Thanks for this advice, and ordinarily, I do follow this.
It’s just by chance that it happened - first because I needed to install a system library (I think it was cmake) to run something in R, which I was in the middle of working on, and then another time when I tried some browsers that I hadn’t come across before that were mentioned in a thread on these boards.
The installation for for R-related triggered a reboot, so I put that off until I had finished work, so that was fine.
Installing the browsers caught me off-guard and only came across the need for a full system update (and reboot) because I ran sudo pacman -Syu to sync the systems before using yay -S <browsers>
However, it’s when doing these kinds of things that I was referring to in terms of holding back upgraded packages that require closing all my work down and rebooting. In the past, on another, my system would run for days or weeks before I’d reboot, so it is just getting used to a different way of doing things.
But, on the basis of advice here, it seems that a prudent strategy would be just to leave things alone, and once I’ve settled into a routine then update when I’m about to close down for the day/ week, as others have suggested.
Thanks for taking the trouble to reply and walk me through the process. Much appreciated
The recommended way of installing a package on Arch, even a single package, is do it on a fully updated system because partial upgrades are unsupported.
So; sudo pacman -Syu <pkg>
This will --sync, --refresh your pacman databases, --upgrade your already installed packages and will install <pkg>.
If in this process there is any package that needs rebooting when upgraded or installed, you will be prompted.
I remembered that I had seen this thread on this forum. There is a post with an script which checks if there is any packages that require rebooting if upgraded and informs you if such is the case.
If you are in the middle of some important work that cannot be interrupted for a reboot and feel a sudden urge to upgrade and/or install a package, run that script before to know what will be coming for not getting surprised by a nasty reboot prompt
The recommended way of installing a package on Arch, even a single package, is do it on a fully updated system
I’ve been adhering to that practice. However, what I have done if installing something from the AURs, then I sync with pacman first sudo pacman -Syu and then once that’s finished, I install the AUR-based package I had wanted as per yay -S <[ackage>
I was under the impression this was the correct/ canonical approach, but I’m still learning so am way open for advice.
Partial or no update on an Arch or Arch based system is inviting troubles. If you need a more stable (less updates) system, maybe Debian stable or OpenSuse Leap is a better option.
Thanks chroot - I knew this coming into Arch/ EOS land. I’m not doing partial/ incomplete updates and am not concerned about the updates - it is the rebooting that my query concerned.
In any event, once I’m settled into the packages I want to be installed and am past testing things out, then I will get into the routine of once weekly updates (and reboots) as others here have suggested.
That is what I end up doing. Not a daily update. This does have a downside though any urgent and important security fixes or zero day exploit fixes will not be installed. Also it would be fantastic to have the ability to do a partial upgrade. But it is not supported in Arch.
@dalto updating twice a month? Is that even doable in a rolling distro like Arch and its derivatives like EOS?
I’m using Arch-Update app to get notified about pending updates. Also it informs me of a pending restart after updating. You can change the intervall of checking for updates. Normally I install updates as soon as I’m notified that there are pending ones. Also I restart my system as soon as needed. Feels good so far.
Because I’m using Chaotic-AUR I install all packages via yay -S. So it will be installed from Arch repo, Chaotic-AUR or AUR.
Back to topic: As soon as there is a new kernel available in the Arch repos (not testing) I have to install it … Having LTS kernel installed as backup if a new kernel update goes wrong.
Thanks @cactux. Will try out arch-audit. Does it have a GUI or a notification panel which can be used? So to check only the first time a user logs into the system in a day?
I was under the impression that if updates are done more than a week apart then it might lead to the system getting bricked or mucked up. I did not know that it could be avoided for a month or for a fortnight. Thanks. Do you update it monthly or fortnightly or bimonthly?
Risk of breakage is small but a lot of manual intervention will be required, especially when some packages were replaced by others or deprecated and merged with others.
Manual intervention is required here and there with an Arch system anyway.
If going months at a time between updates caused me any headaches or was complicated, I would stop doing it. But I’ve been skipping updates for some laptops (out of sheer laziness) for several months at a time for years now. No problems, and practically no manual intervention ever needed (other than things mentioned on the Arch News page, which would have been required even if I updated daily).
Now, the VM that went 3 years without updates mentioned in my post above - that one required some manual intervention. But, c’mon - it was 3 years. And really, it took very little effort to get it fully updated. If I had not forgotten to reinstall GRUB the update would have been completely painless.
But are you actively using these machines on a regular basis as production systems?
It seems no from what I read.
Alright, you proved a point that a system can go without updates for a long time and when updating, with little or no manual intervention, they come back up and running.
But is postponing updates for such a prolonged period of time for production machine used on a daily or regular basis a viable update strategy?
I would say no. Updates bring many bug and security fixes to many crucial part of your system,. kernels, bootloader, firmware, browsers, mail client and practically to each and every package we have installed on our system that may have a vulnerability that can be exploited and that can be fixed by updates.
The question of breakage is irrelevant in this context.
You may say that frequent updates, on a daily basis or several times a day, on a production machine will increase the risk for breakage because you may get hit by a bug or a regression or the like. True, but for production systems used regularly, every 7, 10, or 15 day is a good update frequence. Eager several-time-a-day updaters like myself will have by then bite the bugs for the rest to get the cure in time for their systems
No, as mentioned previously, I don’t use laptops much these days. However, they do not experience breakage, and I specifically was replying to this comment:
And I added:
For my 2 regular, daily use tower PCs I update once a week, occasionally a bit sooner, occasionally every 2 weeks. But I would personally have no worries about going much longer, unless there was a serious exploit discovered that required a patch. Those who are more paranoid about such things may feel differently.
. And really, it took very little effort to get it fully updated. If I had not forgotten to reinstall GRUB the update would have been completely painless.