What's `/var/cache/pkgfile/`?

[followait]

I have installed packages only by pacman for official and pacman -U for aur.
/var/cache/pkgfile/ takes a lot of disk spaces, what is it?

$ ls -lh /var/cache/pkgfile/
total 406M
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 299M  8月 22 00:00 community.files
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  18M  8月 19 00:00 core.files
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  89M  8月 20 00:00 extra.files
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 547K  8月 19 00:00 multilib.files

[Strit]

Its the databases that contains information about every file owned by a package. So they are pretty big.

[bogdancovaciu]

@followait

pacman -U for aur

Wrong! pacman doesn’t deal with AUR packages. Our pamac does. The pacman -U is when you install/update a package from different source and you point to it …

In Pamac UI Preferences you can set the number of packages to keep in cache

Or clean them.

[papajoke]

package pkgfile is installed, used only in bash config for “command not found”

[followait]

@Strit

Its the databases that contains information about every file owned by a package. So they are pretty big.

So is the folder part of pacman and can not be deleted?

@bogdancovaciu

Or clean them

I’ve cleaned all in tab General & tab ThirdParty, but /var/cache/pkgfile/ is not affected.

[bogdancovaciu]

@followait

but /var/cache/pkgfile/ is not affected

That is the database for the official repositories

[Strit]

@followait

So it the folder part of pacman and can not be deleted?

You can delete them, but they will be re-downloaded on next update anyway, so there’s no point in deleting them.

[papajoke]

@Strit

will be re-downloaded on next update

is not pacman but pkgfile package !
this package use a systemd timer

pacman -Fl pkgfile
pkgfile usr/lib/systemd/system/pkgfile-update.service
pkgfile usr/lib/systemd/system/pkgfile-update.timer
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/command-not-found.bash
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/command-not-found.fish
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/command-not-found.zsh
pkgfile var/cache/pkgfile/

package used for example by manjaro-zsh-config

---

“command not found” not useful for you ?
run pactree -r pkgfile
only if result is “pkgfile” you can un-install it, else disable timer

[followait]

@papajoke

only if result is “pkgfile” you can un-install it

When uninstall zsh, it uninstalls pkgfile by default.
After uninstalling zsh & pkgfile, and delete /var/cache/pkgfile/, the system still knows about pkgfile as below

$ pacman -Fl pkgfile
pkgfile usr/
pkgfile usr/bin/
pkgfile usr/bin/pkgfile
pkgfile usr/lib/
pkgfile usr/lib/systemd/
pkgfile usr/lib/systemd/system/
pkgfile usr/lib/systemd/system/pkgfile-update.service
pkgfile usr/lib/systemd/system/pkgfile-update.timer
pkgfile usr/share/
pkgfile usr/share/bash-completion/
pkgfile usr/share/bash-completion/completions/
pkgfile usr/share/bash-completion/completions/pkgfile
pkgfile usr/share/doc/
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/command-not-found.bash
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/command-not-found.fish
pkgfile usr/share/doc/pkgfile/command-not-found.zsh
pkgfile usr/share/licenses/
pkgfile usr/share/licenses/pkgfile/
pkgfile usr/share/licenses/pkgfile/LICENSE
pkgfile usr/share/man/
pkgfile usr/share/man/man1/
pkgfile usr/share/man/man1/pkgfile.1.gz
pkgfile usr/share/zsh/
pkgfile usr/share/zsh/site-functions/
pkgfile usr/share/zsh/site-functions/_pkgfile
pkgfile var/
pkgfile var/cache/
pkgfile var/cache/pkgfile/

It’s not as expected, is it?

BTW

• /usr/share/zsh/ needs to be deleted manully
• zsh is the default shell in the recent offical installer of manjaro, I think it’s ok to change the default shell for a better one, but I can’t understand why zsh depends like this, it’s not good, especially as a default shell, right?

[xabbu]

@followait

It’s not as expected, is it?

Yes, since pacman -F does not look which files are located on your system, it uses the repository database for it’s output.

@followait

/usr/share/zsh/ needs to be deleted manully

Never do that. Other packages place files in that folder to add additional functions to zsh. It will be restored if these packages get an update.

@followait

zsh is the default shell in the recent offical installer of manjaro, I think it’s ok to change the default shell for a better one, but I can’t understand why zsh depends like this, it’s not good, especially as a default shell, right?

The zsh packages does not depend on it. Just the special Manjaro config package for zsh need it. You can use zsh without this config package.

[followait]

@xabbu

@followait

It’s not as expected, is it?

Yes, since pacman -F does not look which files are located on your system, it uses the repository database for it’s output.

Fine

@xabbu

@followait

/usr/share/zsh/ needs to be deleted manully

Never do that. Other packages place files in that folder to add additional functions to zsh. It will be restored if these packages get an update.

Too late, I’ve deleted it. Without zsh, how could the files in the folder be useful?

@xabbu

The zsh packages does not depend on it. Just the special Manjaro config package for zsh need it. You can use zsh without this config package.

That’s ok

Thanks very much

[xabbu]

@followait

Without zsh, how could the files in the folder be useful?

They are completely unnecessary files if zsh is not installed. But since packages are usually not split in the Arch World, you get these files if you want or not.

[fch]

Are there bad consequences to choosing to keep 0? That means there’s only the latest version?

[bogdancovaciu]

@fch

Are there bad consequences to choosing to keep 0?

No, that is why is still an option, but you will not be able do downgrade from cache in case you will need to do that for some reason …