System update or cleanup with Terminal, how?

[Tut_tut]

Hello everyone,
Today I did my first system update graphically when it was offered. Under Ubuntu I usually did this using the terminal. Which commands in the terminal could I use with Manjaro?

1. to update the system
2. to clean the system

I would like to keep the last three versions of the installed packages, which I have also specified in the update management settings.
Or do you recommend not using the terminal commands? I’ve already researched, but there are so many different options available, so I’d rather ask here in the forum.

[zbe]

Can’t you google this stuff? Check wikis/manpages on pacman or pamac.

[Mirdarthos]

Hi @Tut_tut,

I made a script specifically dor this. See here:

My Universal Manjaro Update Helper

Hi Everyone. TLDR; I made an update helper script for performing updates, and generating a precompiled forum post if there were errors. Give it a go. Link and installation instructions below. After spending quite some time on here, on the forum, I started noticing a pattern when updates happen. Usually after the update, when support is being asked, the people trying to help always have to request the same information. Hence me thinking that it can be scripted, seeing as it’s so repetitive. A…

and here:

GitHub - Mirdarthos/manjaro-update-helper: a Helper script for updating Manjaro.

(I’ve got a slight suspicion the last link is more up-to-date, though.)

---

I recommend, and the script uses pamac instead of pacman, especially for newcomers as pamac was developed by Manajaro (developers) for Manjaro and just takes care of more thing than pacman. For example:

@philm

You might be blocked updating when using pacman due to some libcanberra packages. Simply remove those packages: sudo pacman -Rdd lib32-libcanberra-pulse lib32-libcanberra-gstreamer libcanberra-pulse libcanberra-gstreamer. We recommend to use pamac anyway, which does this automatically: pamac update

[soundofthunder]

Hi again @Tut_tut

No step by step walkthrough this time. It’s not needed.

This command uses pacman to install a package:

sudo pacman -S packagename

This command will perform a typical update:

sudo pacman -Syu

This command will clean the package cache, leaving the last three versions of installed packages:

paccache -rk3

See the ArchWiki Pacman article for more information about pacman and related tools.

This links to a post from @cscs who mentions some cache management options using paccache, and also a tool called vacuum:

• Cache management (cscs)
  or
• Clear cache on Linux (alternate methods)

I hope this helps. Cheers.

Aside:- Despite others persistently encouraging the use of pamac to update the system, I will almost always recommend using pacman.

If pamac really must be used, use only the command line version, and the --no-aur switch when performing an update (if AUR is activated).

In the Stable Update 2024-01-13 comments there is already an example of problems that can arise when using the pamac GUI (pamac-manager) which might have been avoided by using pacman.

@zbe

Can’t you google this stuff?

Google might otherwise have led him here.

[Mirdarthos]

There’s also a section for it in the Wiki:

System Maintenance

[cscs]

Since I got mentioned for outlining pacmans own tools (paccache)

I can also do a shameless plug for maclean

(which will batch do paccache commands, aur helper cleanings, and more)

Maclean - a small script to automate (safe) cleaning functions

I dont normally like these kinds of utilities… so I figured I would make one. Its up on gitlab: Example run: Its still early days. Every action prompts the user first, with default response being negative. I am still compiling all of the ‘cleaning actions’ it should take. It should loop through any number of AUR helpers installed. (includes: pacaur, pamac, paru, pikaur, trizen, yay) SNAP/Flatpak cleanings are also included to the best of my knowledge, but I dont use either. …

[Tut_tut]

Many thanks!
I tryed install the Script, but there was an error message:

mkdir /tmp/mumuh && cd /tmp/mumuh && git clone https://github.com/Mirdarthos/manjaro-update-helper.git
Klone nach 'manjaro-update-helper'...
remote: Enumerating objects: 1351, done.
remote: Counting objects: 100% (330/330), done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (116/116), done.
remote: Total 1351 (delta 145), reused 303 (delta 119), pack-reused 1021
Empfange Objekte: 100% (1351/1351), 166.65 KiB | 2.49 MiB/s, fertig.
Löse Unterschiede auf: 100% (497/497), fertig.
[micha@NB mumuh]$ cd manjaro-update-helper/
[micha@NB manjaro-update-helper]$ makepkg --syncdeps --install
==> Erstelle Paket: mirdarthos-universal-manjaro-update-helper 6.0.1-1 (Sa 13 Jan 2024 11:07:28 CET)
==> Prüfe Laufzeit-Abhängigkeiten...
==> Installiere fehlende Abhängigkeiten...
[sudo] Passwort für micha: 
Abhängigkeiten werden aufgelöst …
Nach in Konflikt stehenden Paketen wird gesucht …

