Manjaro System repair / integrity check?

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1

Hi,

Is it possible to run a full system repair or integrity check on Manjaro?

Because it’s a rolling release and because I never had unsolvable issues with Manjaro my system has been rolling for almost a decade now.

I was wondering if it’s possible to perform some sort of integrity check of system files or system repair in Manjaro?

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Hi @whatthe,

Please see:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Alpm_based_tools#Tools

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Use fsck to check your filesystems for consistency. And, what @Mirdarthos said!

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I was thinking about reinstalling every package with:
sudo pacman -Qq | pacman -Syu -

is this a good idea?

5

That is most likely a waste of time and bandwidth as your system would contain exactly that.

In my opinion - no.

What could be an idea, is to schedule - at regular intervals - a copy of your package list and personal configuration - just as a precautionary measure - just an example [root tip] [Utililty Script] Backup configuration and package list and if you want to make sure no systemfiles has been altered outside package sync you could look towards these pages

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sudo pacman -Dkk

will check all files for consistency and print out the result.

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Why? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it…

If you did a check for filesystem errors, using pacutils from the link I gave you above, then there is also pacrepairfile:

pacrepairfile
Repair file properties based on pacman’s database.

find /usr/share | pacrepairfile --uid --gid

But…do you think you have reason to be worried? Or are you just itching to “fix” something that’s working perfectly?

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yeah well, I just wanted to be sure the system is still fine.

I noticed yesterday too late that my root partition was full, that’s why my updates kept failing. I cleared up space by removing a backup from the root partition.
Now I just want to be sure that nothing in my root partition was corrupted or deleted while there was no space left in the root partition.

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I dont think so.
Maybe you mean.

pacman -Dk

$ man pacman

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My bad, i was under the impression that it also performs the other check. But looking closely by the wording you may be right.

edit: i was totally confused. The correct command forchecking file consistency is:

sudo pacman -Qkk

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-Dkk will perform on the repos, what is available, not what you have.

Something more like what OP is asking for might be

pacman -Qkk | grep -v '0 altered files'

Though I fear what this will mean for people looking at the output.
Its likely there willl be ‘modified’ files or ‘mismatched time’ etc that is ignorable.

:+1: Well, the single Dk

pacman -Dk

will report big goofs like missing dependencies… though that will likely only happen if someone did -Rdd manually.

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The TLDR; version:

  • Install pacutils:
pamac install pacutils
  • check everything:
sudo paccheck --quiet

If any errors:

sudo find /usr/share | pacrepairfile --uid --gid

Or that’s what I think, anyway. I might be completely wrong, though…

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much better than pacman -Qkk since it is so verbose it’s hard to get any signal from the noise

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If you think in terms of sfc or dism on Windows, then no. It is not an fixed state os image. It’s more fluid. Best guess is just rerun the upgrade.

The problem with such a check is that the database doesn’t match exactly every file, since they get modified and you get a lot of false positives with pacman -Qkk for example. SteamOS for example made the root readonly and therefore such a check is valid, since no files will be modfied directly, but on an overlay.

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Or, from the page of pacutils:

pacrepairdb
Attempt to repair broken entries in libalpm’s database by reinstalling affected packages from the cache:

paccheck --files --db-files --list-broken | pacrepairdb
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“Nuke it from orbit – it’s the only way to be sure.”
– Adapted from Aliens (1986)

Well, short of doing that, if /home is on a separate partition I’d probably perform a fresh install; and/or use the method suggested by @linux-aarhus in post#5 to restore configurations that I specifically wanted to keep. After a decade of faithful service; and noting your other post which might indicate the possibility of other issues, a reinstall is certainly another way to be sure.

Just my 2 cents. Spend it wisely.

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I think you need to specify --sha256sum to actually check the contents of the files, like to detect if it is corrupted. Without it it’s more like a metadata audit.

My suggestion would be:

sudo paccheck --files --file-properties --db-files --quiet --sha256sum

it prints more info when a problem is found than --list-broken

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This tool is for pure Arch Linux. If you runs it on Manjaro, you will get some mismatched checksums, for example all Manjaro Kernels and some Manjaro packages (they copy from Arch packages and are modified by Manjaro team).

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yes i saw that, i had 5 packages that had warnings. I wonder why is this so? Should not manjaro modify the mtree also if they modify a file, so all matches again.

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For quick checks, fsck can scan your filesystem and pacman -Syu grabs the latest updates, potentially fixing corrupted files. If things feel more serious, consider an Arch live USB for deeper checks. Just remember, backups are your friend!

Unless you’re facing specific problems, Manjaro usually handles things well. But if something’s wonky, hit the web for solutions specific to your symptoms. No need to reinvent the wheel!

Prevention is key, though. Regular updates and keeping an eye on logs can save you headaches later. Happy rolling

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