package-autoremove ?

package-autoremove ?

[David Masterson]

The package-autoremove is giving a list of packages to be removed, but
many of the packages seem to be dependents of other packages, so I don't
want to remove them.  How does package-autoremove decide on which
packages can be removed?  Can I force it to keep some of the packages?
-- 
David Masterson

Re: package-autoremove ?

[Pankaj Jangid]

David Masterson <dsmasterson92630@outlook.com> writes:

> The package-autoremove is giving a list of packages to be removed, but
> many of the packages seem to be dependents of other packages, so I
> don't want to remove them.  How does package-autoremove decide on
> which packages can be removed?  Can I force it to keep some of the
> packages?

I have faced a similar issue when I was re-writing my init.el to
modularize using use-package. It split the big file into tiny little
files.

In my case, the problem was that the packages where installed as a
dependency and actual call (use-package package-name :ensure t) for
those packages were not encountered by the interpreter.

I debugged it using a very inefficient method. Commented out the
(require ...)  statements from the init.el and uncommented one-by-one to
find the problem.

Re: package-autoremove ? Looking like a bug...

[David Masterson]

Pankaj Jangid <p4j@j4d.net> writes:

> David Masterson <dsmasterson92630@outlook.com> writes:
>
>> The package-autoremove is giving a list of packages to be removed, but
>> many of the packages seem to be dependents of other packages, so I
>> don't want to remove them.  How does package-autoremove decide on
>> which packages can be removed?  Can I force it to keep some of the
>> packages?
>
> I have faced a similar issue when I was re-writing my init.el to
> modularize using use-package. It split the big file into tiny little
> files.
>
> In my case, the problem was that the packages where installed as a
> dependency and actual call (use-package package-name :ensure t) for
> those packages were not encountered by the interpreter.
>
> I debugged it using a very inefficient method. Commented out the
> (require ...)  statements from the init.el and uncommented one-by-one to
> find the problem.

Sounds like you're onto something.  I recently started using use-package
and the problem began after that.  What you're suggesting is that you
have to install packages with the package manager and then use
use-package to load them.

Anyone else seen this?

-- 
David Masterson

Re: package-autoremove ? Looking like a bug...

[Stefan Kangas]

David Masterson <dsmasterson92630@outlook.com> writes:

> Sounds like you're onto something.  I recently started using use-package
> and the problem began after that.  What you're suggesting is that you
> have to install packages with the package manager and then use
> use-package to load them.
>
> Anyone else seen this?

Yes, the other day `package-autoremove' wanted to remove a ton of
packages for me.  So I took a closer look.

`package-autoremove' uses `package-selected-packages' to know which
packages to remove.  More specifically, it calls
`package--removable-packages', where the doc string explains:

      "Return a list of names of packages no longer needed.
    These are packages which are neither contained in
    `package-selected-packages' nor a dependency of one that is."

In my case, some packages that I have (most likely) installed via
use-package are _not_ in `package-selected-packages'.  This seems like a
bug.  I'm not sure if it's in use-package or package.el, however.

With a bit of luck, John Wiegley is reading this list, and could
comment on this.

Best regards,
Stefan Kangas

Re: package-autoremove ? Looking like a bug...

[David Masterson]

Stefan Kangas <stefankangas@gmail.com> writes:

> Yes, the other day `package-autoremove' wanted to remove a ton of
> packages for me.  So I took a closer look.
>
> `package-autoremove' uses `package-selected-packages' to know which
> packages to remove.  More specifically, it calls
> `package--removable-packages', where the doc string explains:
>
>       "Return a list of names of packages no longer needed.
>     These are packages which are neither contained in
>     `package-selected-packages' nor a dependency of one that is."
>
> In my case, some packages that I have (most likely) installed via
> use-package are _not_ in `package-selected-packages'.  This seems like a
> bug.  I'm not sure if it's in use-package or package.el, however.
>
> With a bit of luck, John Wiegley is reading this list, and could
> comment on this.

No response from John Wiegley.

What do you think of 'straight.el'?
-- 
David Masterson

Re: package-autoremove ? Looking like a bug...

[Stefan Kangas]

David Masterson <dsmasterson92630@outlook.com> writes:

> No response from John Wiegley.

I would therefore propose to report this as a bug at the use-package
issue tracker.

> What do you think of 'straight.el'?

I haven't had the chance to use it, so I can only judge on having
studied the authors own description.  I don't think it would make a good
replacement for package.el in general, but it has some good ideas that
package.el could certainly learn from.

The main benefit with straight.el seems to be that it clones git
repositories for all your packages.  Personally, I don't mind visiting a
website to get the clone url and pasting that into a terminal when I
need to.

Best regards,
Stefan Kangas

Re: package-autoremove ? Looking like a bug...

[Pankaj Jangid]

David Masterson <dsmasterson92630@outlook.com> writes:

>> In my case, the problem was that the packages where installed as a
>> dependency and actual call (use-package package-name :ensure t) for
>> those packages were not encountered by the interpreter.
>>
>> I debugged it using a very inefficient method. Commented out the
>> (require ...)  statements from the init.el and uncommented one-by-one to
>> find the problem.
>
> Sounds like you're onto something.  I recently started using use-package
> and the problem began after that.  What you're suggesting is that you
> have to install packages with the package manager and then use
> use-package to load them.

I removed all packages and installed using my new configuration which is
using use-package. It still gave me this problem.

But it got solved, after some tweaks. I don't exactly remember what I
did.