What is Meta Package Manager?

• provides the mpm CLI, a wrapper around all package managers

• mpm is like yt-dlp, but for package managers instead of videos

• mpm solves XKCD #1654 - Universal Install Script

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Quick start

Thanks to uv, you can run mpm on any platform in one command, without installation or venv:

$ uvx meta-package-manager

Features

• Inventory and list all package managers available on the system.

• Supports macOS, Linux and Windows.

• Standalone executables for Linux, macOS and Windows.

• List installed packages.

• List duplicate installed packages.

• Search for packages.

• Install a package.

• Remove a package.

• List outdated packages.

• Sync local package infos.

• Upgrade all outdated packages.

• Backup list of installed packages to TOML file.

• Restore/install list of packages from TOML files.

• Software Bill of Materials: export installed packages to SPDX and CycloneDX SBOM files.

• Pin-point commands to a subset of package managers (include/exclude selectors).

• Support plain, versioned and purl package specifiers.

• Export output to JSON or user-friendly tables.

• Shell auto-completion for Bash, Zsh and Fish.

• Provides a Xbar/SwiftBar plugin for friendly macOS integration.

• Because mpm try to wrap all other package managers, it became another pathological case of XKCD #927: Standards

Supported package managers

One CLI to rule them all:

        ---
config:
  sankey:
    height: 400
    showValues: false
    width: 800

---
sankey-beta

Meta Package Manager,apm,1
Meta Package Manager,apt,1
Meta Package Manager,apt-mint,1
Meta Package Manager,brew,1
Meta Package Manager,cargo,1
Meta Package Manager,cask,1
Meta Package Manager,choco,1
Meta Package Manager,composer,1
Meta Package Manager,dnf,1
Meta Package Manager,dnf5,1
Meta Package Manager,emerge,1
Meta Package Manager,eopkg,1
Meta Package Manager,flatpak,1
Meta Package Manager,fwupd,1
Meta Package Manager,gem,1
Meta Package Manager,mas,1
Meta Package Manager,npm,1
Meta Package Manager,opkg,1
Meta Package Manager,pacaur,1
Meta Package Manager,pacman,1
Meta Package Manager,paru,1
Meta Package Manager,pip,1
Meta Package Manager,pipx,1
Meta Package Manager,pkg,1
Meta Package Manager,scoop,1
Meta Package Manager,snap,1
Meta Package Manager,steamcmd,1
Meta Package Manager,uv,1
Meta Package Manager,uvx,1
Meta Package Manager,vscode,1
Meta Package Manager,vscodium,1
Meta Package Manager,winget,1
Meta Package Manager,yarn,1
Meta Package Manager,yay,1
Meta Package Manager,yum,1
Meta Package Manager,zypper,1
    

Metadata and operations

Package manager	Min. version	BSD[1]	Linux[2]	macOS	Unix[3]	Windows	installed	outdated	search	install	upgrade	upgrade_all	remove	sync	cleanup
apm ⚠️	1.0.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎		🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
apt	1.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	✓
apt-mint	1.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	✓
brew	2.7.0		🐧	🍎			✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
cargo	1.0.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓		✓	✓			✓
cask	2.7.0			🍎			✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
choco	2.0.0					🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
composer	1.4.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓			✓
dnf	4.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
dnf5	5.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
emerge	3.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	✓
eopkg	3.2.0		🐧				✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
flatpak	1.2.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓			✓
fwupd	1.9.5		🐧				✓	✓		✓	✓	✓		✓
gem	2.5.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓
mas	1.8.7			🍎			✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
npm	4.0.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
opkg	0.2.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓
pacaur	4.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
pacman	5.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
paru	1.9.3	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
pip	10.0.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓
pipx	1.0.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓
pkg	1.11	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
scoop	0.2.4					🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
snap	2.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
steamcmd	None	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟				✓
uv	0.5.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓		✓	✓	✓	✓		✓
uvx	0.5.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓			✓	✓	✓	✓
vscode	1.60.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓			✓			✓
vscodium	1.60.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓			✓			✓
winget	1.7					🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
yarn	1.20.0	🅱️	🐧	🍎	⨂	🪟	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓
yay	11.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
yum	4.0.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
zypper	1.14.0	🅱️	🐧		⨂		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓		✓	✓

Note

If your favorite manager is missing or does not support an operation, you can influence its implementation: open a ticket to document its output or read the contribution guide and submit a pull request.

