Warning when updating mkinitcpio 29-1

You will; after you handle a few pacnew files, you’ll be a pro at it.

Compare the differences between the pacnew and the original file; merge any changes that you have specifically made in the old file into the new (sometimes it’s simpler/easier to merge the other way, too - and sometimes you can simply replace/overwrite the old file with the new one). You can use various tools to compare the files; meld is a popular one.

A lot of times, I tend to compare the files, then manually make the edits.

Note that there are a few files that you should always leave alone unless there are specific instructions to merge with a pacnew. These files include:

passwd
shadow
gshadow
group

(and probably a couple more that I can’t think of offhand)

The pacnews for the above files will basically just be empty defaults; the ones on your computer have your user and password information, so you never want to overwrite them. Unless specifically instructed (via the Arch news page) to do otherwise, the best action for these pacnew files is to simply delete them.

You can always ask about any pacnew files that you get here on the forum. Also, see @BONK’s post above. But after a while, you’ll get used to them.

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