Alpine / Arch Linux: .apk-new and .pacnew files

18 Jan, 2022 • 347 words • 2 min • updated 03 Jan, 2026

⚠️ This post is over one year old. It may no longer be up to date or relevant. Opinions may have changed.

As packages are upgraded over time, updated configs files under /etc may arise. Different package managers treat this issue differently.

Alpine Linux #

apk creates .apk-new files, which can be located and merged by running doas update-conf. Here is a recent example:

     shell
     
   
% doas update-conf
--- //etc/securetty
+++ //etc/securetty.apk-new
@@ -12,3 +12,6 @@
 tty11
 hvc0
 ttyS0
+ttyS1
+ttyAMA0
+ttyAMA1
New //etc/securetty available:
Quit, Next, Show diff, Edit new, Zap new, Use new (q/n/s/e/z/u) [s] u

Arch Linux #

pacman creates .pacnew files, which can be located and merged by running sudo pacdiff. Here is a recent example:

     shell
     
   
% sudo pacdiff
==> pacnew file found for /etc/sudoers
:: (V)iew, (S)kip, (R)emove pacnew, (O)verwrite with pacnew, (Q)uit: [v/s/r/o/q]

Tip: The pacdiff-pacman-hook-git package helpfully adds a pacman hook that automatically checks whether there are any due .pacnew files upon upgrading the system (pacman -Syu), being a simple and effective way to automate this maintenance task. It looks like this:

     shell
     
   
: Running post-transaction hooks...
(1/5) Reloading system manager configuration...
(2/5) Creating temporary files...
(3/5) Arming ConditionNeedsUpdate...
(4/5) Registering Haskell modules...
(5/5) Reviewing .pacnew files...

/etc/sudoers.pacnew ⟶   /etc/sudoers
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

────┐
76: │
────┘
 ##
 ## User privilege specification
 ##
-root ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
+root ALL=(ALL) ALL

 ## Uncomment to allow members of group wheel to execute any command
-# %wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
+# %wheel ALL=(ALL) ALL

 ## Same thing without a password
-# %wheel ALL=(ALL:ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL
+# %wheel ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL

 ## Uncomment to allow members of group sudo to execute any command
-# %sudo    ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
+# %sudo    ALL=(ALL) ALL

 ## Uncomment to allow any user to run sudo if they know the password
 ## of the user they are running the command as (root by default).
 # Defaults targetpw  # Ask for the password of the target user
-# ALL ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL  # WARNING: only use this together with 'Defaults targetpw'
+# ALL ALL=(ALL) ALL  # WARNING: only use this together with 'Defaults targetpw'

 ## Read drop-in files from /etc/sudoers.d
 @includedir /etc/sudoers.d
 :: Searching databases for updates...
 :: Searching AUR for updates...
  there is nothing to do