I use the ‘xfig’ package a lot. I started using it way back in the early 2000’s. It requires the ‘transfig’ package and a few other libraries like libXaw3d, and some XFonts. It used to be simple. Now for some reason, the texlive package has been made a prerequisite for transfig. Try updating dependency transfig on openSuse 15 and you’ll see this whopper:
>The following package is going to be upgraded:
> transfig
>
>1 package to upgrade, 2150 new.
>Overall download size: 847.9 MiB. Already cached: 0 B. After the operation, additional 1.3
>GiB will be used.
Really?!? 2150 new packages related to texlive taking 1.3GB? That’s just not right. SO- I have reverted to an older version of xfig/transfig that does not have all these texlive dependencies. BUT- the automatic update feature continues to ask me to upgrade transfig, which I don’t want to do.
Can I tell the autoupdater to ignore transfig/xfig for now? I am not going to install 1.3GB of texlive that I don’t need.
Yeah,
The Tex install is that large.
If your app currently uses Tex, then maybe the packages to be upgraded are that large but the additional space used might not be as much. If your app was ported to using Tex, then the additional space used will be that large.
But,
If you don’t upgrade, then there will be consequences…
Maybe your app will break.
Maybe your app will work for now but will break soon.
Maybe there are unpatched vulnerabilities or features you won’t get, which could affect your system or User experience.
Bottom line though is that a good part of the world has standardized on Tex and if you create any documents that will eventually be modified by others, you should follow the recommendation to install the newer version.