The future is now: opkg vs apk

slh · 2024-11-25T19:46:20.159Z

efahl:

mikma:

Would you still be able to install multiple ABI versions of a library side-by-side

No, you would not be able to install two versions of the same package as the identical names would conflict. Do you have a use case where you'd want to descend into "DLL hell" with something like this?

Nobody 'wants' that, but libraries like wolfssl might require that during in-place upgrades, when the depending packages haven't all been rebuilt for the new ABI, yet. That is the problem with upstreams like wolfssl, who don't commit to reasonably stable ABIs and change them just-cause.

efahl · 2024-11-25T23:34:53.039Z

Yeah, there's always "that guy." It might sound harsh, but maybe apply the same ruthlessness to crappy packages that we do to 4/32 devices: "get rid of it and use a better one". It doesn't really make sense to me to spend a lot of effort modifying the mainstream tools to accommodate fringe cases, it just messes up too many widely spread bits with special case code.

For example, my PR fixing the ubus call rpc-sys packagelist "works", but produces unusable results, because there is no ABI info in any of the packages, "installed" db or "world" file. We're going to have to hack up the buildroot package scripts, rpc code and probably patch apk itself to add this. (The apk devs have already refused a PR to add ABI metadata upstream: https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/alpine/apk-tools/-/merge_requests/152)

bigsmile · 2024-11-26T06:37:23.450Z

Since this impacts everyone, is there a "suggestion" package?

# opkg -A whatprovides dnsmasq
opkg: has been replace by 'apk'. See 'apk -h' for help.

Try:
    apk list --providers <package>

slh · 2024-11-26T07:16:35.755Z

No, and there won't be.

On the one hand is your example command quite specific and 'uncommon', on the other hand do (currently) many programs (e.g. luci-app-packagemanager) decide what to use based on the presence of opkg XOR apk executables, so adding a helper of this kind would actively break important tools.

Boilerplate4U · 2024-11-26T07:29:38.757Z

efahl:

The apk devs have already refused a PR to add ABI metadata upstream: https://gitlab.alpinelinux.org/alpine/apk-tools/-/merge_requests/152

Was the other proposal using “custom tags” too limited or complex/complicated?

sppmaster · 2024-11-26T08:20:07.260Z

I currently get this on main snapshots.

image576×599 41.8 KB

Is it expected.

dannil · 2024-11-26T18:15:51.128Z

Yes, currently APK prints those messages to stderr instead of stdout, it is a known issue, nothing to do with OpenWrt itself.

github.com/openwrt/luci

luci-app-package-manager: apk update: fetch of package.adb index is shown in Errors output

opened 09:31AM - 13 Nov 24 UTC

ynezz

### Is there an existing issue for this? - [X] I have searched the existing iss…ues ### screenshots or captures ![image](https://github.com/user-attachments/assets/52cbdac3-4465-445b-9e02-cccb5bc06237) ### Actual behaviour 1. Go to https://192.168.1.1/cgi-bin/luci/admin/system/package-manager 2. Click on `Update lists...` action button 3. Once the `apk update` finishes it shows the output in the Errors section, which is misleading as its not an error ### Errors ``` fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/targets/x86/64/packages/packages.adb fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/x86_64/base/packages.adb fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/targets/x86/64/kmods/6.6.60-1-2e46b6878177e1dea330c0dbbbcfb6be/packages.adb fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/x86_64/luci/packages.adb fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/x86_64/packages/packages.adb fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/x86_64/routing/packages.adb fetch https://downloads.openwrt.org/snapshots/packages/x86_64/telephony/packages.adb ``` ### Expected behaviour Only errors/issues are shown in the `Errors` section. ### Steps to reproduce 1. Go to https://192.168.1.1/cgi-bin/luci/admin/system/package-manager 2. Click on `Update lists...` action button ### Additional Information ```shell { "kernel": "6.6.60", "hostname": "OpenWrt", "system": "13th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i9-13900HX", "model": "QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009)", "board_name": "qemu-standard-pc-q35-ich9-2009", "rootfs_type": "squashfs", "release": { "distribution": "OpenWrt", "version": "SNAPSHOT", "revision": "r28056-40b8fbaa97", "target": "x86/64", "description": "OpenWrt SNAPSHOT r28056-40b8fbaa97", "builddate": "1731280190" } } ``` ### What browsers do you see the problem on? Firefox ### Relevant log output _No response_

GitLab

db: make db fetch output text less verbose (!243) · Merge requests · alpine /...

