[arch-general] pacman caches packages with u=rw, g=, o= permissions

[u34 at net9.ga]

mpan via arch-general <arch-general at lists.archlinux.org> wrote:

> > Right to the point. A systemd timer script had a too strict Umask setting.

That should have been UMask, not Umask. It could be that Umask is supported. 
It is UMask at 
https://www.freedesktop.org/software/systemd/man/systemd.exec.html .

>    Are you invoking pacman in an unattended manner in a systemd timer? 
> If yes, you probably have another problem. I suppose you mean calling 
> `pacman -Sywu`. 

You are correct. With long options, it is written as 
pacman --sync --refresh --downloadonly --sysupgrade .

> That puts your system into a potential partial upgrade 
> scenario and makes your local package versions desynced from from the 
> sync database contains.
> 

According to 
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/System_maintenance#Partial_upgrades_are_unsupported
pacman -Sywu is not safe. But pacman -Syu is safe. Quoting the wiki, the 
rational is that pacman -Sywu
    will update the pacman sync database without installing the newer packages.
What I fail to see is why pacman -Sywu, followed by pacman -Su,  
1. Will update the pacman sync database without installing the newer packages.
But then
2. Will not update the pacman sync database while installing the 
   packages it has prevoiusly downloaded.

>    If your goal is to download packages to cache, see the `checkupdates` 
> command from package community/pacman-contrib????????. `checkupdates -d` is 
> doing exactly what you want, but without leading to a partial upgrade.

That is, my understanding is that checkupdates -d is equivalent to 
pacman -Sywu && pacman -Su . I haven't read checkupdates manual page. It 
could be that other then a safe upgrade it does additional work.

--
jadon

> ____
> ???????? https://archlinux.org/packages/community/x86_64/pacman-contrib/