Ubuntu – Does Ubuntu have an equivalent to the AUR (Arch User Repository)

package-management

Having just played around with Arch a little bit, the thing about it that impresses me the most about it is the AUR. With a tool like Yaourt, you can really easily install bleeding-edge software, some of which is from git, and it automatically compiles and installs it for you. Is there something like this for Ubuntu? I know about PPAs, but I don't really think they're an equivalent.

Edit: here's why I don't really think PPAs are the same as the AUR:

PPAs have compiled packages, while the AUR features both compiled packages and source packages, along with scripts for compiling them on any platform. This means that a PPA has to be maintained by someone who builds them, whereas with the AUR, uncompiled packages can be built on the user end.
Since PPAs are specific to the Ubuntu release, many PPAs are out of date. The packages would still work if the PPA maintainers would just update their PPAs to the latest version of Ubuntu, but often they go stale. Sometimes I've had to hack a PPA so that I can keep using the same package that worked in a previous release.
Many PPAs don't build properly, even though the projects are more or less stable. I'm thinking of FinalTerm, which mostly works, but the Ubuntu PPA almost never has passing builds, so it's impossible to install on Ubuntu without manually compiling.
PPAs don't seem have a rating system where users can vouch for working package repositories. I think this kind of consensus is very useful towards avoiding malware and/or non-working packages.
There are tons of AUR packages that come directly from GitHub, so installing a package like something-git will usually give you the latest package straight from GitHub. PPAs aren't updated dynamically like this, and so packages there are typically very out-of-date.

Best Answer

Yes, PPAs. That's the closest you can get right now. If you don't think they're equivalent enough for you, then the answer right now is simply "no". Some comments on your claimed differences:

PPAs have compiled packages, while the AUR features both compiled packages and source packages

PPAs ship source packages too. PPA uploads must be source uploads. Users can access both the source (for example they can rebuild the sources themselves), or binaries built from those sources.

Since PPAs are specific to the Ubuntu release, many PPAs are out of date.

This is true. However, users can quite easily copy a package from any PPA to their own PPAs, including to a different release, while choosing to rebuild them if necessary on the way. See the Package details -> Copy packages page. If there is anything that needs updating to work with a newer release then that won't work, but I presume that's the same with AUR.

In terms of PPAs being up to date, that is presumably simply a matter of volunteer time (who can do the same pocket copy as above), rather than any fundamental difference between PPAs and AUR.

Many PPAs don't build properly, even though the projects are more or less stable

Same answer as above. This has nothing to do with infrastructure or mechanism and everything to do with volunteer time.

PPAs don't seem have a rating system where users can vouch for working package repositories.

Agreed.

There are tons of AUR packages that come directly from GitHub, so installing a package like something-git will usually give you the latest package straight from GitHub.

You could arrange for this to happen automatically in a PPA, but I admit it is far from trivial to set up.

None of this is exactly the same, I'll grant you. If you want more ABS/AUR -like functionality in Ubuntu, I think you need to go into more detail of how exactly your proposed changes would work in terms of what Ubuntu already has.

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – Check for and remove unused PPAs

Here is a script. Without a parameter, the script lists some infos. With --delete, the list files will be removed, if no packages are installed.

#!/usr/bin/env bash
for f in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/*.list; do
    grep -Po "(?<=^deb\s).*?(?=#|$)" "$f" | while read -r ENTRY ; do
    echo "ENTRY: $ENTRY"

    # Sanitize entry line by removing stuff between square brackets
    ENTRY=$(echo "$ENTRY" | sed 's/\[.*\] //')

        HOST=$(cut -d/ -f3 <<< "$ENTRY")

        if [ "ppa.launchpad.net" = "$HOST" ]; then
          USER=$(cut -d/ -f4 <<< "$ENTRY")
          PPA=$(cut -d/ -f5 <<< "$ENTRY")
          packageCount=$(awk '$1=="Package:" {if (a[$2]++ == 0) {system("dpkg -l "$2)}}' /var/lib/apt/lists/*"$USER"*"$PPA"*Packages 2>/dev/null | awk '/^ii/' | wc -l)
          echo "PPA: ppa:$USER/$PPA"
          echo "FILENAME: $f"
          echo "$packageCount package(s) installed"
          if [ "$packageCount" -eq 0 ] && [ "$1" == "--delete" ]; then
            sudo rm "$f" && echo "$f deleted"
          fi
          echo
        else 
          USER=$(cut -d/ -f3 <<< "$ENTRY")
          PPA=$(cut -d/ -f4 <<< "$ENTRY")
          packageCount=$(awk '$1=="Package:" {if (a[$2]++ == 0) {system("dpkg -l "$2)}}' /var/lib/apt/lists/*"$USER"*Packages 2>/dev/null | awk '/^ii/' | wc -l)
          echo "REPOSITORY: $USER/$PPA"
          echo "FILENAME: $f"
          echo "$packageCount package(s) installed"
          if [ "$packageCount" -eq 0 ] && [ "$1" == "--delete" ]; then
            sudo rm "$f" && echo "$f deleted" 
          fi
          echo
        fi
    done
done

