The documentation for this diagram explains that the blue arrows are
automatic processes which happen every six hours. There is no
explanation about how the purple arrows happen or how often.
As a new contributor to nixpkgs, I incorrectly assumed that the purple
arrows were also automatic processes (they aren't), which left me sort
of confused about what the whole scheme was accomplishing.
Recently I went through the github history to see how often these
events happen, and realized that the purple arrows are (a) triggered
manually by a nixpkgs project member and (b) happen much, much, much
less frequently than every six hours.
Now everything makes a lot more sense. I suggest the wording change
in this commit, or something similar, to save future contributors the
same confusion that I experienced.