From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On Tue, 12 Nov 2024 21:06:37 GMT, Sylvain Robitaille wrote:

[snip]

I wrote a script, many years ago, that helps me identify which other
packages a given installed package depends on, so that if I'm having
trouble with software on a system with a not-full installation,
I can compare to the same software on a more complete installation and
see what might be missing.

https://www.therockgarden.ca/software/slackware/listdeps.sh

I hope that helps somebody.

Hello,

I browsed your therockgarden.ca website, very nice! Thanks for providing
the link. I was attracted to it by the mention of listdeps.sh that you
made above. People should write collections of code, yes? It's a duty,
I think.

I had a job once managing a collection of code on *nix and other
machines. I'm afraid it permanently affected me. I can't let it go--I
just keep writing code. Almost entirely Bash. A very little C and
Python thrown in. And some PHP when I have to. That came later.
Originally it was Fortran and shell code. That was a long time ago.

So back to this duty we have. If I find I like your listdeps.sh may I
stick it in my collection? It may end up eventually published in a
library for my SAM system. I will give you credit as the author, but
would like to change the name of listdeps.sh, dropping the suffix.

I have found tools are easier to use when they are treated as commands.
My SAM system allows any directory of commands, including certain
function definitions, to be used as a menu or as a library--thus enabling
the writing of code which supports other code.

I hope that you are thinking that someone should have done this a long
time ago! Well, like I said, I've been working on this for a while.

You can read about my SAM at RosevearSoftware.com and about me at JoesLife.org.

-Joe

--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On 2025-01-17, Joseph Rosevear wrote:

I browsed your therockgarden.ca website, very nice!

Well thank you. Development on the website itself is rather glacially
slow, I'm afraid, but the site is there for those that might find
something useful from it.

People should write collections of code, yes? It's a duty, I think.

Well, when I write something that I imagine might be useful to others,
I make it available. There's plenty that I've written that I wouldn't
expect anyone to even notice, let alone care about. I don't feel any
"duty" to create code; I do think that there's value in sharing what
I've done, though I do apply judgement to determine what might be
worth sharing.

I had a job once managing a collection of code on *nix and other
machines.

My job was never actually about coding or managing code, but rather
about managing (Unix and Linux) systems themselves. The coding, of
course, is simply a tool that facilitates that.

... If I find I like your listdeps.sh may I stick it in my collection?

Yes. I place no restriction on code I've made available, other than to
ask that I get credit for my work.

... would like to change the name of listdeps.sh, dropping the suffix.

There's nothing wrong with doing that.

I have found tools are easier to use when they are treated as commands.

I tend to think, more than anything, of the Unix "pipeline" method of
building tools. The best tools are those that I can use to build other
tools with.

Thanks for looking at my site, and for seeking permission to include my
script in your project.
--
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sylvain Robitaille syl@therockgarden.ca ----------------------------------------------------------------------
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On Sun, 3 Nov 2024 00:16:49 -0000 (UTC), John Forkosh wrote:

How do you use slackpkg to upgrade a package along with any libraries
that the upgraded package may also need?

[snip]

OK, I'm going to jump into this thread. There has been some good advice given, but here are my two cents:

I don't do what you are doing. Instead I update my whole Slackware installation. No mess no fuss. Three lines entered in xterm does it:

/mnt/joe_root/begin
bound $lib/Zombie
up_basis

I showed you the above to demonstrate how simple it is with the right
tools. The "begin", "bound" and "up_basis" tools are mine. "begin"
starts my menu system--I keep it on a flash drive. "bound $lib/Zombie"
goes to the Zombie menu which contains the "up_basis" script. "up_basis" runs:

slackpkg update gpg
slackpkg update
slackpkg install-new
slackpkg upgrade-all
slackpkg clean-system

Be careful if you use the above. "slackpkg clean-system" is a great
command, because it shows you what additional Slackware packages you have added, but it will optionally also remove them.

Maybe do a backup before you run the above--just in case it breaks
something.

I run "up_basis", but not on my daily system. Instead I run it on a
special "Basis" system which lives on an internal drive. Then, if it
looks OK, I run another command in the Zombie menu to rsync the Basis to
a different device and then tweak it:

install /dev/sda1 /dev/sde 1 2 3 191026aa

I call the resulting "tweaked" installation ZombieSlack. I'll stop here
and not tell you the rest of the story. I wanted to show you how simple
it can be with the right tools.

-Joe
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

Joseph Rosevear <Mail@joeslife.org> wrote:

On Sun, 3 Nov 2024 00:16:49 -0000 (UTC), John Forkosh wrote:

How do you use slackpkg to upgrade a package along with any libraries
that the upgraded package may also need?