Copy the code above in a new file, e.g.:

mkdir -p ~/bin
nano ~/bin/checkPPAs

Make the script executable

chmod +x ~/bin/checkPPAs

And run it with

~/bin/checkPPAs

to list all repositories and the number of installed packages.

Start the script with

~/bin/checkPPAs --delete

to remove the list files.

Sample output on my system

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/y-ppa-manager/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:webupd8team/y-ppa-manager
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/webupd8team-ubuntu-y-ppa-manager-vivid.list
3 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/nilarimogard/webupd8/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/nilarimogard-ubuntu-webupd8-vivid.list
5 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/obsproject/obs-studio/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:obsproject/obs-studio
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/obsproject-ubuntu-obs-studio-vivid.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu vivid-getdeb apps
REPOSITORY: archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu vivid-getdeb apps
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/getdeb.list
7 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/psi-plus/ppa/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:psi-plus/ppa
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/psi-plus-ubuntu-ppa-vivid.list
15 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:libreoffice/ppa
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/libreoffice-ubuntu-ppa-vivid.list
24 package(s) installed

ENTRY: https://deb.nodesource.com/node_0.12 vivid main
REPOSITORY: deb.nodesource.com/node_0.12 vivid main
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/nodesource.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main
REPOSITORY: dl.google.com/linux
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list
2 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/gnome3-team/gnome3/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/gnome3-team-ubuntu-gnome3-vivid.list
273 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/noobslab/apps/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:noobslab/apps
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/noobslab-ubuntu-apps-vivid.list
0 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntuhandbook1/corebird/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/corebird
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ubuntuhandbook1-ubuntu-corebird-vivid.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/unstable/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:webupd8team/unstable
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/webupd8team-ubuntu-unstable-vivid.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://download.mono-project.com/repo/debian wheezy main
REPOSITORY: download.mono-project.com/repo
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mono-xamarin.list
166 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/otto-kesselgulasch/gimp-edge/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:otto-kesselgulasch/gimp-edge
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/otto-kesselgulasch-ubuntu-gimp-edge-vivid.list
5 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/numix/ppa/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:numix/ppa
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/numix-ubuntu-ppa-vivid.list
3 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/atom/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:webupd8team/atom
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/webupd8team-ubuntu-atom-vivid.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: https://packages.graylog2.org/repo/debian/ trusty 1.0
REPOSITORY: packages.graylog2.org/repo
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/graylog.list
3 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mate-dev/ppa/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:ubuntu-mate-dev/ppa
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ubuntu-mate-dev-ubuntu-ppa-vivid.list
0 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/gnome3-team/gnome3-staging/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3-staging
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/gnome3-team-ubuntu-gnome3-staging-vivid.list
268 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://debian.koha-community.org/koha stable main
REPOSITORY: debian.koha-community.org/koha stable main
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/koha.list
0 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/pgavin/ghdl/ubuntu trusty main
PPA: ppa:pgavin/ghdl
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/pgavin-ubuntu-ghdl-vivid.list
0 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/ubuntu-mate-dev/vivid-mate/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:ubuntu-mate-dev/vivid-mate
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ubuntu-mate-dev-ubuntu-vivid-mate-vivid.list
3 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/sublime-text-3/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:webupd8team/sublime-text-3
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/webupd8team-ubuntu-sublime-text-3-vivid.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://ppa.launchpad.net/webupd8team/java/ubuntu vivid main
PPA: ppa:webupd8team/java
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/webupd8team-ubuntu-java-vivid.list
1 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main
REPOSITORY: dl.google.com/linux
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google.list
2 package(s) installed

ENTRY: http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main
REPOSITORY: dl.google.com/linux
FILENAME: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome-beta.list
2 package(s) installed

Ubuntu – Download multiple packages in parallel from a single repository with apt

Upon digging around some more, I found apt-fast. There is an Ubuntu PPA that can be used for installation. The apt-fast command is able not only to download packages in parallel but also to download using multiple connections per package and from multiple mirrors. Documentation is all available on the GitHub page linked above.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – Check for and remove unused PPAs

Ubuntu – Download multiple packages in parallel from a single repository with apt

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