Score:3

How to automatically find the 'freshest' PPA for a given package?

cn flag

Exact use case:

  • I've potentially found a bug in a program (specifically i3-gaps).
  • As I don't have the latest version installed the maintainer asked that I install the latest version to check if bug is still there.
  • I've originally installed the tool from a PPA. Checking this PPA, there is no version more recent there. Only version is quite outdated.
  • So I'm looking for other PPAs. I found this page: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+ppas?name_filter=i3-gaps
  • If I select one PPA, I can get info on the exact version number(s) found there and its/their compile time.
  • There are tens of available PPAs. Checking each one manually is tedious...

So my Question: Is there a means/How to automatically find the PPA with the freshest version of a package ? "freshness" could be in terms of version number or compile time (as these 2 metrics seem to be available) ; for the moment I don't care.

Thanks

Michal Przybylowicz avatar
eg flag
I think the best way to obtain latest version is to use GitHub and compile i3 yourself. It's not that difficult. Try it.
us flag
This one is quite fresh, and it is maintained by the regolith team. https://launchpad.net/~regolith-linux/+archive/ubuntu/stable
Score:4
zw flag

The answer my be divided in three parts:

  1. Search for specific Ubuntu codename is not implemented, but already reported to LaunchPad as bug 1820387, search for package version is not implemented, you have to report such bug by yourself.

  2. Search on local machine maybe done by Y PPA Manager as follows

    • Install it first by

      sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/y-ppa-manager
      sudo apt-get update
      sudo apt-get install y-ppa-manager
      
    • then run search using its GUI or by commandline y-ppa-search then specify package name i3-gaps to get something like shown below, sort by Version column:

      Search result for 18.04 LTS Y PPA Manager search for i3-gaps

      and then optionally add PPA with highest version by click on Add Selected PPA button, then install newest package by sudo apt-get dist-upgrade.

  3. Search on local machine also maybe done by user-created python script named pyppasearch as follows

    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get install python3-requests python3-bs4 python3-launchpadlib
    
    cd ~/Downloads
    wget -c https://raw.githubusercontent.com/anenasa/pyppasearch/main/pyppasearch.py
    chmod +x pyppasearch.py
    

    Then we can run search using below command:

    ./pyppasearch.py -c bionic -a amd64 i3-gaps
    

    to get results like shown below:

    i3-gaps 4.17.1-1ubuntu1~ppa5 ppa:regolith-linux/experimental Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.18.2-1~regolith2 ppa:rynojvr/ppa Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.17.1-1ubuntu1~ppa4 ppa:kgilmer/regolith-unstable Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.17.1-1ubuntu1~ppa5 ppa:regolith-linux/regolith-1.4.1 Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.17.1-1ubuntu1~ppa5 ppa:regolith-linux/r1.3 Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.19.1-1ubuntu1 ppa:regolith-linux/release Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.19.1-1ubuntu1 ppa:regolith-linux/stable Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.19.1-1ubuntu1 ppa:regolith-linux/unstable Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.17.1-1ubuntu1~ppa5 ppa:a-weller/regolithtest Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.18.2-1~regolith2 ppa:kgilmer/speed-ricer Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.17.1-1ubuntu1~ppa4 ppa:kgilmer/regolith-stable Bionic (amd64)
    i3-gaps 4.17.1-0york0~18.04 ppa:jonathonf/i3 Bionic (amd64)
    Search is finished.
    

    They are absolutely equal to those from Y PPA Manager, the differences are in the order of appearance.

mangohost

Post an answer

Most people don’t grasp that asking a lot of questions unlocks learning and improves interpersonal bonding. In Alison’s studies, for example, though people could accurately recall how many questions had been asked in their conversations, they didn’t intuit the link between questions and liking. Across four studies, in which participants were engaged in conversations themselves or read transcripts of others’ conversations, people tended not to realize that question asking would influence—or had influenced—the level of amity between the conversationalists.