Use apk_msg instead of apk_notice for "fetch URL" message to skip printing redundant info in stderr on normal execution without error. Such info are already printed...

stangri · 2024-11-26T20:59:38.561Z

I'm getting an error on package deletion:

root@OpenWrt:~# apk del luci-app-pbr pbr
(1/6) Purging luci-app-pbr (1.1.7-r61)
Executing luci-app-pbr-1.1.7-r61.pre-deinstall
(2/6) Purging pbr (1.1.7-r61)
Executing pbr-1.1.7-r61.pre-deinstall
Stopping pbr service... OK
Removing rc.d symlink for pbr... OK
Executing pbr-1.1.7-r61.post-deinstall
ERROR: lib/apk/exec/pbr-1.1.7-r61.post-deinstall: execve: No such file or directory
ERROR: pbr-1.1.7-r61.post-deinstall: script exited with error 127

Do I need a deinstall script in the Makefile in addition to the prerm/postrm scripts?

wterlave89 · 2024-11-27T00:45:30.939Z

The OpenWrt developers have decided to use opkg in 24.10, remove the option to build it with APK support, and postpone the APK switch in release branches until the 25.xx series. This will give them more time to work out any remaining issues with it in OpenWrt main.

http://lists.openwrt.org/pipermail/openwrt-devel/2024-November/043431.html

@hauke ~~Meeting notes have not yet been posted~~, nor any release goals for this upcoming series.

Edit: Meeting notes have now been posted.

jjm2473 · 2024-11-27T04:10:18.088Z

Since we are not switching to apk in 24.10, can we use apk v2 or apk v4 or other names (in short, non-adb format) in 25.xx? I think adb (apk v3) is not a good design.

wterlave89 · 2024-11-27T04:41:13.076Z

I don't think there's any chance that OpenWrt developers are going to suddenly revert to apk v2. If you have valid, detailed, and constructive feedback and factual analysis about problems with apk v3 and how exactly it could possibly be improved upon in a future apk v4, the place to discuss that is in the Alpine Linux community, such as on the apk-tools mailing list. See also: contributing to Alpine Linux.

However, from what I've read, the Alpine Linux distribution itself hasn't yet switched to apk v3. I imagine it'll be quite a while before a potential apk v4 comes around, and OpenWrt 25.xx will most likely use apk-mbedtls v3.

Disclaimer: I am neither an OpenWrt nor an Alpine developer.

efahl · 2024-11-27T05:06:32.867Z

wterlave89:

I don't think there's any chance that OpenWrt developers are going to suddenly revert to apk v2.

All of the changes that OpenWrt devs have submitted upstream to the apk-tools project are on the master branch and hence v3-only. Backporting them to v2 would be a huge task and a real waste of time.

wterlave89:

Alpine Linux distribution itself hasn't yet switched to apk v3.

Correct again, stable Alpine (3.20) is still on apk-tools 2.14. I've been running it on one of my laptops for a while and keep it up-to-date on a weekly basis, so I can see when things are upgraded. I think if you were to use "edge" (their equivalent of OpenWrt's "snapshot") you'd get apk-tools v3.

jjm2473 · 2024-11-27T10:03:03.811Z

Even in alpine edge, apk v2 is still used. Check these links:

https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/edge/main/x86_64/APKINDEX.tar.gz
https://dl-cdn.alpinelinux.org/alpine/edge/main/x86_64/alpine-sdk-1.1-r0.apk

aparcar · 2024-11-27T16:11:34.012Z

Would this be enough for most people?

github.com/openwrt/openwrt

base-files: add migration information for APK

openwrt:main ← aparcar:motd

opened 04:10PM - 27 Nov 24 UTC

aparcar

+18 -0

If the `apk` package manager is installed, show a table of common commands to de…al with the system.

phinn · 2024-11-27T17:42:30.452Z

Personally not a fan of it, people should run a simple "apk --help" command like one would do on every single CLI program Linux wide.

totkeks · 2024-11-27T18:42:08.005Z

I think there are a lot of different people here with different backgrounds. I like the assumption, but not everyone thinks like that. Or considers using a websearch or even a LLM to answer most of their questions.

The question would be: who are you trying to cater to? Who is your user?

dkachel7258 · 2024-11-27T21:00:00.194Z

If the APK package manager is installed, perhaps (for a while) display a notice that points to the documentation for introductory material and commands needed to perform common tasks (that they may already know how to do with OPKG)?

The audience for this would probably be people who already have a little experience with installing/using OpenWrt, but are not new users or very experienced users.

The documentation could contain introductory material on the topic, how to perform common tasks, and then a full reference section (if appropriate).

FWIW, as a person who has several decades of IT experience, including years of writing documentation and knowledge base articles, I personally find MAN pages and --help text to be fairly unhelpful for me because what I often need is introductory/primer information, not reference information (which may use unfamiliar terminology on top of that). And web searches can be rather time consuming to find the useful gem that I actually need to read.

The first time I encountered APK on a SNAPSHOT upgrade, I mostly needed to know what commands to use to get my router upgraded and running again. I seem to recall that it took a router swap and about 45 minutes of research and tinkering to get OpenWrt up again.

ynezz · 2024-11-27T21:13:42.671Z

If the APK package manager is installed, perhaps (for a while) display a notice that points to the documentation for introductory material and commands needed to perform common tasks (that they may already know how to do with OPKG)?

https://github.com/openwrt/openwrt/commit/c19c31f7aa6f9952b5d5e1b313eca79d4e7ed59c

castillofrancodamian · 2024-11-27T21:33:00.701Z

Is it correct that with apk, the "Available" tab shows the installed packages? With opkg it didn't show anything.

efahl · 2024-11-27T21:36:53.208Z

That may be due to the ongoing issue with ABI-versioned names. Is it all packages, or just some like jansson4 vs jansson, libgcc1 vs libgcc and so on?