Bug#1117685: apt: consider running apt-listchanges after finishing package upgrades

Control: reassign -1 apt-listchanges

On 9 October 2025 19:57:35 CEST, Xiyue Deng <[email protected]> wrote:
>Package: apt
>Version: 3.0.3
>Severity: wishlist
>
>Dear Maintainer,
>
>When running `apt upgrade', `apt-listchanges' is run after packages are
>downloaded and before they are actually upgraded.  The downloading phase
>can be quite long, especially when upgrading from one major Debian
>version to the next and I may attend to other things during that time,
>and when I come back, I found the upgrade was stuck in displaying the
>news from packages by `apt-listchanges', and after quitting, I'll have
>to wait another long time until the upgrades finish.
>
>As `apt-listchanges' just displays the news from packages, and does not
>offer a way to stop or postpone package upgrades, I wonder whether it
>would be possible to run it after packages are upgraded, so that people
>like me won't be surprised that we'll have to wait for another long
>time.  I know there are unattended upgrade options, but for upgrading
>from one major version to the next, it would be better to monitor the
>process somehow which would benefit more from this since the process can
>be quite long.
>
>-- System Information:
>Debian Release: 13.1
>  APT prefers stable-updates
>  APT policy: (500, 'stable-updates'), (500, 'stable-security'), (500, 'stable-debug'), (500, 'stable')
>Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
>
>Kernel: Linux 6.12.48+deb13-amd64 (SMP w/16 CPU threads; PREEMPT)
>Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE not set
>Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
>Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
>LSM: AppArmor: enabled
>
>Versions of packages apt depends on:
>ii  adduser                 3.152
>ii  base-passwd             3.6.7
>ii  debian-archive-keyring  2025.1
>ii  libapt-pkg7.0           3.0.3
>ii  libc6                   2.41-12
>ii  libgcc-s1               14.2.0-19
>ii  libseccomp2             2.6.0-2
>ii  libssl3t64              3.5.1-1+deb13u1
>ii  libstdc++6              14.2.0-19
>ii  libsystemd0             257.8-1~deb13u2
>ii  sqv                     1.3.0-3
>
>Versions of packages apt recommends:
>ii  ca-certificates  20250419
>
>Versions of packages apt suggests:
>pn  apt-doc         <none>
>ii  aptitude        0.8.13-7
>ii  dpkg-dev        1.22.21
>ii  gnupg           2.4.7-21
>pn  powermgmt-base  <none>
>ii  synaptic        0.91.7
>
>-- no debconf information
>


-- 
sent from my phone, excuse the brevity, if any