Pacman Home Page
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A simple library-based package manager.

== Introduction

pacman is a utility which manages software packages in Linux. It uses simple
compressed files as a package format, and maintains a text-based package
database (more of a hierarchy), just in case some hand tweaking is necessary.

pacman does not strive to "do everything." It will add, remove and upgrade
packages in the system, and it will allow you to query the package database for
installed packages, files and owners. It also attempts to handle dependencies
automatically and can download packages from a remote server.

== History

Version 2.0 of pacman introduced the ability to sync packages (the '\--sync'
option) with a master server through the use of package databases. Prior to
this, packages would have to be installed manually using the '\--add' and
'\--upgrade' operations.

Version 3.0 was the switch to a two-part pacman -- a back-end named libalpm
(library for Arch Linux Package Management) and the familiar pacman front-end.
Speed in many cases was improved, along with dependency and conflict resolution
being able to handle a much wider variety of cases. The switch to a
library-based program should also make it easier in the future to develop
alternative front ends.

Version 4.0 added package signing and verification capabilities to the entire
makepkg/repo-add/pacman toolchain via GnuPG and GPGME.

Version 5.0 added support for pre/post-transaction hooks and sync database file
list operations.

Version 6.0 added support for parallel downloads.

Version 7.0 added support for performing downloads in a separate sandboxed
process.

== Documentation


=== Man Pages

There are several man pages available for the programs, utilities, and
configuration files dealing with pacman.

* linkman:alpm-hooks[5]
* linkman:BUILDINFO[5]
* linkman:PKGBUILD[5]
* linkman:libalpm[3]
* linkman:makepkg[8]
* linkman:makepkg-template[1]
* linkman:makepkg.conf[5]
* linkman:pacman[8]
* linkman:pacman-key[8]
* linkman:pacman-conf[8]
* linkman:pacman.conf[5]
* linkman:repo-add[8]
* linkman:vercmp[8]

=== Changelog

For a good idea of what is going on in pacman development, take a look at the
link:https://gitlab.archlinux.org/pacman/pacman[Git summary page] for the
project.

See the most recent
link:https://gitlab.archlinux.org/pacman/pacman/-/blob/master/NEWS[NEWS]
file for a not-as-frequently-updated list of changes. However, this should
contain the biggest changes in a format more concise than the commit log.