You can help if you purchase business support 🤝 or sponsor the project 🫶.

Installation

All installation methods are available in the documentation. Below are the most popular ones:

macOS

mpm is part of the official Homebrew default tap, so you can install it with:

$ brew install meta-package-manager

Windows

mpm is available in the main repository of Scoop, so you just need to:

> scoop install main/meta-package-manager

Executables

Standalone binaries of mpm latest version are available as direct downloads for several platforms and architectures:

Platform	arm64	x86_64
Linux	Download mpm-linux-arm64.bin	Download mpm-linux-x64.bin
macOS	Download mpm-macos-arm64.bin	Download mpm-macos-x64.bin
Windows	Download mpm-windows-arm64.exe	Download mpm-windows-x64.exe

No need to install Python or uv. Useful for CI/CD pipelines running on minimal images, or old platforms where dependency management is painful.

Quickstart

List installed packages

List all packages installed on current system:

$ mpm installed
╭─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┬─────────┬────────────────────╮
│ Package name                │ ID                          │ Manager │ Installed version  │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┼─────────┼────────────────────┤
│ github                      │ github                      │ apm     │ 0.36.9             │
│ update-package-dependencies │ update-package-dependencies │ apm     │ 0.13.1             │
│ rust                        │ rust                        │ brew    │ 1.55.0             │
│ x264                        │ x264                        │ brew    │ r3060              │
│ atom                        │ atom                        │ cask    │ 1.58.0             │
│ visual-studio-code          │ visual-studio-code          │ cask    │ 1.52.0             │
│ nokogiri                    │ nokogiri                    │ gem     │ x86_64-darwin      │
│ rake                        │ rake                        │ gem     │ 13.0.3             │
│ iMovie                      │ 408981434                   │ mas     │ 10.2.5             │
│ Telegram                    │ 747648890                   │ mas     │ 8.1                │
│ npm                         │ npm                         │ npm     │ 7.24.0             │
│ raven                       │ raven                       │ npm     │ 2.6.4              │
│ jupyterlab                  │ jupyterlab                  │ pip     │ 3.1.14             │
│ Sphinx                      │ Sphinx                      │ pip     │ 4.2.0              │
│ ms-python.python            │ ms-python.python            │ vscode  │ 2021.10.1317843341 │
│ ms-toolsai.jupyter          │ ms-toolsai.jupyter          │ vscode  │ 2021.9.1001312534  │
╰─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┴─────────┴────────────────────╯
16 packages total (brew: 2, pip: 2, apm: 2, gem: 2, cask: 2, mas: 2, vscode: 2, npm: 2, composer: 0).

List outdated packages

List all packages installed for which an upgrade is available:

$ mpm outdated
╭──────────────┬─────────────┬─────────┬───────────────────┬────────────────╮
│ Package name │ ID          │ Manager │ Installed version │ Latest version │
├──────────────┼─────────────┼─────────┼───────────────────┼────────────────┤
│ curl         │ curl        │ brew    │ 7.79.1            │ 7.79.1_1       │
│ git          │ git         │ brew    │ 2.33.0            │ 2.33.0_1       │
│ openssl@1.1  │ openssl@1.1 │ brew    │ 1.1.1l            │ 1.1.1l_1       │
│ rake         │ rake        │ gem     │ 13.0.3            │ 13.0.6         │
│ Telegram     │ 747648890   │ mas     │ 8.1               │ 8.1.3          │
│ npm          │ npm@8.0.0   │ npm     │ 7.24.0            │ 8.0.0          │
│ pip          │ pip         │ pip     │ 21.2.4            │ 21.3           │
│ regex        │ regex       │ pip     │ 2021.9.30         │ 2021.10.8      │
╰──────────────┴─────────────┴─────────┴───────────────────┴────────────────╯
8 packages total (brew: 3, pip: 2, gem: 1, mas: 1, npm: 1, apm: 0, cask: 0, composer: 0).

