I have noticed that certain files have been overwritten during updates. This is for sure an expected behaviour during an update, but for some files like ~/.vimrc or the novnc*.service files (I wanted to get rid of the unencrpted warning) this can be a bit annoying.
Suggestion: at least make a backup copy before overwriting.
Have I told you about my life and death struggle with zynthian_pwm_fan.service…?
There are indeed many files that are blatted by an update. I have been caught out by this many time. Even files one might not expect to go, do. I don’t think it is reasonable for zynthian to make backups of all files on every update. We have already, just this week heard of disks filling up. The update mechanism is mindful of how the system should be configured and we must consider this an embedded system, not a desktop OS. Users making bespoke or custom changes should be considering this and making their own backups.
If there is an enhancement to the config, then please raise a ticket and offer a patch.
You could chattr +i the files, then they will be immutable even by root. You have to chattr -i them first if they are be written to again.
I did the same with zynthian_wsleds_base.py, in which during start all leds will be set to on instead of off, which leads to an eye-piercing blue flash with my transparent keypad on every boot. so I modified on to off and chattr +i the file and now it will not be overwritten. The same I did with multitouch.py to get rid of the dreaded touch rotation on the HDMI screen. Issues are filed, but seem to have drowned in the flood.
Update will continue to run, but show an error. Consequence could be breaking something if a file has to be modified.