On Archlinux it is not recommended to update only one package with the package manager pacman. Let’s say I have 11 packages, and one of them is extra/firefox (true story). Updating only a pacman -S firefox could introduce problems, but installing a new single package if it wasn’t there is okay.
So my question is, could we get around this by removing and installing the same package again in one go: pacman -Rs firefox && pacman -S firefox
It is OK to use ‘-S’ only if all installed packages are on the same level as the cached package info. That is assuming that the cached version of the package is still available on package servers.
I just think you’re being too literal about this, instead of thinking about the reasoning behind that rule.