After being informed by Dirk Muller, I discovered that I might possess a plethora of abandoned packages, and he educated me on how to conduct a check for such occurrences:
> sudo zypper packages --orphaned
[sudo] password for root:
Loading repository data...
Reading installed packages...
S | Repository | Name | Version | Arch
---+------------+---------------------------------------------+------------------------+-------
i+ | @System | libavif13 | 0.9.3-150400.3.3.1 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libcamel-1_2-63 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libcpupower0 | 5.14-150500.9.3.1 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libdleyna-core-1_0-5 | 0.7.0-150400.1.6 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libebackend-1_2-10 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libebook-1_2-20 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libebook-contacts-1_2-3 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libecal-2_0-1 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libedata-book-1_2-26 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libedata-cal-2_0-1 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libedataserver-1_2-26 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libedataserverui-1_2-3 | 3.42.5-150400.3.7.2 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libgupnp-1_2-1 | 1.4.3-150400.1.6 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libgupnp-av-1_0-2 | 0.12.11-1.56 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libgupnp-igd-1_0-4 | 1.2.0-150400.1.10 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libmalcontent-ui-0-0 | 0.10.3-150400.1.9 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libpoppler126 | 23.01.0-150500.3.8.1 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libportal0 | 0.4-150400.1.9 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libprocps7 | 3.3.15-150000.7.34.1 | x86_64
i+ | @System | librav1e0 | 0.5.1+0-150400.1.10 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libsrt1 | 1.3.4-1.45 | x86_64
i+ | @System | libwireplumber-0_4-0 | 0.4.13-150500.3.2.1 | x86_64
i+ | @System | lifecycle-data-sle-module-development-tools | 1-150200.3.27.1 | noarch
i+ | @System | python2-cairo | 1.15.1-150000.3.6.1 | x86_64
i+ | @System | slack | 4.35.131-0.1.el8 | x86_64
i+ | @System | zoom
Clearly, I comprehended the presence of slack and zoom (although I aim to transition to utilizing Flatpaks for those applications – more about that will be discussed later). However, the origins of the other packages remained a mystery to me.
Dirk suggested utilizing tools to assist with this matter, particularly “weakremover.” He mentioned that a zypper du should eliminate all “weakobsoletes.” Unfortunately, upon attempting this method, it failed due to a specific bug related to weakremover in version 15.6.
Simultaneously, he advised assessing each package to determine if it has dependencies using the command rpm -e --test {package_name}. The underscored “package_name” hinted at the upcoming events.
Eventually, I crafted a Python script to automate these actions. If a package had no dependencies, the script would proceed with executing zypper remove {package_name}. When testing the script initially, it revealed that many packages indeed had dependencies. However, upon running the script to remove the packages, they were all successfully deleted! I can only hope that the script sequentially handled the dependent packages and eradicated them first, and that no crucial system components were inadvertently removed.
Presently, everything appears to be functioning as expected, although I have yet to perform a system reboot 🙂
Ultimately, no more unexplained orphaned packages remained:
> sudo zypper packages --orphaned
Loading repository data...
Reading installed packages...
S | Repository | Name | Version | Arch
---+------------+-------+------------------------+-------
i+ | @System | slack | 4.35.131-0.1.el8 | x86_64
i+ | @System | zoom | 5.17.1.1840_openSUSE-1 | x86_64
