[NEW IDEA] Automatic removal of dependencies

[Ola Thoresen]

2006-04-22 "Jeff Spaleta" <jspaleta at gmail.com> wrote
> On 4/22/06, Ola Thoresen <redhat at olen.net> wrote:
>> It will simply list all packages where no files have been accessed the
>> last 6 months.  I believe it has been posted here before (or I might
>> have picked it up somewhere else), but anyway something like this would
>> probably more helpful than only looking at the dependencies if one is
>> trying to determine what packages can safely be removed.
>
> doesn't prelink operation on libraries nullify much of the value of
> such a script? If prelink operation changes the access time, you'll
> basically get false positives for every library prelink touches.
>

After a stat of the files in /lib it seems like you are right, so with
prelink running every night you will never catch unsed libs in
/[usr/]lib{,64} and other paths where prelink runs.  But on the other
hand, it will also catch it if your php-script is using something that
would otherwise get removed (becuase it was auto-installed).
I don't claim this to be the one true solution, it is just a simple way
to list at least some installed but unused packages.

Maybe a simple prelink-patch wich restores the A-time of the files it
prelinks would be a possible path.. hmm....


Rgds.

Ola Thoresen