Pakete (2) meld-3.22.0-2  xclip-0.13-4

Gesamtgröße des Downloads:             0,87 MiB
Gesamtgröße der installierten Pakete:  5,09 MiB

:: Installation fortsetzen? [J/n] j
:: Pakete werden empfangen …
 xclip-0.13-4-x86_64                                             14,8 KiB   106 KiB/s 00:00 [#####################################################] 100%
 meld-3.22.0-2-any                                              875,8 KiB  3,46 MiB/s 00:00 [#####################################################] 100%
 Gesamt (2/2)                                                   890,6 KiB  3,11 MiB/s 00:00 [#####################################################] 100%
(2/2) Schlüssel im Schlüsselbund werden geprüft                                             [#####################################################] 100%
(2/2) Paket-Integrität wird überprüft                                                       [#####################################################] 100%
(2/2) Paket-Dateien werden geladen                                                          [#####################################################] 100%
(2/2) Auf Dateikonflikte wird geprüft                                                       [#####################################################] 100%
(2/2) Verfügbarer Festplattenspeicher wird ermittelt                                        [#####################################################] 100%
:: Paketänderungen werden verarbeitet …
(1/2) Installiert wird xclip                                                                [#####################################################] 100%
(2/2) Installiert wird meld                                                                 [#####################################################] 100%
:: Post-transaction-Hooks werden gestartet …
(1/5) Arming ConditionNeedsUpdate...
(2/5) Updating the MIME type database...
(3/5) Compiling GSettings XML schema files...
(4/5) Updating icon theme caches...
(5/5) Updating the desktop file MIME type cache...
==> Prüfe Buildtime-Abhängigkeiten...
==> Empfange Quellen...
  -> Lade mirdarthos-universal-manjaro-update-helper-6.0.1.tar.gz herunter...
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
  0     0    0     0    0     0      0      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--     0
100 13410    0 13410    0     0  23655      0 --:--:-- --:--:-- --:--:--  360k
==> Überprüfe source Dateien mit sha256sums...
    mirdarthos-universal-manjaro-update-helper-6.0.1.tar.gz ... FEHLGESCHLAGEN
==> FEHLER: Eine oder mehrere Dateien überstanden nicht die Gültigkeits-Prüfung!
[micha@NB manjaro-update-helper]$

What can I do?

[megavolt]

@Tut_tut

to update the system

pamac update

@Tut_tut

to clean the system

pamac clean

Easy?

[Mirdarthos]

Hmmm…

I really, really, really don’t know why the hashes didn’t update. But Just made doubly-sure it’s now updated and correct, so please try it again:

Clone/download the PKGBUILD somewhere, let’s use /tmp:

mkdir /tmp/mumuh && cd /tmp/mumuh/
wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Mirdarthos/manjaro-update-helper/master/PKGBUILD

Then install it with:

sudo makepkg -i

---

Tip

If your language isn’t English, please prepend any and all terminal commands with LC_ALL=C. For example:

LC_ALL=C bluetoothctl

This will just cause the terminal output to be in English, making it easier to understand and debug.

[Tut_tut]

@Mirdarthos

I really, really, really don’t know why the hashes didn’t update.

Don’t be mad at me, but I don’t want to continue using the script and have uninstalled it. I really appreciate your efforts to look after something like this! However, I am not an expert enough to judge the significance of errors.

[Tut_tut]

It’s easy, you are right! That’s how I want to do it, thank you very much!

[Mirdarthos]

@Tut_tut

Don’t be mad at me, but I don’t want to continue using the script and have uninstalled it.

I’m not mad. In the end it’s your decision, that you have to live with, so all’s good!

[Tut_tut]

@soundofthunder

This command uses pacman to install a package:

sudo pacman -S packagename

This command will perform a typical update:

sudo pacman -Syu

This command will clean the package cache, leaving the last three versions of installed packages:

paccache -rk3

I also tryed, thank you!