Pacman

Pacman

Release Status	Maintained
Last Release	6.1.0, 2024-03-04
Language(s)	C
Developer(s)	Arch Linux
Website	pacman.archlinux.page

Pacman

Intro

The Linux distribution Arch Linux and its derivatives usually use a package manager called Pacman, invokable as pacman. More information can be found on the relevant Arch Wiki page, located here. Pacman is a binary distribution package manager, and only has builds for x86_64, though some have tried creating alternative ports. The most common usages of Pacman are to install, search, update, and query packages.

Flags

Pacman uses a flag scheme involving one main flag (uppercase) and many minor flags (lowercase). The most commonly used main flags are -S for "sync", -R for removal, and -Q for querying. Sync and query are similar, but sync looks for (and installs) packages from the Arch Linux repositories, while query only finds currently installed packages.

Minor flags may be appended to the main flags, slightly changing their behavior. For example, -Su upgrades a package and -Ss searches for them, both via the online repositories.

Usage

The following are several common usages of Pacman. In all cases where applicable, the given operation can also be performed on multiple packages at once by simply writing them all out separated by a space, i.e. pacman -S package1 package2

Common Pacman Commands

Command	Description
pacman -S package-name	(Re)install a given package
pacman -Ss search-termpacman -Qs search-term	Search the online repositories or local package database for a given package
pacman -Si package-namepacman -Qi package-name	Get info about a package from the online repositories or local package database
pacman -Sy package-name	Install the latest version of a package without upgrading the entire system (not recommended, causes a partial upgrade)
pacman -Syu	Update system's packages; Listed packages will also be installed alongside the update
pacman -Syyu	Update system's packages, forcing a listing update (not recommended)
pacman -R package-name	Remove a given package
pacman -Rs package-name	Remove a package and its unneeded dependencies
pacman -Rns package-name	Remove a package, it's dependencies, and any global configuration files
pacman -Rsc package-name	Remove a package and all of its dependencies, even if need by other packages (not recommended)
pacman -Qdt	List packages installed as dependencies that are no longer needed as dependencies (orphans)

Removing Packages

The recommended ways to remove packages are pacman -R package-name, pacman -Rs package-name, and pacman -Rns package-name. The functionality of each of these commands is described within the table under #Common Usages.

When removing packages, -Rsc should be used sparingly. If you wish to remove unneeded dependencies to save space (or for other reasons), use -Rs, or simply remove with -R and find the orphaned packages using -Qdt. If the q flag is added, the output will be "quiet" and can be chained with another -R command, i.e. pacman -R $(pacman -Qdtq)

Dangerous Commands

TODO: Include information about the following arguments: -Sy, -Syyu, -Rsc

Repositories

Repository	Purpose
core	Packages necessary for a base Arch installation
extra	Packages that are not critical to a functioning Arch system
multilib	32 bit (x86) packages that are not critical to a functioning Arch system

Testing repositories

Testing repositories allow users to test software before it's pushed to all users. The Testing Repo Forum should be used to report any bugs encountered while on the testing repositories.

Using Testing

To begin using testing, uncomment the [<repo>-testing] entries in /etc/pacman.conf as well as their corresponding Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist entries. All testing repositories should be enabled at once to avoid a partial upgrade.

See Also

pacman - ArchWiki

Pacman Home Page