pkg_mgr: a package browser for OpenBSD

What is it ?

pkg_mgris a user-friendly graphical tool which allows you to manage installed packages, browse available packages by categories, and finally install/uninstall packages.

It has its roots in pkg_select, and takes some ideas too from FreeBSD's sysinstall. And as pkg_* tools, it's written in OO-ish perl (at least i tried..)

History:

• 2008-01-26: git log says 'initial import of pkg_mgr', but i had the idea in mind since months :)
• 2008-03-10: abandon DBIx::Class in favor of DBD::SQLite
• 2008-04-15: announce first release on ports@, pkg_mgr is featured on undeadly!
• 2008-04-17: imported in ports-tree!

Features:

• Browse available packages, sorted by categories.



• See package details.


• Search for a keyword in package names and comments.



• Show installed package list.


• Install/uninstall packages using standard OpenBSD tools pkg_add/pkg_delete (simulations are possible).

Various notes and ideas:

• At the moment, only the curses GUI is available, but a menu-driven and a GTK2 interfaces are in the TODO-list.
• It is in no way a drop-in replacement for existing working tools, and it uses them.
• It doesn't need to be run as root, it will try to use sudo when root privileges are needed.
• The ports-tree is not needed, but in the future it could be used to permit to build packages and select flavors.
• It uses sqlports as data-provider backend, and a plain DBD::SQLite model layer.
• If you're tracking -current, sqlports needs to be reinstalled each time you update your ports-tree with pkg_add -u -F installed sqlports, simply running pkg_add -ui is not enough.
• I've tried using an higher-level model like DBIx::Class and Rose::DB, but it was far slower than plain SQL.
• It doesn't do a lot of things, and bugs are probably lying around, but i have lots of plans for it (and i suppose users will have some too..)
• It should normally work for OpenBSD 4.3 and higher.

Ah, and btw the mandatory download link, and also a port for -current.

Feedback, ideas and critics are welcomed at landry at openbsd dot org.