== Releases

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[frame="topbot",grid="none",options="header,autowidth"]
!======
!Version !Date
!7.1.0  !2025-11-01
!7.0.0  !2024-07-14
!6.1.0  !2024-03-04
!6.0.1  !2021-09-04
!6.0.0  !2021-05-20
!5.2.1  !2019-11-01
!5.2.0  !2019-10-21
!5.1.3  !2019-03-01
!5.1.2  !2018-12-25
!5.1.1  !2018-07-27
!5.1.0  !2018-05-28
!5.0.2  !2017-06-03
!5.0.1  !2016-02-23
!5.0.0  !2016-01-30
!4.2.1  !2015-02-20
!4.2.0  !2014-12-19
!4.1.2  !2013-06-18
!4.1.1  !2013-05-07
!4.1.0  !2013-04-01
!4.0.3 !2012-04-07
!4.0.2 !2012-02-11
!4.0.1 !2011-11-20
!4.0.0 !2011-10-13
!3.5.4 !2011-08-10
!3.5.3 !2011-06-07
!3.5.2 !2011-04-18
!3.5.1 !2011-03-23
!3.5.0 !2011-03-16
!3.4.3 !2011-01-22
!3.4.2 !2010-12-29
!3.4.1 !2010-09-03
!3.4.0 !2010-06-16
!======
|
[frame="topbot",grid="none",options="header,autowidth"]
!======
!Version !Date
!3.3.3 !2009-11-10
!3.3.2 !2009-10-05
!3.3.1 !2009-09-22
!3.3.0 !2009-08-02
!3.2.2 !2009-01-05
!3.2.1 !2008-08-26
!3.2.0 !2008-07-30
!3.1.4 !2008-04-01
!3.1.3 !2008-03-06
!3.1.2 !2008-02-20
!3.1.1 !2008-01-20
!3.1.0 !2008-01-09
!3.0.6 !2007-09-16
!3.0.5 !2007-06-17
!3.0.4 !2007-05-08
!3.0.3 !2007-04-28
!3.0.2 !2007-04-23
!3.0.1 !2007-04-04
!3.0.0 !2007-03-25
!2.9.8 !2006-02-02
!2.9.7 !2005-09-16
!2.9.6 !2005-06-10
!2.9.5 !2005-01-11
!2.9.4 !2004-12-20
!2.9.3 !2004-12-19
!2.9.2 !2004-09-25
!2.9.1 !2004-09-25
!2.9 !2004-09-18
!2.8.4 !2004-08-23
!2.8.3 !2004-08-04
!2.8.2 !2004-07-22
!2.8.1 !2004-07-17
!======
|
[frame="topbot",grid="none",options="header,autowidth"]
!======
!Version !Date
!2.8 !2004-07-03
!2.7.9 !2004-04-30
!2.7.8 !2004-04-29
!2.7.7 !2004-04-15
!2.7.6 !2004-04-04
!2.7.5 !2004-03-02
!2.7.4 !2004-02-18
!2.7.3 !2004-02-07
!2.7.2 !2004-01-04
!2.7.1 !2003-12-21
!2.7 !2003-11-25
!2.6.4 !2003-10-17
!2.6.3 !2003-10-01
!2.6.2 !2003-09-29
!2.6.1 !2003-09-15
!2.6 !2003-09-03
!2.5.1 !2003-07-12
!2.5 !2003-05-30
!2.4.1 !2003-04-19
!2.4 !2003-04-11
!2.3.2 !2003-03-17
!2.3.1 !2003-03-14
!2.3 !2003-02-27
!2.2 !2002-12-11
!2.1 !2002-09-16
!2.0 !2002-08-09
!1.23 !2002-04-30
!1.22 !2002-04-12
!1.21 !2002-04-03
!1.2 !2002-03-18
!1.1 !2002-03-10
!1.0 !2002-02-25
!======

|======

Source code for releases since moving to gitlab is available at
link:https://gitlab.archlinux.org/pacman/pacman/-/releases[].
Source code for historical releases is available at
link:https://sources.archlinux.org/other/pacman/[]. To install, download the newest
available source tarball, unpack it in a directory, and run the three magic
commands:

	$ meson build
	$ ninja -C build
	# ninja -C build install

You may wish to read the options presented by `meson` in order to
set appropriate paths and build options that are correct for your system.

== Development

=== Mailing List

There is a mailing list devoted to pacman development, hosted by Arch Linux.
link:https://lists.archlinux.org/listinfo/pacman-dev/[Subscribe] or
link:https://lists.archlinux.org/pipermail/pacman-dev/[view the archives].

=== Source Code

Development of pacman is currently done in Git. The central repository is
hosted by Arch Linux, although some of the developers have their own trees (ask
on the above mailing lists if you are interested in finding the locations of
these trees).

The current development tree can be fetched with the following command:

	git clone https://gitlab.archlinux.org/pacman/pacman.git

which will fetch the full development history into a directory named pacman.
You can browse the source as well using
link:https://gitlab.archlinux.org/pacman/pacman/[gitlab].

If you are interested in hacking on pacman, it is highly recommended you join
the mailing list mentioned above, as well as take a quick glance at our
link:HACKING.html[HACKING] document.
link:submitting-patches.html[submitting-patches] is also a recommended read.

Not as familiar with code as you'd like to be, but still want to help out? If
you speak a foreign language, you can help by either creating or updating a
translation file for your native language. Instructions can be found in
link:translation-help.html[translation-help].

== Bugs

If you find bugs (which is quite likely), please report them to the issue
tracker at link:https://gitlab.archlinux.org/pacman/pacman/-/issues[] with
specific information such as your command-line, the nature of the bug, and even
the package database if it helps.

== Copyright

pacman is Copyright (C) 2006-2025 Pacman Development Team
<pacman-dev@lists.archlinux.org> and Copyright (C) 2002-2006 Judd Vinet
<jvinet@zeroflux.org> and is licensed through the GNU General Public License,
version 2 or later.
