• 9 Posts
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Joined 5 years ago
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Cake day: January 21st, 2021

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  • IF no dependency tries to update too. Off course in that case I would stop. Without pacman -Sy, I never do that anyway, only -Syu.

    That’s all you need to know. As long as you always use pacman -Syu you will be fine. pacman -Sy is the real problem. The wiki page is pretty clear about the sequences of commands that are problematic https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/System_maintenance#Partial_upgrades_are_unsupported.

    Right? What i don’t understand is, when I uninstall with pacman -Rs firefox, delete the cached firefox package (only that file), then the system is in the same state as before I installed it. Then -S firefox should be okay, right? And it even looks up the new version.

    This isn’t correct. It won’t look up the new version. Assuming that the system was in a consistent state it will download the exact same package that you deleted. The system only ever “updates” when you run pacman -Sy. Until you use -y all packages are effectively pinned at a specific version. If the version that gets installed is different than the one you removed it probably means that you were breaking the partial update rule previously.


  • But that is my point. Just running pacman -S firefox is fine as long as you didn’t run pacman -Sy at some point earlier. It won’t update anything, even dependencies. It will just install the version that matches your current package list and system including the right version of any dependencies if they aren’t already installed.

    But that means if you already have Firefox installed it will do nothing.


  • I think you are a little confused at the problem here. The issue is that partial updates are not supported. The reason for this is very simple, Arch ensures that any given package list works on its own, but not that packages from different versions of the package list work together. So if Firefox depends on libssl the new Firefox package may depend on a new libssl function. If you install that version of Firefox without updating libssl it will cause problems.

    There is no way around this limitation. If you install that new Firefox without he new libssl you will have problems. No matter how you try to rules lawyer it. Now 99% of the time this works. Typically packages don’t depend on new library functions right away. But sometimes they do, and that is why as a rule this is unsupported. You are welcome to try it, but if it breaks don’t complain to the devs, they never promised it would work. But this isn’t some policy where you can find a loophole. It is a technical limitation. If you manage to find a loophole people aren’t going to say “oh, that should work, let’s fix it” it will break and you will be on your own to fix it.

    Focusing on your commands. The thing is that pacman -S firefox is always fine on its own. If Firefox is already installed it will do nothing, if it isn’t it will install the version from the current package list. Both of those operations are supported. Also pacman -Rs firefox && pacman -S firefox is really no different than just pacman -S firefox (other than potentially causing problems if the package can’t be allowed to be removed due to dependencies). So your command isn’t accomplishing anything even if it did somehow magically work around the rules.

    What is really the problem is pacman -Sy. This command updates the package list without actually updating any packages. This will enter you system into a precarious state where any new package installed or updated (example our pacman -S firefox command form earlier) will be a version that is mismatched with the rest of your system. This is unsupported and will occasionally cause problems. Generally speaking you shouldn’t run pacman -Sy, any time you are using -Sy you should also be passing -u. This ensures that the package list and your installed packages are updated together.


  • Yeah, it is very important to consider how dependant you are on third parties. At the very least the more dependence the more power they have over you. But also how screwed you are if they just go under.

    • If you use SaaS they can interrupt your use at any time and you can only react (for example demanding a reversal or lawsuits).
    • If you host closed source software they can’t interrupt service on an existing contract but can legally require you to stop using it if they don’t renew the contract. (And if the company goes under you can likely get away with using the software as long as it doesn’t need code fixes.)
    • If the software is open source you can continue using the software indefinitely including making code fixes. (Maintenance may be expensive as it is now your problem but that can be costed and an exit plan made if required.)




  • Off topic. But I can’t help but rate the trash cans.

    • 1995: Excellent can. Obviously not that many pixels to work with but it is clear, legible and clean.
    • 1998: I mean its fine, but a bit of a downgrade. Why so much black? Especially that top rim that apparently was painted black. The shading on the arrows also just hurts legibility, why do 2D arrows have shading anyways?
    • 2000: Nope. The only good thing about it is that it is throwing away Windows. The shading is to simple arrows are strange colours and lacks a sense of depth.
    • 2001: I don’t love the theme but the execution is great. It looks clean shiny and bright. The only real weird thing is the bag inside, it is a bit strangely round despite seemingly not going over the edge.
    • 2006: This is a nice refinement of the last one. Cleaner look, skip the bag, more realistic trash. This is the second best executed after 1995.
    • 2015: This one is bland and lacks contrast and detail. The arrows are also oddly stubby for some reason. It’s not bad, but also not good.





  • No, I don’t mean a law. I don’t even know how you would make this a law. You can already legally just walk away. Maybe you can have a law that the “no tip” option on card machines must be at least as easy as the tip option or something.

    There is no such thing as “everyone”, but you only need a tipping point. Maybe 1/3 of people or similar. You just need enough awareness so that it isn’t considered incredibly rude or outrageous, that most retail workers will understand what is happening and the businesses will see it coming. It definitely wouldn’t be easy, that is why I would put the target date far in advance (maybe next January is actually too close). So that cultural knowledge could slowly be built and enough people to make a difference would switch at the same time.


  • IMHO if we want to get rid of tips the way to go about it is to pick a date (for example January 1st 2026) then agree to stop tipping on that date. Hard and fast stop doing it. Stores can raise their prices to compensate.

    The problem is that it is very hard to make this change incrementally. Because individuals are considered assholes if they don’t tip enough. So we all sort of got to get together and agree to it. Of course it will be hard to publicize this because big media companies are all owned by the rich that benefit by paying minimum wage workers less with the excuse that they can get tips.