[SOLVED] Is Anyone Else Having Trouble Upgrading balena-etcher? - Part 2

[lhb1142]

I upgrade my computer(s) daily (using yay), generally the first thing in the morning here on the east coast of North America.

Normally this creates no problem. Genrally upgrading the systems(s) take less than five minutes (each computer).

But during the last week, the balena-etcher program has upgraded no less than four (4) times.

The problem I have with that is that this program takes much longer than any other program I have on my computer(s) to build and upgrade (it is contained within the AUR).

I understand that, in a rolling release, frequent updates and upgrades are part and parcel of the system but, really, are such frequent upgrades of this particular program absolutely necessary?

In other words, is there a reason that balena-etcher has to be upgraded so frequently?

If anyone knows that answer to that I’d be very interested in knowing the reason.

I hope that everyone reading this will take it as a legitimate question, not something meant to offend anyone.

Thank you.

Lawrence

[ramblinwreck]

The best place to look for the specifics of that program and the changes going on with it is the changelog of the program itself. It looks to be very actively updated (in my mind at least).

Changelog

Also, there is probably something like this build into yay that you could use to not update that specific program if you wanted.

[Tasia91]

You can also install etcher-bin instead, so it won’t have to be rebuild every time.

[montycantsin]

if you do not plan to die-hard install it, take the appimage instead. works straight out of the box.

i think it even does delta-updates by itself, so minimal upgrade time.

[dalto]

@lhb1142

In other words, is there a reason that balena-etcher has to be upgraded so frequently?

It actually has nothing to do with the rolling nature of Arch. It is just a choice made by Balena. They choose to do frequent small updates instead of less frequent large updates.

Since it is in AUR package and you are using yay, you should be getting an option that asks you if you want to exclude AUR packages, you could always just select the number for etcher when you do your updates.

Alternatively, don’t build it from source. As @Tasia91 has suggested, use the AUR package etcher-bin which will install much faster.

It is also available in other forms if you prefer. There is an AppImage and a flatpak.

[lhb1142]

@dalto

@lhb1142

In other words, is there a reason that balena-etche r has to be upgraded so frequently?

It actually has nothing to do with the rolling nature of Arch. It is just a choice made by Balena. They choose to do frequent small updates instead of less frequent large updates.

Since it is in AUR package and you are using yay, you should be getting an option that asks you if you want to exclude AUR packages, you could always just select the number for etcher when you do your updates.

Alternatively, don’t build it from source. As @Tasia91 has suggested, use the AUR package etcher-bin which will install much faster.

It is also available in other forms if you prefer. There is an AppImage and a flatpak.

Thank you dalto and Tasia91. I just installed etcher-bin. During the yay installation process, the (necessary) option to remove balena-etcher was offered (naturally I did remove it) and the whole process went smoothly.

I do have one further question: my former balena-etcher program also installed electron (currently 9.0.4-1). Should I keep that program? Is it necessary for the proper functioning of etcher-bin?.

Thank you both again for this answer to me question. And thanks to the others who have replied.

Lawrence

[dalto]

@lhb1142

Should I keep that program?

If it is orphaned, you can remove it. There are other electron apps so it is hard to say if you need it or not without more knowledge of your system.

You can see what depends on it with:

pactree -r electron

If that returns nothing, than nothing else needs it.

[2000]

For future use …

You can also ‘blacklist’ an application so that it doesn’t receive updates by pacman/yay; unless you force it manually.

sudo nano /etc/pacman.conf
Just add e. g. balena-etcher to IgnorePkg = .

The comma-separated applications will then be ignored during a system update. You could still force an update by installing manually (yay -S balena-etcher).

[Edit: Multiple applications are separated by spaces, not commas!]

---

I have my linux-lts in the IgnorePkg section, so I don’t accidentally overwrite my proven functioning fallback kernel. Once in a while I then manually update and check if the lts kernel still works.

[lhb1142]

@dalto

If it is orphaned, you can remove it. There are other electron apps so it is hard to say if you need it or not without more knowledge of your system.

You can see what depends on it with:

pactree -r electron

If that returns nothing, than nothing else needs it.

Dear dalto,

The only thing that shows is electron itself.

Am I correct in thinking that it can be removed safely (without affecting the functioning of the etcher-bin program itself?

Thank you for your reply and for all the help you are giving (and have given) to me.

Lawrence

[2000]

Yes, it should be safe to remove electron then.

[dalto]

@lhb1142

Am I correct in thinking that it can be removed safely (without affecting the functioning of the etcher-bin program itself?

Yes, you can remove it. etcher-bin probably has electron built into it instead of relying on the system electron.

[lhb1142]

@2000

Yes, it should be safe to remove electron then.

Thank you. I am going to remove it.

Lawrence

[lhb1142]

@2000

For future use …

You can also ‘blacklist’ an application so that it doesn’t receive updates by pacman/yay; unless you force it manually.

sudo nano /etc/pacman.conf
Just add e. g. balena-etcher to I gnorePkg = .

The comma-separated applications will then be ignored during a system update. You could still force an update by installing manually ( yay -S balena-etcher ).

Thank you for this information about which I was unaware.

Lawrence

[lhb1142]

@dalto

@lhb1142

Am I correct in thinking that it can be removed safely (without affecting the functioning of the etcher-bin program itself?

Yes, you can remove it. etcher-bin probably has electron built into it instead of relying on the system electron.

Thank you. I will indeed remove it. If the new etcher-bin program does not function correctly, I could always add it back.

Lawrence

[freebird54]

@2000

The comma-separated applications will then be ignored during a system update. You could still force an update by installing manually ( yay -S balena-etcher ).

Umm - doesn’t work that way on my system Spaces are all that is needed to separate package names.

(I wouldn’t be so fussy, but my computer is wearing me down…)

[2000]

@freebird54

Spaces are all that is needed to separate package names

Absolutely right, sorry! The packages are just separated by spaces.

[freebird54]

No need for sorrow, or sorry for that matter. Just don’t be wondering why it doesn’t ignore the ones after commas! (Of course, if spaces are included along with commas, it might work!). One of those things you learn from watching someone/thing that knows how making entries - in my case it was downgrade I must keep audacious GTK so I can use it…

[ricklinux]

I just installed etcher-bin fresh on plasma and yes it does take a little time for it to build and then install. It wasn’t that long for me on this system but i understand it could be a little slower on some systems.

[lhb1142]

The etcher-bin program takes nowhere nearly as long to install as did balena-etcher. I have removed both balena-etcher (AUR) and electron (Community) from three of my computers (so far) and replaced them with etcher-bin.

The etcher-bin program still shows in Applications/Accessories and, when I start it, it appears to set up exactly as did the balena-etcher.

I haven’t yet had a need to actually use the program but I am confident that it will exactly the same as before.

I just hope that there aren’t as many annoying (and lengthy in time) upgrades as there were before. Four upgrades in less than one week is just too many in my opinion.

Again I wish to thank everyone who has given me information and answers to my question(s). I can only say again that, in my opinion, this is the very best Linux forum there is!

Lawrence

[Tasia91]

@lhb1142

The etcher-bin program still shows in Applications/Accessories and, when I start it, it appears to set up exactly as did the balena-etcher .

It should be exactly the same app, it’s just pre-compiled
Imo, there’s really no reason to build it yourself from source unless you want to customize it, or get the latest changes as quickly as possible or you just have no other choice.