List managers

If you wonder why your package manager doesn’t seems to be identified, you can list all those recognized by mpm with:

$ mpm --all-managers managers
╭────────────┬────────────────────┬────────────────┬──────────────────────────────┬────────────┬───────────╮
│ Manager ID │ Name               │ Supported      │ CLI                          │ Executable │ Version   │
├────────────┼────────────────────┼────────────────┼──────────────────────────────┼────────────┼───────────┤
│ apm        │ Atom's apm         │ ✓              │ ✘ apm not found              │            │           │
│ apt        │ APT                │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✓ /usr/bin/apt               │ ✓          │ ✘         │
│ apt-mint   │ Linux Mint's apt   │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✓ /usr/bin/apt               │ ✓          │ ✘         │
│ brew       │ Homebrew Formulae  │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/brew     │ ✓          │ ✓ 3.6.3   │
│ cargo      │ Rust's cargo       │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/cargo    │ ✓          │ ✓ 1.64.0  │
│ cask       │ Homebrew Cask      │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/brew     │ ✓          │ ✓ 3.6.3   │
│ choco      │ Chocolatey         │ ✘ Windows only │ ✘ choco not found            │            │           │
│ composer   │ PHP's Composer     │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/composer │ ✓          │ ✓ 2.4.2   │
│ dnf        │ DNF                │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ dnf not found              │            │           │
│ emerge     │ Emerge             │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ emerge not found           │            │           │
│ flatpak    │ Flatpak            │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ flatpak not found          │            │           │
│ gem        │ Ruby Gems          │ ✓              │ ✓ /usr/bin/gem               │ ✓          │ ✓ 3.0.3.1 │
│ mas        │ Mac AppStore       │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/mas      │ ✓          │ ✓ 1.8.6   │
│ npm        │ Node's npm         │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/npm      │ ✓          │ ✓ 8.19.2  │
│ opkg       │ OPKG               │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ opkg not found             │            │           │
│ pacman     │ Pacman             │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ pacman not found           │            │           │
│ paru       │ Paru               │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ paru not found             │            │           │
│ pip        │ Pip                │ ✓              │ ✓ ~/.pyenv/shims/python3     │ ✓          │ ✓ 22.2.2  │
│ pipx       │ Pipx               │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/pipx     │ ✓          │ ✓ 1.1.0   │
│ scoop      │ Scoop              │ ✘ Windows only │ ✘ scoop not found            │            │           │
│ snap       │ Snap               │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ snap not found             │            │           │
│ steamcmd   │ Valve Steam        │ ✓              │ ✘ steamcmd not found         │            │           │
│ vscode     │ Visual Studio Code │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/code     │ ✓          │ ✓ 1.71.2  │
│ yarn       │ Node's yarn        │ ✓              │ ✓ /opt/homebrew/bin/yarn     │ ✓          │ ✓ 1.22.19 │
│ yay        │ Yay                │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ yay not found              │            │           │
│ yum        │ YUM                │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ yum not found              │            │           │
│ zypper     │ Zypper             │ ✘ Linux only   │ ✘ zypper not found           │            │           │
╰────────────┴────────────────────┴────────────────┴──────────────────────────────┴────────────┴───────────╯

If your favorite manager is not supported yet, you can help! See the contribution guide.

Used in

Check these projects to get real-life examples of mpm usage:

• Dotfiles - macOS dotfiles for Python developers, using mpm to manage system packages.

Feel free to send a PR to add your project in this list if you are relying on mpm in any way.

Usage

Other subcommands and options are documented in:

• the detailed help screens

• the list of use-cases where you’ll find inspiration on how to leverage mpm power

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[1]

BSD: DragonFly BSD, FreeBSD, MidnightBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, SunOS.

[2]

Linux: Alpine Linux, ALT Linux, Amazon Linux, Android, Arch Linux, Buildroot, CachyOS, CentOS, CloudLinux OS, Debian, Exherbo Linux, Fedora, Generic Linux, Gentoo Linux, Guix System, IBM PowerKVM, Kali Linux, KVM for IBM z Systems, Linux Mint, Mageia, Mandriva Linux, Manjaro Linux, Nobara, openSUSE, openSUSE Tumbleweed, OpenWrt, Oracle Linux, Parallels, Pidora, Raspbian, RedHat Enterprise Linux, Rocky Linux, Scientific Linux, Slackware, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, Tuxedo OS, Ubuntu, Ultramarine, Windows Subsystem for Linux v1, Windows Subsystem for Linux v2, XenServer.

[3]

Unix: Cygwin, GNU/Hurd, Haiku, IBM AIX, illumos, Solaris.