[snip]

OK, I'm going to jump into this thread. There has been some good advice given, but here are my two cents:

I don't do what you are doing. Instead I update my whole Slackware installation. No mess no fuss. Three lines entered in xterm does it:

/mnt/joe_root/begin
bound $lib/Zombie
up_basis

I showed you the above to demonstrate how simple it is with the right
tools. The "begin", "bound" and "up_basis" tools are mine. "begin"
starts my menu system--I keep it on a flash drive. "bound $lib/Zombie"
goes to the Zombie menu which contains the "up_basis" script. "up_basis" runs:

slackpkg update gpg
slackpkg update
slackpkg install-new
slackpkg upgrade-all
slackpkg clean-system

Be careful if you use the above. "slackpkg clean-system" is a great command, because it shows you what additional Slackware packages you have added, but it will optionally also remove them.

Maybe do a backup before you run the above--just in case it breaks something.

I run "up_basis", but not on my daily system. Instead I run it on a
special "Basis" system which lives on an internal drive. Then, if it
looks OK, I run another command in the Zombie menu to rsync the Basis to
a different device and then tweak it:

install /dev/sda1 /dev/sde 1 2 3 191026aa

I call the resulting "tweaked" installation ZombieSlack. I'll stop here
and not tell you the rest of the story. I wanted to show you how simple
it can be with the right tools.

-Joe

Thanks for all the additional information, Joe and everybody.
On each of my several desktop boxes, I usually keep four slackware
partitions on a 1TB ssd that's /dev/sda, and all data on a much
larger hdd on /dev/sdb (with /home symlinked to a similar home on sdb).
Then I rotate through the four slackwares when updating, keeping
the older ones just in case. So I can try your update procedure
on one of those older installs, without too much worry.

But my usual "update" procedure is just a whole new install. I usually
rsync -av --delete \
rsync://mirrors.kernel.org/slackware/slackware64-current/ \
empty_slackware_directory/
and then run usbimg2disk.sh to make a bootable usb stick,
from which I do a clean install on the next sda partition in the
rotation. Then I do lots of additional stuff, e.g., on an older
box, add pci=nommconf to kernel options append= line in lilo.conf or
elilo.conf to avoid tons of "PCIe Bus Error"s as soon as dhcpcd starts.
--
John Forkosh
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On Tue, 21 Jan 2025 07:55:30 +0000, Joseph Rosevear wrote:

slackpkg update gpg
slackpkg update
slackpkg install-new
slackpkg upgrade-all
slackpkg clean-system

Care should be taken when running any such automated process that some packages might require extra manual intervention.

Some packages will contain some /etc/*.new configuration file which does
not overwrite any existing configuration file, but might be better
adapted to the new version of the software.

Whenever the kernel is updated there is a big fat warning in
ChangeLog.txt about the importance of updating your boot loader. Failing
to do so might result in a system which doesn't boot or a system which
boots a kernel unable to find any matching kernel modules.

regards Henrik
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On Thu, 23 Jan 2025 07:07:49 -0000 (UTC), Henrik Carlqvist wrote:

On Tue, 21 Jan 2025 07:55:30 +0000, Joseph Rosevear wrote:

slackpkg update gpg slackpkg update slackpkg install-new slackpkg
upgrade-all slackpkg clean-system

Care should be taken when running any such automated process that some packages might require extra manual intervention.

Some packages will contain some /etc/*.new configuration file which does
not overwrite any existing configuration file, but might be better
adapted to the new version of the software.

[snip]

regards Henrik

Hello, Henrik! Thanks for your comments.

Are you talking about the "K", "O", "R", "P" question that I've seen? I
don't get that every time--perhaps only when the kernel is updated?.
Anyway, it is a bothersome question. I always choose "O". I don't think
I want to wade through all of them--which is an option--I don't remember which.

So far the process I described has worked for me, but then I've only been updating/upgrading regularly for a few months now. I'll holler, if I
have trouble. It's nice to know there is help here in this Usenet group.

I must say, though, that currently I'm happy, My tools make it easy, and
as a result I'm able to update/upgrade often.

This is in contrast to what I did before. I was bad. I often went
several years between, because the way I applied my system tweaks made it difficult. But no more! I hope I'm not naive.

-Joe
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

Joseph Rosevear <Mail@joeslife.org> wrote:

<<snip>>
This is in contrast to what I did before. I was bad.
I often went several years between, because the way
I applied my system tweaks made it difficult.

That's still me, to a tee.

But no more! I hope I'm not naive.

And I'm still striving to achieve naive.
--
John Forkosh
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On Fri, 24 Jan 2025 09:56:16 +0000, Joseph Rosevear wrote:

Are you talking about the "K", "O", "R", "P" question that I've seen?

I must admit that I am not very familiar with slackpkg myself. I install
my security update with a custom Makefile which basically just checks
that it is run on the right Slackware version (by checking /etc/slackware-version) before running
"upgradepkg --install-new --reinstall" on all packages that need to get updated. I have customized my kernel packages, they contain my own,
possibly patched kernels and the doinst.sh also checks which bootloader
is being used and updates that. But probably most important, I carefully
read the ChangeLog.txt before downloading and installing any packages.

Nevertheless I have hit some bumps during the years. At some occasion
some glibc-zoneinfo package reseted all my time zone settings. Since then
I avoid upgrading such packages. If we would switch to another time zone
or change the daylight saving dates in Sweden I would probably have to
upgrade that package. I usually also first install the updates on a test system and try to see if the behave as expected before pushing them out
to more systems.

