FS#57292 - Only lock database on packages download end

Attached to Project: Pacman
Opened by mirh (mirh) - Tuesday, 30 January 2018, 18:52 GMT
Last edited by Eli Schwartz (eschwartz) - Tuesday, 30 January 2018, 19:43 GMT
Task Type Feature Request
Category General
Status Closed
Assigned To No-one
Architecture All
Severity Low
Priority Normal
Reported Version 5.0.1
Due in Version Undecided
Due Date Undecided
Percent Complete 100%
Votes 0
Private No

Details

Summary and Info:
Assume starting a hefty system upgrade (which sometimes can take even half a hour due to big packages or network congestion)
In the meantime I want to install something else (maybe even local), but from the moment I give the -Syu command, to the very 100% end I'm barred from "touching the system".

Now, I can see why you wouldn't want any interference between a given "batch" of updates ( FS#20541  is an example), but at least up to the totally boring download phase this seems unnecessary.
This task depends upon

Closed by  Eli Schwartz (eschwartz)
Tuesday, 30 January 2018, 19:43 GMT
Reason for closing:  Won't implement
Comment by Eli Schwartz (eschwartz) - Tuesday, 30 January 2018, 19:43 GMT
Well, you also don't want interference between two attempts to, say, download the same file... you also want the database to be consistent within any given run of pacman.

I really don't think there is any gain to moving the database lock on a pacman -Su until after the user selects "Y" to the update, on the off chance that they will leave the proposed package installation/updates list on screen for a few hours while running pacman in another terminal.

Nor does it make sense to lock the database on a pacman -Syu, then remove the lock after syncing the databases and continuing on with the same packagelist display and eventual database re-locking from pacman -Su.

Nor do I see how this helps your use-case of installing things with pacman while simultaneously downloading unrelated packages, which will never be okay as both of these actually do attempt conflicting access to the package databases.

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