking that jusched is one of them, right? It sounds like it may be something to do with scheduling, but what could the first part of the name “ju” mean?

Most legitimate processes and services running on your computer are given complex names however they do stand for some sort of abbreviation, or do have some meaning. Beware that malware authors and coders try to pass illegal apps as legitimate ones, and one of their favorite methods is to name the malware application exactly or very similar to the process which should be running on your computer. To a completely unbeknownst user, since most processes have weird names, it would be extremely difficult to understand which is which, or if a process is actually legitimate or not. One of the main indicators is that if you have more than one of the background processes of the same name running on your pc, then that could spell out malware. Background processes are processes which have no GUI (Graphical User Interface) to interact with, and are basically invisible unless you press the aforementioned Ctrl+Alt+Del to check what processes are running.

jusched.exe is simply the update scheduler for Sun Microsystem’s Java suite, in fact the name stands for Java Update SCHEDuler (Note the capital letters which compose the name of the process). It is basically a process which stands by most of the time, and every now and then checks for Java updates. If you use Java Runtime Environment (it is usually part of the package when you use browsers, since some websites sometimes use Java widgets and client-side code, it is suggested to keep it updated for security as well as for having the latest functionality. However this process wastes memory space, since it stays put, just for the occasion of an update, which normally doesn’t happen everyday. Now there is a way to make the process not start with windows every time, but it is advised to at least either open it manually every month to check for Java security and other important updates, if you opt to disable it completely. You can also allow it to load automatically once a month to check for updates. This way the rest of the 29 remaining days of the month, the process is not just sitting there eating up memory resources for no reason.

How to Disable Jusched.exe?

Even though Jusched.exe is set to run automatically by default, it is not required for Java to run. You can disable jusched.exe to free up some system resources.

Here is how to disable this process jusched:

1. Go to Start -> Control Panel
2. Double click on the Java icon
3. Go to Update tab in the window that pops up
4. Uncheck “Check for updates automatically”
5. From the message box that loads select either “monthly” or “never” according to what you have decided to do with the process.
6. Click on “Apply”
7. Close Windows and Restart System

What you can also do to set it up to run once a month automatically without you having to remind yourself to switch the feature on is, go to Start >> Control Panel and find Scheduled Tasks. Follow the wizard along to pick a month and date, usually the jusched.exe process is default set to check automatically on the 14th of every month. When you get to the “Start a Program” screen, use this as the path (adjusting the path if you are running a different version of Java). For example mine is:

“C:\Program Files\Java\jre1.6.0_07\bin\jucheck.exe”

To discover your actual path to jucheck.exe go to “C:\Program Files\Java\” and continue from there. There should be one folder named jre + something usually a version number (JRE stands for java runtime environment). Then go in the bin folder, and there you should find your jucheck.exe file. Copy the whole path and paste it in the Task Scheduler path. That’s all folks!