when installing/removing particular apps, want more flexibility
A feature request.
STR:
- Open the Software app.
- In the title bar, select the Installed button.
- For any app listed, if the app can have been installed in more than one way, look for information on how that app was installed.
Actual result: No such information.
Context:
Apps can be installed in several ways: as part of a distro, separately from the distro but through the Software app, separately from the distro or the Software app, and during a distro update if the distro update offers an app not in the original distro installation.
Multiple versions of an app can also be installed, such as a stable version and a beta version, and they might be installed to coexist, at least temporarily, in the same filesystem.
The Software app shows what is installed.
The problem is that the Software app doesn't help us tell the differences between the above. This becomes an issue when something is wrong with what's on my hard drive and I have to narrow down the cause. While typically an app can be singled out, sometimes a question arises about whether something else is the underlying cause of that app's failure, like if a dependency is shared. Or I might install two versions of one program and I need the Software app to tell the difference, so that I can uninstall just the one I intend to remove.
Expected results:
--- Ability to see details of how an app was installed.
--- Ability to choose which of superficially identical apps to remove.
A solution:
--- A distro should store a list, perhaps as a date-time-stamped text file, of the apps it is including subject to the user who is installing opting against some of what's on the list. Then, the Software app would read the list, determine if anything on the list did not get installed, mark in its own display the apps installed as having come with the distro, and record the text file's date-time stamp.
--- If a distro update would add an app not in the distro previously, the distro's text file would be updated to list the new app and it would get a new date-time stamp. (It would do likewise for unsupporting an app already installed.) The Software app would notice the new or modified text file, check it, and update the app info it displays accordingly (likewise for newly unsupported apps).
--- If an app that is not in the Explore section of the Software app is installed, it would be labeled in the Installed section as an outlier, as a user might consider it a prime suspect for problems with other apps.
--- If an app is installed that appears to the Software app as identical to one the Software app already treats as installed, it could ask the user how s/he would want the new app to be labeled and/or it could default to the installation date-time based on completion of installation, and display the label in its app info.
--- If an app is not offered through the Software app under Explore but has been installed by another means (such as a CLI terminal running dnf), is not present solely for dependency for one or more other apps or the OS, and is not recognized by the Software app as installed (if the Software app recognizes all installed apps regardless of absence under Explore then this is irrelevant to the feature request), then list it as installed and offer the option to remove it with a caution that it cannot be reinstalled through the Software app but might be available through another means.