It does require a bit of programmatic comprehension to get things rolling, but it's a far more simple a process than installing bog-standard Windows on bare-metal x64 machinery.
As far as maintenance:
I often go multiple weeks between my updates . . . I last checked my Dashboard about a month ago; and, just now . . . everything is currently 'latest'.
My rPI 4b is sitting-atop my Synology 920+ in my network cabinet, and I rarely know it exists.
The only unfortunate aspect of all this, is that I occasionally have to remove it from Production to use flashrom on the 4b to up sproms, in multiple devices. I really should have purchased multiples back when they were readily-available, and reasonably priced