Hi folks.
TLDR:
Removed bunch of system critical packages,
broke everything,
reinstalled most of them - didn’t help,
only working solution is removal of vendor gpu drivers.
Is there a way out without complete reinstall?
Do I even need vendor drivers if I’m not gaming?
Full story at the bottom of the list if anyone interested.
Here is the list of what got caught in the crossfire:
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] transaction started
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed kimageformats (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed xorg-server (1.20.10-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed imwheel (1.0.0pre12-5)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed lmms (1.2.2-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed xf86-input-libinput (0.30.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed phototonic (2.1-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-imageformats (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed manjaro-xfce-minimal-settings (20200811-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:07+0000] [ALPM] removed qtqr (2.0-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM-SCRIPTLET] 0%...10%...20%...30%...40%...50%...60%...70%...80%...90%...100%
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed virtualbox-ext-vnc (6.1.16-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed virtualbox (6.1.16-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qpdfview (0.4.18-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed deepin-picker (5.0.9-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed stacer (1.1.0-1.2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-charts (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed krita-plugin-gmic (2.9.4-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed udisks2-qt5 (5.0.5-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed krita (4.4.1-7)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kitemviews (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kcrash (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kcompletion (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kwidgetsaddons (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kconfig (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kguiaddons (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5ct (1.1-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed quazip (1.1-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed gio-qt (0.0.9-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kvantum-theme-matcha (20190810-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-translations (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-styleplugins (5.0.0.20170311-25)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed manjaro-settings-manager-notifier (0.5.6-10)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed manjaro-settings-manager (0.5.6-10)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kauth (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed polkit-qt5 (0.113.0-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kitemmodels (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed libchamplain (0.12.20-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed clutter-gtk (1.8.4-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed clutter (1.26.4-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed poppler-qt5 (20.12.1-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed manjaro-pulse (20200126-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed pulseaudio-equalizer (14.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed meson (0.56.0-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed ninja (1.10.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed deepin-qt5integration (5.1.5-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed deepin-qt5platform-plugins (5.0.19-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kwayland (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-wayland (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed dtkwidget (5.4.1-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed dtkgui (5.4.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed dtkcore (1:5.4.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed gsettings-qt (0.1.20170110-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed deepin-qt-dbus-factory (5.3.0.20-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kcoreaddons (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed ki18n (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed vlc (3.0.11.1-6)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed software-center-web-jak (1.0.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed python-jade-application-kit (3.5.6-3)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed python-pyqtwebengine (5.15.2-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed python-pyqt5 (5.15.2-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed libqtxdg (3.6.0-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kvantum-theme-matchama (20191118-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kvantum-qt5 (0.17.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kwindowsystem (5.77.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-svg (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-multimedia (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-x11extras (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-webengine (5.15.2-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-webchannel (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-location (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed pyside2 (5.15.2-2)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-declarative (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed higan (110-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed kseexpr (4.0.1.0-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed qt5-base (5.15.2-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] removed libinput-multiplier (1.16.4-1)
[2021-01-06T07:42:08+0000] [ALPM] transaction completed
I totally broke my system by being an absolute idiot…
So I was having problems with slow scroll speed in chromium. XFCE doesn’t have a native solution for mouse scroll so I looked it up.
People fixed same issue by installing some package (don’t remember the name now) which suppose to help - and it didn’t. So I decided to delete it straight away.
For some reason it drag a whole bunch of dependencies with him - can someone please explain how does it work? Why does a single package takes a whole lot of system critical dependencies with him on removal?
Obviously, it warned me - I will take a lot of stuff with me, are you sure?
I scrolled through the list, and because I’m an ignorant bastard I didn’t spot anything system critical over there and gave it a green light. While everything was getting deleted, I’m thinking to myself - hmm, it’s probably a good idea to do a system backup before removing so many packages that I have no clue of.
Too late. After restart during booting sequence light display manager failed to boot. I TTY out of there and reinstalled it. Next booting sequence went fine, I thought. But at the end there was a weird black screen with a few white and green pixels at the very top of the screen (like one of the booting sequence lines got dismembered in to pixel row somehow and teleported to the very edge of the screen).
I couldn’t even TTY out of there so I had to chroot myself out of this mess. God dang!
After searching through forums I learned about xorg, so I reinstalled it with all the dependencies - no joy.
The next thing what I did - I found pacman log, and reinstalled most of the removed packages back, leaving out only ones that I thought are not critical.
That didn’t help - maybe I missed some crucial packages?
The only thing that “helped” is removal of vendor gpu drivers, like linux-vesa etc.
Is there an easy way to learn about which package is required for system to work and which could be safely removed? Because the hard way suck. Sure I know about lightdm and xorg now, and have vague suspicion that qt5 is doing something important as well - but I would really like to know what’s going on under the hood.
As you guessed, I’m quite fresh in the linux world - I made a complete switch last March (no dual boot shenanigans) and I absolutely love the freedom and security it provides. And there is something brilliant and elegant in the way how everything works.
But with great freedom comes great amount of unknown packages. How do I learn about the important ones without breaking my system? How do I know which ones are harmful? People always say - don’t install unknown packages - but what if I need their functionality?
Thank you very much for your time.
