Hey fellow Linux enthusiasts! I’ve been using Manjaro for a while now and have relied heavily on the AUR (Arch User Repository) for its extensive package collection. However, I’ve encountered a particular package that hasn’t seen updates in months, which has me exploring alternatives. Can anyone recommend an exhaustive package manager that’s as user-friendly and comprehensive as the AUR? I’d love to hear your suggestions and experiences with other package managers on Manjaro. Thanks in advance for your insights!
The AUR isn’t a package manager. It’s a package repository that you can use a package manager (on Manjaro it’s probably pamac) to install from.
There really isn’t a more extensive package repository than the AUR, and there’s definitely not one for any Arch based distro. If the package hasn’t been updated in a while, you might have to go to the project website and check for an alternative install method, like Flatpak, AppImage, or a precompiled binary.
ETA - someone pointed out Nix, which I had totally forgotten about. I feel like everything else I say here stands though.
As a side note, and I’m likely to get jumped on by Manjaro fans for this, but on Manjaro extensive use of the AUR can lead to system instability. This is because the official repos for Manjaro are out of sync with the Arch repos, and you can run into dependency problems.
get jumped on by Manjaro fans
nah, we appreciate the nuance instead of mAnJARo bAd. I agree the AUR can be a problem and in the past so has, but for me hasn’t in a while and never severe
I try to avoid any kind of “ThiNG BAd” statements. They’re just not helpful, and they tend to piss off anyone who likes the thing.
Thanks for not jumping on me, though. I really don’t mean any offense, just trying to be helpful.
check for an alternative install method, like Flatpak,
If anyone wants to go the Flatpak route, think about enabling Flatpak in the Manjaro package manager. That way you’ll keep a centralised overview of installed software and the package manager will handle any updates.
As the other people have commented, Manjaro is a really poor choice if you are planning to use AUR. I would suggest you choose another Arch based OS, like Endeavour.
NixOS that was suggested here is very nice but has a steep learning curve.
Give Distrobox a try.
I don’t think anyone was suggesting NixOS, just the Nix package manager and repository, which will work on any distro. There’s still a bit of a learning curve, but it’s not as steep.
Yes, my bad, you are correct.
only other repository that’s on the scale of AUR is the Nix repository – more packages and more up-to-date packages
(and you can install the Nix package manager on whatever OS without having to replace your OS with NixOS)
The reason why people think nix has a larger repo is because nix has only 1 repo for everything, were arch has 3 main and 4 testing and then the aur. If arch lumped everything into one repo it too could say it has 80k+ packages.
Solid point!
So let’s say I ran the multiuser command and installed the repo. How do I install packages after that? I’m assuming I won’t use pacman, and would have to use something from nix? Sorry if this sounds dumb, I’ve never tried nix and know nothing about it.
heads up: I don’t have any experience with either the package manager or NixOS, but I’ve been looking over both because I like both the idea of a declarative system (everything defined by one master config file) and an immutable system (harder to break things)
for just using the package manager – you can use their online package search which will give you options for installing using the package manager (
nix-env), installing under NixOS (editingconfiguration.nix), or trying out a temporary install (nix-shell) – ex. installing Firefox ESR on a non-NixOS system would benix-env -iA nixpkgs.firefox-esrthe full manual for the package manager is also online – but a big heads up, if you’re planning on doing anything beyond just installing/removing packages, things can get a little hairy – Nix uses their own functional programming language (also called Nix) to define/declare everything
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None. Arch repos + AUR have the highest availability of any Linux repository.
You can look at the PKGBUILD file and update it yourself. Most of the time it’s just a version bump and you’re good. If that’s the case, I think you can also take over maintaining it if you want to share the wealth.
I second this. Learning how to maintain your own PKGBUILD will save you a ton of headache in the long run, especially if you use something that locks you out until you update (like Discord, those bastards)
AFAIK nixpkgs is bigger than the AIR, and nix is distro-agnostic
However, I’ve encountered a particular package that hasn’t seen updates in months
Please specify which package.
Have you checked the source git repo to see if that was updated?
If the app you speak of is a -git type then the aur page will have an old date but the repo where the source is will be new and current.
It could also be that the app you speak of is abandoned, try sending a msg to the maintainer.
You could try the nix package manager
I woukd suggest the Nix package manager. Its repository, Nixpkgs, is larger than the AUR, so I guess it would work.
That’s not true
Nixpkgs was, last I checked, larger than the AUR.
Accoding to repology.org as of now, 18th September 2023:
By total number of packaged projects:
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nix (nixpkgs): 86,732
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AUR: 74,315
By number of non-unique packaged projects:
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nix (nixpkgs): 68,902
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AUR: 37,152
By number of projects with up to date packages:
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nix (nixpkgs): 57,085
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AUR: 22,386
Nixpkgs includes all the packages that the base repos in Arch does, as well as much of the stuff you’d find in the AUR, which doesn’t generally include base packages unless there’s a variant someone wants to post.
Comparing it would be like taking core + extras + mutilib + AUR, and I’m pretty sure that would be a very different number.
I don’t know, looking at the number of non-unique packaged projects, I think if you do the math, you get pretty much the same number of packages. I have only ever found 2 packages that I used on Arch that are not available on NixOS, Nitroshare and nwg-look. For a tiling window manager user that uses some pretty niche packages, I think that’s pretty, pretty good, eh?
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You can give a try to Portage Prefix
