metapac

multi-backend declarative package manager

metapac allows you maintain consistent packages among multiple machines and make setting up a new system with your preferred packages from your preferred package managers much easier.

Installation

Cargo

cargo install metapac

Arch User Repository

paru -S metapac

paru -S metapac-bin

Meta

metapac is a meta package manager, that means it does not directly implement the functionality to install packages on your system, instead it provides a standardised interface for installing packages from other package managers. See the Supported Backends section for a list of the currently supported backend package managers.

Declarative

metapac is also a declarative package manager, that means that you declare in .toml group files the packages you would like installed on your system and then run one of the metapac commands which read these group files and then operate on your system to do some function such as install packages in your group files that are not present on your system yet (metapac sync), or remove packages present on your system but not in your group files (metapac clean).

The group files are then stored with your other system configuration files and so can be tracked with version control.

Getting Started

Migrating a default system into metapac

Run metapac unmanaged and save the output into a group file in metapac's groups/ folder, see the Group Files section for the exact location of this folder on your operating system.

For example, on linux this would mean:

mkdir -p ~/.config/metapac/groups
metapac unmanaged > ~/.config/metapac/groups/all.toml

Now metapac won't try to remove any of your explicitly installed packages when you run metapac clean.

Caution

If you run metapac clean without first configuring your group files with the packages you want installed then metapac will attempt to remove all of your packages.

metapac clean will always show you which packages it intends to remove and ask for confirmation, so make sure to double check that the expected packages are being removed before confirming.

Adding a package to your group files

1. Edit your group files with a text editor to add the package to an existing group file or create a new group file and add the package to it. See the Group Files section for the group file syntax
2. Run the metapac add command, see metapac add --help for arguments

After adding the package to your group files you can then run metapac sync to install the newly added package.

Tip

The first option is recommended since then you can group or organize the order of packages in your group files in a way that is meaningful to you and even add comments in the toml.

Removing a package from your group files

Edit the group file which contains the package you want to remove and delete the package from in the group file. You could even delete the entire group file but that would remove all packages that are in the group file.

After removing the package from your group files you can then run metapac sync to install the newly added package.

Tip

There is not yet a equivalent to the metapac add command for removing packages from your group files, but even if there were a metapac remove command, using a text editor would still be the recommended method for the same reasons as for adding a package.

Advanced usage

For more advanced usage read through the remaining sections, especially the Config section.

Supported Backends

At the moment, these are the supported backends. Pull Requests for adding support for additional backends are welcome!

Backend	Group Name	Notes
pacman/paru/pikaur/yay	[arch]	see the arch_package_manager config
apt	[apt]
brew	[brew]
cargo	[cargo]
dnf	[dnf]
flatpak	[flatpak]
pipx	[pipx]
rustup	[rustup]
snap	[snap]
winget	[winget]
xbps	[xbps]

Config

# metapac's config.toml file (like this one) should be placed in the following location
# dependent on the operating system as specified in the `dirs` crate:
# | Platform | Value                                                 | Example                                                      |
# | -------- | ----------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------ |
# | Linux    | $XDG_CONFIG_HOME or $HOME/.config/metapac/config.toml | /home/alice/.config/metapac/config.toml                      |
# | macOS    | $HOME/Library/Application Support/metapac/config.toml | /Users/Alice/Library/Application Support/metapac/config.toml |
# | Windows  | {FOLDERID_RoamingAppData}\metapac\config.toml         | C:\Users\Alice\AppData\Roaming\metapac\config.toml           |

# To decide which group files are relevant for the current machine
# metapac uses the machine's hostname in the hostname_groups table in
# the config file to get a list of group file names.

# Since pacman, paru, pikaur and yay all operate on the same package database
# they are mutually exclusive and so you must pick which one you want
# metapac to use.
# Must be one of: ["pacman", "paru", "pikaur", "yay"]
# Default: "pacman"
arch_package_manager = "paru"

# Whether to install flatpak packages systemwide or for the current user.
# Default: true
flatpak_systemwide = true

# Backends to disable from all metapac behavior. See the README.md for
# the list of backend names
# Default: []
disabled_backends = ["apt"]

# Whether to use the [hostname_groups] config table to decide which
# group files to use or to use all files in the groups folder.
# Default: false
hostname_groups_enabled = true

# Which group files apply for which hostnames
# paths starting without a / are relative to the groups folder
# Default: None
[hostname_groups]
pc = ["example_group"]
laptop = ["example_group"]
server = ["example_group"]

Group Files

# metapac's group files (like this one) should be placed in the following location
# dependent on the operating system as specified in the `dirs` crate:
# | Platform | Value                                     | Example                                                  |
# | -------- | ----------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------- |
# | Linux    | $XDG_CONFIG_HOME or $HOME/.config/groups/ | /home/alice/.config/metapac/groups/                      |
# | macOS    | $HOME/Library/Application Support/groups/ | /Users/Alice/Library/Application Support/metapac/groups/ |
# | Windows  | {FOLDERID_RoamingAppData}\groups\         | C:\Users\Alice\AppData\Roaming\metapac\groups\           |
#
# The packages for each backend in group files can come in two formats, short-form
# and long-form:
#
# short-form syntax is simply a string of the name of the package.
#
# long-form syntax is a table which contains several fields which can
# optionally be set to specify install options on a per-package basis.
# The "package" field in the table specifies the name of the package.
#
# For example, the following two packages are equivalent:
# arch = [
#  "metapac",
#  { package = "metapac" }
# ]

arch = [
 "metapac",
 # optional_deps: additional packages to install with this package, short-form syntax only
 { package = "metapac",  optional_deps = ["git"] }
]
apt = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac" }
]
brew = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac" }
]
cargo = [
 "metapac",
 # see cargo docs for info on the options
 { package = "metapac", git = "https://github.com/ripytide/metapac", all_features = true, no_default_features = false, features = [ "feature1", ] },
]
dnf = [
 "metapac",
 # see dnf docs for more info on these options
 { package = "metapac", repo = "/etc/yum.repos.d/fedora_extras.repo" },
]
flatpak = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac", remote = "flathub" }
]
pipx = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac" }
]
rustup = [
 "stable",
 # components: extra non-default components to install with this toolchain
 { package = "stable", components = ["rust-analyzer"] }
]
snap = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac" }
]
winget = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac" }
]
xbps = [
 "metapac",
 { package = "metapac" }
]

Credits

This project was forked from https://github.com/steven-omaha/pacdef so credits to the author(s) of that project for all their prior work.