Why does PackerInstall keep deleting things?

[GideonWolfe]

So I'm trying to put together my lua neovim configuration, and I'm adding some plugins to help my workflow.

The issue is, I'll be using some plugin for a while without issue, and then when I try to add a completely unrelated plugin and run :PackerInstall, I'm prompted like this

The only thing I added to my Packer config was galaxyline.nvim, and it's not even close to that location in the file. I certainly don't want to remove friendly-snippets.

It won't proceed without agreement, and the last time I accepted it, my perfectly working compe + luasnips configuration starts throwing errors. It's kind of like 2 steps forward, one step back.

[wbthomason]

packer should only request to delete a plugin if it's not in your currently loaded plugin specification. It should also allow you to proceed in the install even if you reply "N" to the cleaning prompt. Usually when an unexpected deletion prompt happens, it's because of Lua module caching - the cached version of your plugin specification module doesn't include the plugin packer is asking to delete.

Can you reproduce the issue consistently, across a restart of Neovim? As well, when you say "it won't proceed without agreement" - what specifically happens when you reply to the prompt with "N"?

[GideonWolfe]

On this particular occasion I said yes and it then just brought up a window saying it installed successfully... So I guess that's good? Just a bit confusing haha

[wbthomason]

So, whether you said yes or no to the cleaning, the install should still have proceeded. The question is more why packer tried to clean a plugin you wanted installed - like I suggested in my earlier response, this is usually due to running an operation with a cached plugin specification module.