So far the process I described has worked for me, but then I've only
been updating/upgrading regularly for a few months now.

Fortunately, kernel updates in stable versions of Slackware does not
happen very often. The last such update was back in June 2024 when the
kernel was upgraded to 5.15.161.

regards Henrik
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

Henrik Carlqvist <Henrik.Carlqvist@deadspam.com> wrote:

Nevertheless I have hit some bumps during the years. At some occasion
some glibc-zoneinfo package reseted all my time zone settings.

Your system timezone is set via a symlink (usually) at /etc/localtime
which points to the appropriate zone file stored in /usr/share/zoneinfo
(Slack 15).

Perhaps the package that mucked things up changed that symlink for you.
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

Rich <rich@example.invalid> writes:

Your system timezone is set via a symlink (usually) at /etc/localtime
which points to the appropriate zone file stored in /usr/share/zoneinfo (Slack 15).

Don't quote me on this, but I think a long time ago, Slackware used to
use a file instead of the symlink. glibc advises the symlink. At some
point it switched over. There's been alot of major changes over the
years for Slackware (PAM and Avahi come to mind).
--
PGP Key ID: 781C A3E2 C6ED 70A6 B356 7AF5 B510 542E D460 5CAE
"The Internet should always be the Wild West!"
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

jayjwa <jayjwa@atr2.ath.cx.invalid> wrote:

Rich <rich@example.invalid> writes:

Your system timezone is set via a symlink (usually) at /etc/localtime
which points to the appropriate zone file stored in /usr/share/zoneinfo
(Slack 15).

Don't quote me on this, but I think a long time ago, Slackware used to
use a file instead of the symlink. glibc advises the symlink. At some
point it switched over. There's been alot of major changes over the
years for Slackware (PAM and Avahi come to mind).

If you go back in time far enough, yes, the Slackware installer did a
"cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/xx/yyy /etc/localtime" to set your timezone.

I don't recall what version made the switch to the symlink.
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

On Sat, 25 Jan 2025 04:03:24 +0000, Rich wrote:

If you go back in time far enough, yes, the Slackware installer did a
"cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/xx/yyy /etc/localtime" to set your timezone.

I don't recall what version made the switch to the symlink.

I don't remember for sure which version of Slackware got the timezone
setting reseted by a package upgrade, maybe it was Slackware 9.1 or
somewhere around that era.

Looking at the doinst.sh for the glibc-zoneinfo-2011i_2011n-noarch-1.tg
for Slackware 9.1 it does seem to use symlinks, but seem to mess with etc/localtime unless etc/localtime-copied-from already exist and that
file (or link) does not seem to be created by the original glibc-zoneinfo-2.3.2-noarch-1.tgz for Slackware 9.1.

regards Henrik
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

Henrik Carlqvist <Henrik.Carlqvist@deadspam.com> wrote:

On Sat, 25 Jan 2025 04:03:24 +0000, Rich wrote:

If you go back in time far enough, yes, the Slackware installer did a
"cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/xx/yyy /etc/localtime" to set your timezone.

I don't recall what version made the switch to the symlink.

I don't remember for sure which version of Slackware got the timezone setting reseted by a package upgrade, maybe it was Slackware 9.1 or somewhere around that era.

Looking at the doinst.sh for the glibc-zoneinfo-2011i_2011n-noarch-1.tg
for Slackware 9.1 it does seem to use symlinks, but seem to mess with etc/localtime unless etc/localtime-copied-from already exist and that
file (or link) does not seem to be created by the original glibc-zoneinfo-2.3.2-noarch-1.tgz for Slackware 9.1.

Ah, you /might/ have found the culprit there. A bug in the initial
installed package that failed to install the sentinel file indicating
which zone the /etc/ file was copied from.
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: alt.os.linux.slackware

Henrik Carlqvist <Henrik.Carlqvist@deadspam.com> wrote:

On Sat, 25 Jan 2025 04:03:24 +0000, Rich wrote:

If you go back in time far enough, yes, the Slackware installer did a
"cp /usr/share/zoneinfo/xx/yyy /etc/localtime" to set your timezone.

I don't recall what version made the switch to the symlink.

I don't remember for sure which version of Slackware got the timezone setting reseted by a package upgrade, maybe it was Slackware 9.1 or somewhere around that era.

Looking at the doinst.sh for the glibc-zoneinfo-2011i_2011n-noarch-1.tg
for Slackware 9.1 it does seem to use symlinks, but seem to mess with etc/localtime unless etc/localtime-copied-from already exist and that
file (or link) does not seem to be created by the original glibc-zoneinfo-2.3.2-noarch-1.tgz for Slackware 9.1.

FWIW, Slack 13.1 still has the copied file and the sentinel 'copied
from' symlink.

So the switch to a pure symlink for /etc/localtime happened sometime
after 13.1. 15.0 has just the symlink for /etc/localtime.
--- Synchronet 3.21d-Linux NewsLink 1.2