
list-transient

This operation expects no arguments. It lists the packages that are currently
in transient states. Transient states are called so because your goal is to
perform operations so the packages are moved to non-transient states. The
tutorial has more information about package states.

Shortly, transient states are:

new		To indicate that a package has been added to the tree.
outdated	To indicate that your version needs an upgrade.
unavailable	To indicate that the package has apparently been removed.

New packages are usually installed or skipped, so they are moved to the
installed or not-installed states. Outdated packages are usually upgraded, so
they are moved to the installed state. Unavailable packages are usually removed
to mimic the removal of the package from its remote source, but they can
occasionally represent foreign packages that have not been marked as foreign
yet.

It's important to note that usually, you want to upgrade the key system
packages first. Key system packages are aaa_glibc-solibs, glibc-solibs, sed
and pkgtools, so they are listed first by list-transient if they are outdated.
Usually, the next sane step to take is to handle new packages, then outdated
packages and finally unavailable packages. Hence, this is the order in which
list-transient lists the packages.

However, you need to understand that this may not always be the correct order.
The order in which to proceed is completely up to you and should be based on
general good practices, common sense and specific information that may be found
in the change log entries.

Also see: upgrade-key-packages, install, not-installed, upgrade, remove.

