Somewhere in my memory banks I recall someone said we should should not git clone, but I cannot why remember why not. Can someone please explain the difference and what is the rationale for simply downloading the package with yay or paru as opposed to git clone?
The only time I have used git clone in the past is when only .git comes up in the search results in the AUR, and then I only use makepkg -sic to avoid having to clean up stray directories afterwards.
Now I am on a fresh Cassini installation and don’t want the directories to get so messy.
First of all git clone is how you copy a git repo. I don’t think it is related to your question.
I think you are comparing the process of manually building an AUR package with makepkg as opposed to using an AUR helper like yay or paru.
You can do either, however, AUR helpers do some important things for you like diffing build files between versions and automatically checking to make sure everything is up to date.
But does a cloned package get updated each time the git is updated with some developer’s version rather than the stable package?
This a clean Cassini installation, and I want to know to do housecleaning to make sure the directories don’t get messy with directories and files that I won’t need.
Would you recommend creating a git directory under the home and I continue with the makepkg -sic or do I need to keep them? I guess it’s my awkward way of asking for a 101 deep dive tutorial on package management.
You aren’t cloning a package, you are cloning the files used to build the package and then manually building the package with makepkg. So, no, the package won’t get updated unless you update it manually or use an AUR helper to update it in the future.(However, if you are going to update it with an AUR helper, you might as well install it with the AUR helper)
I guess it is the premise I don’t understand. Why do you think using yay or paru is more “messy” than manually downloading and building a package?
No, I would recommend using an AUR helper along with all the benefits and automation that brings. Remembering to manually check if the package needs to be updated, downloading the files again, manually diffing the files to see the changes and then manually running makepkg and then removing all the files when you are done seems like a lot of work with no obvious benefit.