#28 Review update frequency policy
Closed: Won't fix 4 years ago by catanzaro. Opened 6 years ago by catanzaro.

For the past several weeks, I've been getting notified about new updates that are available to install every single day. We should review our policy regarding update frequency. I think only urgent updates (security or non-security) should trigger the daily notification: all other updates should wait for the weekly notification. Also, flatpak nightlies should wait for the weekly notification same as everything else: subscribing to a nightly doesn't mean you want to update every single day, it just means you want the newest version.

Of course, if the user manually performs a check for new updates, then all available updates should be presented.

We should also review the timing. Currently checks for updates seem to occur in the morning, right after I boot my computer. I apply the updates at the very end of the day, when I turn it off. Then when I boot it in the morning, there are more updates right away. We should smooth this out.


Metadata Update from @catanzaro:
- Issue tagged with: meeting

6 years ago

Here is the diagram that describes the logic in gnome-software, from back when I implemented it. But I believe it is still accurate.

https://bug709121.bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=256126

In the meeting today, we noted Bodhi (the updates mechanism in Fedora infra) currently does batching of non-urgent updates: https://rungehoc.wordpress.com/2017/08/07/bodhi-101-an-updates-life-cycle/

@mclasen said he planned to talk to Richard about how the logic and timing in gnome-software interact with bodhi, to see if there are issues still to address. The WG consensus was indeed that we don't want to bug users daily about non-urgent updates, although to pull them down silently in advance was fine.

According the Richard, the only time we should see daily notifications is when there is a security update waiting.

Perhaps this was a flatpak specific issue? @catanzaro?

Perhaps this was a flatpak specific issue? @catanzaro?

It's possible that flatpak exacerbates this issue. I have Builder installed from the GNOME nightly repo, so that I get a recent version, but that should not affect update frequency in any way. I only want to hear about Builder updates once per week at most, unless there is an urgent security update.

However, overaggressive update notifications have been an issue since long before Software had any flatpak support. The vast majority of security updates fix minor issues and are not worth notifying about daily. Only updates marked urgent should go out immediately (including urgent non-security updates!). All other updates should wait until the next weekly batch.

Lastly, 6 AM is not a good time to check for updates in general. I want to install updates when I shut down my computer at the end of the day, not at the beginning of the day. Getting this notification when I boot my computer each morning is just annoying. Either we should move the check until another time, or we should wait to send a notification about pending updates until after the updates have been available for a long time without being applied (e.g. >24 hours). Ideally I would never see an update notification ever, because I turn off my computer at the end of the day and will just check the checkbox on the shutdown dialog: there's no need to prompt me to do it separately from that. Of course we should notify about urgent updates immediately, but I'm hoping those are rare.

However, overaggressive update notifications have been an issue since long before Software had any flatpak support. The vast majority of security updates fix minor issues and are not worth notifying about daily. Only updates marked urgent should go out immediately (including urgent non-security updates!). All other updates should wait until the next weekly batch.

The Bodhi change that batches updates weekly is fairly recent. Hopefully you were able to familiarize yourself with how that works (see earlier link).

Lastly, 6 AM is not a good time to check for updates in general. I want to install updates when I shut down my computer at the end of the day, not at the beginning of the day. Getting this notification when I boot my computer each morning is just annoying. Either we should move the check until another time, or we should wait to send a notification about pending updates until after the updates have been available for a long time without being applied (e.g. >24 hours). Ideally I would never see an update notification ever, because I turn off my computer at the end of the day and will just check the checkbox on the shutdown dialog: there's no need to prompt me to do it separately from that. Of course we should notify about urgent updates immediately, but I'm hoping those are rare.

As do we all. I agree that first thing in the morning doesn't seem ideal. That's when I expect to be doing work, not waiting to do it.

The Bodhi change that batches updates weekly is fairly recent. Hopefully you were able to familiarize yourself with how that works (see earlier link).

Sorry, I missed that comment. Looking at the meeting log, I agree with Kalev. Now that bodhi is doing this work for us, perhaps displaying all available updates immediately makes more sense. Especially since, as Ryan says, we don't want to get into a situation where updates get delayed by one week by Bodhi and then a second week by gnome-software. (But that only works for OS updates, not for flatpaks. We of course do not want to show daily notifications for flatpak updates.)

Especially since, as Ryan says, we don't want to get into a situation where updates get delayed by > one week by Bodhi and then a second week by gnome-software.

Thats not going to happen. gnome-software checks daily, and notifies if the last notification was more than a week ago.

And making changes in gnome-software depending on bodhi behavior is, needless to say, not something we can really push upstream. I don't really want to carry a downstream patch for this, in particular when it is is unnecessary.

I think the issue here is resolved; we should be able to observe results in F27.

Metadata Update from @pfrields:
- Issue untagged with: meeting
- Issue close_status updated to: Fixed

6 years ago

Metadata Update from @pfrields:
- Issue status updated to: Open (was: Closed)

6 years ago

We decided that batched bodhi updates are sufficient to handle this from a Fedora package perspective.

I'm not certain, but we might still have a problem with Flatpak updates. I will ask the Software maintainers about this.

OK, I discussed with Richard and he agreed this should be changed, but doesn't have time to implement it. @kalev, is it something you could handle?

hughsie mcatanzaro, i guess we need to change the default from "no update metadata -> high prio" to "no update metadata -> low prio"
mcatanzaro  hughsie: Can you make it happen? :)
hughsie mcatanzaro, at the moment, no, sorry
hughsie is backlogged
mcatanzaro  OK, do you want a bug report or shall we just keep it in the Workstation tracker for now, where it will bug kalev every once in a while :P
hughsie i think bugging kalev might get you a fix quicker :)
mcatanzaro  Yes OK

Oops, #107 is a duplicate of this. Let's continue there, since it has newer discussion.

Metadata Update from @catanzaro:
- Issue close_status updated to: Won't fix
- Issue status updated to: Closed (was: Open)

4 years ago

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