[arch] Option to remove unnecessary dependencies

[gobonja]

New 0.9.0 version is great, expecially arch repository support!

Is it possible to add pacman option for remove unnecessary dependencies when removing packages?

pacman -R [-s, --recursive]

This is currently only thing that keeps me from replacing pamac with bauh.

Thanks in advance

[vinifmor]

@gobonja do you mean an option to remove all unnecessary packages from the system ? The "uninstall" action was re-implemented for Arch packages in 0.9.0 and supports transitive dependencies exclusion.

[gobonja]

Installing e.g. xed also installs xed's dependencies (gspell, gtksourceview3, libpeas, xapps)
When bauh is removing packages, it uses command:
sudo -S pacman -R xed --noconfirm
which results in removing only xed
If you provide option to append -s or --recursive to pacman it will also remove xed's dependencies since they are not needed anymore.
sudo -S pacman -Rs xed --noconfirm or sudo -S pacman -R --recursive xed --noconfirm

sudo pacman -R xed
checking dependencies...

Packages (1) xed-2.4.1-1

Total Removed Size:  11,82 MiB

:: Do you want to remove these packages? [Y/n]

sudo pacman -Rs xed 
checking dependencies...
:: gtkd optionally requires gtksourceview3
:: gtkd optionally requires libpeas

Packages (5) gspell-1.8.3-1  gtksourceview3-3.24.11-1  libpeas-1.26.0-1  xapps-1.6.10-1  xed-2.4.1-1

Total Removed Size:  21,61 MiB

:: Do you want to remove these packages? [Y/n]

This of course shoudn't be default behavior but giving user option would be great.

[vinifmor]

In this latest version bauh removes all required, so the command would look like: pacman -R xed xapps gspell etc... --noconfirm. The optional required are ignored for the moment. But sure, it is a good add. I'm going to add this feature to the backlog log.

Cheers.

[vinifmor]

Added a behavior to uninstall that for related unneeded packages. You can try by installing bauh-staging (0.9.1.RC-1) from AUR. Let me know if it's working on your end.

The final release (0.9.1) should be available in the next days.

[gobonja]

It doesn't seems to be working correctly (e.g. tilix and xed)
tilix -> gtkd, liblphobos - not removed
xed -> gspell, gtksourceview3, libpeas, xapps - not removed

I like your approach with keep and uninstall buttons.
However, clicking close button doesn't cancel operation so it's little confusing.
Also adding cancel next to the keep and uninstall would be great from user perspective.

[gobonja]

I don't know how are you getting list of dependencies to be removed, but you can get list without version number by running:
pacman -Rs --print-format=%n xed

Parameter --print-format implies --print so it will only print the targets instead of performing the actual operation (sync, remove or upgrade).

[vinifmor]

The close button would be "X" ?

I'm going to review those cases you mentioned. Thanks for the tip regarding the pacman simulation command

[gobonja]

Yes, it is X button.

[vinifmor]

@gobonja , I've fixed the behavior. Please, try the new RC from bauh-staging and let me know if it works on your end.

[gobonja]

It appears that there are still some issues.
Few examples:
removing tilix -> leaves liblphobos
removing deepin-screenshot -> leaves: libqtxdg, dtkwidget, deepin-qt-dbus-factory, dtkcore, gsettings-qt, deepin-qt5dxcb-plugin

[vinifmor]

could you check if these dependencies are not required by other packages ?

[gobonja]

Yes, I checked. Those packages are removed when running run:
sudo pacman -Rs deepin-screenshot

Also I noticed that packages are installed with:
sudo -S pacman -S libqtxdg deepin-qt5integration deepin-qt-dbus-factory deepin-qt5dxcb-plugin dtkwidget deepin-turbo dtkwm dtkcore gsettings-qt deepin-screenshot --noconfirm

Doing so marks packages:
Install Reason : Explicitly installed

Which means that running:
sudo pacman -Rs --print-format=%n package_name
won't list that packages.

Installing dependency with --asdeps will mark them as:
Install Reason : Installed as a dependency for another package

[vinifmor]

Indeed... but there is a reason for that. There are some packages that have malformed pkgbuilds and put some mutual dependent packages... for such cases if a install command is executed before with all dependencies, the wished package ends up being installed as a dependency of a dependency.If you use pacman's interactive mode, it sorts this out. But this subject could be another thread :). I'm going to review these cases you have mentioned.

[vinifmor]

@gobonja , it seems fixed now. I've published a new RC to bauh-staging (RC-4).

First bauh will ask the user to select the main dependencies not required by the package:

After the wanted are selected, bauh will check their dependencies trees and displays everything that will be removed:

Let me know if its working now. Thank you for helping me to test this feature.

[gobonja]

Works like a charm!

Thank you for listening to the users and implementing this feature.

[vinifmor]

No worries. The final release (0.9.1) is already available. I'm going to close this issue.

Cheers