Re: Please drop anacron from task-desktop

[Paride Legovini <pl@ninthfloor.org>]

Hello Adrian,

Adrian Bunk wrote on 08/03/2019:
> On Thu, Mar 07, 2019 at 10:11:41PM +0100, Paride Legovini wrote:
>> Michael Stone wrote on 07/03/2019:
>>> On Thu, Mar 07, 2019 at 09:02:23PM +0100, Holger Wansing wrote:
>>>>> I'm actually wondering if this is a good idea..
>>>>>
>>>>> There are lot of other packages installing cronjobs and people, I would
>>>>> assume, expect that they will run.
>>
>> cronjobs run even without anacron, they just don't run
>> "anac(h)ronistically".
> 
> Which means some won't ever run on a 9 to 5 desktop.

Right, but idea of removing it from desktop-task began with observing
that in a default desktop install all the important cron jobs also ship
a .timer.

>>>>> I would personally revert his patch as long as all the cronjobs have not
>>>>> a corresponding systemd .timer
>>>>
>>>> Any thoughts on this?
>>>
>>> What's the downside to having anacron there if a .timer supersedes the
>>> cron job?
>>
>> Having a useless service running is itself a downside; I second the
>> removal.
> 
> Please explain your usage of the word "useless".
> 
> The output of "ls /etc/cron.daily" is not empty for me.

But a few (a good part?) of them will just do nothing if you are using
systemd, e.g.:

if [ -d /run/systemd/system ]; then
    # Skip in favour of systemd timer.
    exit 0
fi

This will happen more and more over time and I think it's the practice
to favor: having three systems to manage the execution of periodic jobs
(systemd timers, cron, anacron) in the default install is IMHO far ideal.

I don't doubt there *are* cases where anacron is useful, but we're just
talking of removing it from desktop-task, not from the archive, after
all. This said, I just wanted to add a data point to the thread, I agree
there is no strong reason for the removal -- but there is no strong
reason for inclusion neither, and I tend to favor simplicity.

>> I'll also mention that anacron has been orphaned almost one
>> year ago.
> 
> I'll also mention that "has been orphaned" does not imply anthing about 
> the quality of the package.

I know, and thank our QA team. But I think it tells something on the
interest our community has for the package, especially if orphaned for a
long time.

Paride