Check AUR buildscript changes

Test if you are AUR ready by running below snippet in a terminal

if [[ $(pacman-mirrors -G) == 'stable' ]]; then echo 'AUR is a no-go'; else echo 'OK - go ahead'; fi

The Arch way

Every AUR build script page has a notification subscription -> in upper right box.

This is a simple as it gets - when the script is updated you get a mail notification.

But Pamac can do that?

And you are correct - it can.

Even so it has proven countless times this is a bad idea.

1. An otherwise successful sync breaks due invalid AUR database
2. You run into issues when a package and dependencies is demoted from repo to AUR
3. Duplicate package names - where version in AUR is higher than official repo. [Example 1] [Example 2]

That just a couple of stumbling points the last couple of months.

So do yourself a favour and revert Pamac -> Preferences -> Third Party -> Check for updates to the default - which is disabled.

Another fairly simple solutions is to run a script after login

The check-aur.sh script

The script requires yay to be installed

sudo pacman -Syu yay

Create a script - check-aur.sh - place it in ~/.local/bin and make it executable with content

Notify script

#!/usr/bin/env bash
#
# AUR buildscript update checker
#
#    This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
#    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
#    the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
#    (at your option) any later version.
#
#    This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
#    but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
#    MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
#    GNU General Public License for more details.
#
#    You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
#    along with this program.  If not, see <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
#
# 2022-12-20
# @linux-aarhus (c) root.nix.dk
# 2023-05-09: added not on yay bugs

# due to a fair amount of open bugs for yay https://github.com/Jguer/yay/issues
# it may be due dilligence to change to paru
# paru supports the same arguments as yay
# simply change yay to paru in the script

AurHelper="yay"

#check if yay is available
if ! command -v ${AurHelper} > /dev/null; then 
    echo ":: ${AurHelper} not found... please install"
    exit 1
fi

#check if libnotify is available
if ! [[ "$(which notify-send)" =~ (notify-send) ]]; then
    echo ":: libnotify not found... (sudo pacman -S libnotify"
    exit 1
fi

aur_changed=$(${AurHelper} -Quaq)

if ! [[ -z ${aur_changed} ]]; then
    if ! stty &>/dev/null; then
        notify-send -u normal "Notification of AUR changes"  "$aur_changed"
        exit
    fi
    printf "${aur_changed}"
fi

Make the script executable

chmod +x ~/.local/bin/check-aur.sh

The script will do

• check if yay is installed - if not exit
• execute {paru|yay} -Quaq and store the response in a variable
• if there is any content in the response
  • if run by a service use the system notification daemon to pop a notification
  • if run from command line output to console

autorun after login

To run it one time after login create a user service file

First create the service folder structure

mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user

Then create a file ~/.config/systemd/user/check-aur.service - paste the following content

[Unit]
Description=Check for changes to AUR my buildscrpts
# wait for network
After=syslog.target network.target default.target

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStartPre=/bin/sleep 30
ExecStart=/home/%u/.local/bin/check-aur.sh

[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

Start the user service - do not use sudo

systemctl --user enable check-aur.service

After login the service will activate and do the following

• wait 30 seconds
• run the check-aur.sh script
• execute the script and exit

oh-no no updates - what shall I make of my time

If you are not satisfied with the popup shortly after login create a timer

Do not flood AUR with useless traffic

Create a complementary timer ~/.config/systemd/user/check-aur.timer with content - example is 4 hours

[Unit]
Description=Schedule AUR change checks

[Timer]
OnStartupSec=10m
OnUnitActiveSec=4h

[Install]
WantedBy=timers.target

The timer will do this

• wait until 10m after boot
• activate the check-aur.service
• re-activate the service every 4 hours while system is up

When using a timer - you need to disable the service - otherwise the timer refuse to activate it.

systemctl --user disable --now check-aur.service

Then activate the timer

systemctl --user enable --now check-aur.timer

When you are notified

When you use this notifier and you are notified - simply use your favorite AUR helper to rebuild the packages.

Pamac works from command line too

pamac build <scriptname>

Rebuild all from the command line

pamac build $(check-aur.sh)

Rewritten notify script with IgnoredPkgs

This example is from my system. I am using the dotnet-core-bin custom script to install dotnet 6 - because the the project I work on must have long term support.

My issue is that the above script keeps informing me the package has been updated to dotnet 7 - which I - for the time being - do not need.

So I rewrote the script be able to handle an array of ignored packages. One added benefit was the aquired bash array knowledge - never too old to learn - right?

#!/usr/bin/env bash
#
# AUR buildscript update checker - optional ignore specific packages
#
#    This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
#    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
#    the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
#    (at your option) any later version.
#
#    This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
#    but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
#    MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
#    GNU General Public License for more details.
#
#    You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
#    along with this program.  If not, see <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
#
# 2023-04-15
# @linux-aarhus (c) root.nix.dk
# Revision log
# 2023-05-09: Added paru as supported helper - paru will be preferred over yay 
#           : Rewrite comparison to arrays and fix missing content with libnotify
# 2023-05-10: shellcheck validated
#
#
# Ignore specific packages
# e.g. IgnorePkgs=('pkg1' 'pkg2')
IgnorePkgs=('dotnet-host-bin' 'dotnet-targeting-pack-bin'
           'aspnet-targeting-pack-bin' 'aspnet-runtime-bin'
           'dotnet-runtime-bin' 'dotnet-sdk-bin'
           'netstandard-targeting-pack-bin')

# to skip search set AurHelper to yay or paru
AurHelper="paru"

if [[ -z ${AurHelper} ]]; then
    #check if paru is available
    if command -v paru > /dev/null; then 
        AurHelper="paru"
    fi

    if [[ -z ${AurHelper} ]]; then
        #check if yay is available
        if command -v yay > /dev/null; then 
            AurHelper="yay"
        fi
    fi

    if [[ -z ${AurHelper} ]]; then
        echo "=> No AurHelper found"
        echo "=> supported helpers:"
        echo "  --> yay:  sudo pacman -S yay"
        echo "  --> paru: pamac build paru-bin"
        exit 1
   fi
fi

#check if libnotify is available
if ! [[ "$(which notify-send)" =~ (notify-send) ]]; then
        echo ":: libnotify not found... (sudo pacman -S libnotify)"
        exit 1
fi

# get changed scripts
aur=$(${AurHelper} -Quaq)

# setup arrays
IFS=$'\n' ignored=("$(sort <<<"${IgnorePkgs[*]}")"); unset IFS
IFS=$'\n' changed=("$(sort <<<"${aur[*]}")"); unset IFS

# create a filtered array
filtered=$(comm -13 <(printf "%s\n" "${ignored[@]}") <(printf "%s\n" "${changed[@]}"))

# create the notification
notification=$(for f in "${filtered[@]}"; do echo "${f}"; done)

# display notification if the filtered array is not empty
if  [[ -n "${notification}" ]]; then
    if ! stty &>/dev/null; then
        notify-send -u normal "Notification of AUR changes" "${notification}"
    else
        echo "${notification}"
    fi
fi