F21 downloads repository metadata in 3 places!

[Hedayat Vatankhah]

/*Reindl Harald <h.reindl at thelounge.net>*/ wrote on Sat, 13 Dec 2014 
22:19:25 +0100:
>
> Am 13.12.2014 um 22:10 schrieb Hedayat Vatankhah:
>> I noticed that F21 can potentially download repository metadata 3 times:
>> 1. Yum cache 2. DNF cache 3. PackageKit cache! It really hurts to see
>> how Fedora ignorance towards different kind of users is being increased
>> as time passes. If Fedora is an international distro, it should try to
>> consider condition of different users, not just a portion of them.
>> Fedora repository metadata format was already hostile, it wastes
>> bandwidth considerably downloading mostly useless data repeatedly.
>> Things got worse for DNF as it decides to also always download 
>> filelists.
>>
>> Now, Fedora 21 contains yum, dnf and PackageKit (software center) with
>> new backend. Surprisingly, PackageKit uses its own separate cache. DNF
>> refreshes its cache automatically (without user's consent) every 3 hours
>> by default (according to 'man dnf.conf'). PackageKit also does the same,
>> but I don't know when it does (also without user's consent).
>
> the automatic metadata refresh is a no-go
>
> frankly in the meantime only the metadata are half as large as some of 
> my server setups at all (our asterisk PBX needs 850 MB with F20)
>
>> Now, if you are exclusively a 'yum' user, you'll end up with 3
>> repository metadata downloads
>
> "systemctl mask dnf-makecache.timer" stops the new nosense
>
> if you are not using GNOME and YUM from CLI you can remove package kit 
> at all and frankly my typical command is "rm -rf /var/cache/yum*; yum 
> upgrade" because when i look for updates i want the *now* recent 
> metadata and don't need them refreshed one hour ago
*I* know how to disable them (or at least, I hope so! Maybe there 
is/will be a foo package who decides to download its own copy too!), but 
that's not the point of my post. What I expect is either: 1. disable all 
kinds of potentially demanding internet access by default and let people 
enable if they like; or 2. add an option to anaconda, or a post 
installation option, so that the user can decide if he wants automatic 
metadata/package updates for *Fedora* (not a specific DE/application) or 
not. And the options should be applied to the whole distribution 
consistently, even if you use multiple DEs.
(And hey, you might find 'yum clean expire-cache' a better alternative 
for the 'rm -rf' command you use!)

>
> [harry at srv-rhsoft:~]$ rpm -qa | grep -i packagekit
> [harry at srv-rhsoft:~]$
>
> <sarcasm>maybe someone should place a bandwidh-limiting of 0.5 Mbit 
> and a onhtly limit of 1 GB per month in front of developers to wake 
> them up</sarcasm>
That would be great! ;) I think even 1 month of such experience should 
be more than enough!