1. Apparatus for managing a software component update on a computer system with a memory in response to an update request, the apparatus comprising: a component manager that receives the request, and has a parser that extracts from the request URL information which identifies the location of a file containing the software component resources for satisfying the request; a download manager that receives the URL information from the component manager and has a file retriever which asynchronously retrieves the file from the specified location, places the file in a staging area in the memory and notifies the component manager; and an install manager that is instructed by the component manager to asynchronously install the file in the staging area.