You cannot just run pacman -S and expect it to sync (install) all the packages from the repositories on the local system. That would be disastrous if your system installs all 40,000+ packages of the remote repositories.🗨️ Did this article help you understand the ‘sync’ concept in Arch Linux, or are you more confused than before? Do let me know in the comment section.(Don’t take it literally and start commenting that it will be a financially stupid decision to order a new phone instead of the older charger. This is just for example 😜)
Table of Contents
What does pacman -Syu does?
-S (capital letter S) is the main option and y and u are ‘sub-options’ supporting it.
Understanding pacman -Syu command
sudo pacman -yu
error: invalid option '-y'
With the work of these two sub options done, S (sync) will fetch the packages (newer versions) from the remote repository and install (update existing) them.
Those y and u are ‘sub options’ of -S. You cannot use them on their own like pacman -yu:There are additional options with Sync. You’ll probably be using a lot of sudo pacman -Syu.Pacman package manager works pretty much the same. There is a remote repository that has the actual packages, a local package database that usually keeps the information about the packages by interacting with the remote repository. pacman is the command line interface that utilizes this structure to manage packages on your Arch Linux.If you had run pacman -Syu, you would have ordered both the newer iPhone and the correct charger with it.Imagine an old-fashioned paper catalog folks used to get in the mail a few decades back. If you get a catalog in the mail from a store, it had a listing of everything the store had for sale and the current prices. The Arch package database is like this catalog. The catalog you have with you is the package database cache on your system.I hope you are familiar with the concept of package manager. If not, please refer to this explainer article:This is why you need to provide a target (package names) with only -S option. Otherwise, you’ll see this error.You’ll notice that Arch package installation often mentions the pacman command in the following format:Imagine you just run pacman -Sy. This is equivalent to getting the latest catalog. Sometimes, I feel like it would have been better to use terms like install instead of sync and r for refresh instead of y. Easier to understand.
Why always run “pacman -Syu” even while installing a single package?
sudo pacman -S
error: no targets specified (use -h for help)
The packages are like the actual goods you buy through the catalog. You find the item number that you want in the catalog, place the order, and the correct item is delivered. You can always explore more options of the pacman command to see what it can do for regular package management on Arch Linux.How do you update Arch Linux? You run sudo pacman -Syu command.sudo pacman -Syu package_name
📋Now, let’s say you have an iPhone 14 (an outdated package) and you order an iPhone charger from the new catalog. You’ll have a problem when the new charger arrives because the iPhone now uses the type C port instead of the old lightning port. A conflict arises.I liked the analogy in this Reddit discussion and I am going to use the same here as well.S stands for sync but you can think of it as ‘install’. It syncs your Arch Linux system with the remote repository for the given package. Meaning, both repository and local Arch system will be synced (at that time) for the given package. Which is another way of saying that the package is installed on the system.The y sub-option of S refreshes the local package cache DB with remote repository. Then u sub-option is for sysupgrade which refers to the local package cache to make a list of all the installed packages that can be upgraded to a newer version.
Conclusion
I don’t know whether you were ever curious about it or not, but I do hope you have a slightly better understanding of the logic behind the famous -Syu option of pacman command. The man page is always there to read the official explanation of each option and its usage.How do you install a package on Arch Linux? You run sudo pacman -Syu package_name.
In simpler words, pacman -Syu updates all the installed packages on your Arch-based Linux distribution if they have a newer version available. Here, -S stands for sync or install, y refreshes the local package database cache with the remote repository and u will make a list of all the install packages that can be updated by referring to the local package database cache and getting actual packages from the remote repository.
