% pacman-mirrors(8) Pacman-Mirrors 4.3 User Manual % % October, 2017

NAME

pacman-mirrors - generate pacman mirrorlist for Manjaro Linux

SYNOPSIS

pacman-mirrors [-f NUMBER | [[-i [-d]] [-c COUNTRY, [COUNTRY] ... | --geoip]]] [-m METHOD] [-a [-p PREFIX] [-R] [-G | -S BRANCH] [-P PROTO [PROTO] ...][-U URL]] [-b BRANCH] [-t SECONDS] [-q] [-v] [-n | -y]

DESCRIPTION

Generate mirrorlist for Manjaro Linux. Default is to rank all mirrors by reponse time. If no arguments are given pacman-mirrors lists available options. Pacman-mirrors requires access to files which are read-only so it must be run with su or sudo. To create a up-to-date mirrorlist using all default use,

pacman-mirrors --fasttrack 10 && sudo pacman -Syy

The mirrorlist generation process can be refined through arguments and arguments with options, for example,

pacman-mirrors --country Denmark --timeout 5

IMPORTANT

After all operations ALWAYS syncronize your pacman database with

sudo pacman -Syy

OPTIONS

Some options are mutual exclusive and will throw an arguments error:

• --no-mirrorlist and --sync
• --branch, --get-branch and --set-branch
• --sync and --no-mirrorlist
• --country and --geoip

Others can be used together but they have precedence. If the fasttrack arg is used with interactive, country or geoip the fasttrack arg will have precendence and the others are ignored. Some arguments requires other argument to have effect for example,this command will ignore --default argument

WRONG pacman-mirrors -b unstable --default

as it should have been in conjunction with --interactive, like

CORRECT pacman-mirrors -b unstable --interactive --default

The same goes for the API specific arguments. For those to have effect the --api argument must be present also.

pacman-mirrors -aS unstable

The arguments can appear in any order except for arguments which takes additional options in which case the options must follow immediately after the argument, for example

pacman-mirrors -aidS unstable

Pacman-mirrors downloads the lastest available status from http://repo.manjaro.org. These data is always used during mirrorlist generation to ensure that you connected to a mirror which is up-to-date for your selected branch. Should you decide to temporarily switch branches you will still connect to an up-to-date mirror.

IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER

It cannot be stressed enough that for every mirrorlist generation you commence, you MUST run pacman -Syy.

YEE BE WARNED: Deprecated arguments

-g, --generate

The argument is deprecated in favor of -f/--fasttrack

-y, --sync

An argument which never should have been here. The better option is to educate yourself to always use pacman -Syy after any change to your mirrorlist

METHODS

-f, --fasttrack NUMBER

Generates an up-to-date mirrorlist for the users current selected branch, mirrors are randomly selected from http://repo.manjaro.org/status.json, the randomly selected mirrors are ranked by their current access time. The higher number the higher possibility of a fast mirror. If the number 0 is used - it is understood that all mirrors mirrors should be used.

-i, --interactive [--default]

This is a function designed to leave full control for mirrors and protocols. This function DOES NOT take into consideration up-to-date mirrors. The addition argument --default forces pacman-mirrors to load the default mirror file and ignore any preset custom-mirrors file, thus allowing for reselecting mirrors for a new custom mirror file.

-m, --method METHOD

Default method is rank but random can be selected.

BRANCH

-b, --branch BRANCH

Temporarily use another branch, stable, testing or unstable. The branch is reset with next run of pacman-mirrors.

COUNTRY

-c, --country COUNTRY [COUNTRY] ...

Specifiy a country or a list of countries.

--geoip

Use geolocation if possible, if geoip is not available all mirrors.

-l, --list, --country-list

Lists available mirror countries.

API

-a, --api [-p PREFIX] [-R] [-G|-S BRANCH] [-P PROTO [PROTO] ...] [-U URL]

Instructs pacman-mirrors to activate processing of API arguments

-p, --prefix PREFIX

Add a path prefix to pacman-mirrors file-handling eg. /mnt/install or $mnt

-G, --get-branch

Return branch from configuration.

-P, --proto, --protocols PROTO [PROTO] ...

Write protocols to configuration, use all or http, https, ftp and ftps

-R, --re-branch

Replace branch in mirrorlist

-S, --set-branch BRANCH

Replace branch in configuration, use stable, testing or unstable

-U, --url URL

Replace mirrorlist with supplied url

MISC

-h, --help

Show the help message

-n, --no-mirrorlist

Use to skip generation of mirrorlist

-q, --quiet

Make pacman-mirrors silent

-t, --timeout SECONDS

Change the number of seconds waiting for a server response, SSL enabled mirrors has this value doubled to compensate for the time spent on exchanging encryption keys

-v, --version

Show the version of pacman-mirrors

Exit status:

0     : OK
1     : Problem with argument
2     : Problem accessing systemfiles
3     : Missing mirror file
BRANCH: Value from config

IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER

It cannot be stressed enough that for every mirrorlist generation you commence, you MUST run pacman -Syy.

Configuration flow of pacman-mirrors

At launch an internal default configuration is setup, file configuration is applied and the commandline is parsed and applied.

API arguments

These arguments modifies key elements of pacman-mirrors configuration according to the packagers needs.

The actions performed by the API are in strict order and performed before any other actions. This also means that ordinary arguments supplied in conjunction with app might be ignored. Eg. -U argument terminates pacman-mirrors when branch and mirrorlist has been written.

1. If -G
   • print config.branch
   • sys.exit(0)
2. If p PREFIX
   • add PREFIX to internal file configuration
3. If -S BRANCH
   • apply BRANCH to internal configuration
   • replace branch in pacman-mirrors.conf with BRANCH
4. If -U URL
   • apply internal configuration to a mirrorlist with URL
   • sys.exit(0)
5. If -P PROTO [PROTO] ...
   • replace protocols in pacman-mirrors.conf with PROTO
6. If -R
   • replace branch in mirrorlist with -S BRANCH

When done pacman-mirrors checks the internet connection and if possible download the latest datafiles for creating the mirrorlist. At this point it is possible to interrupt further processing.

If the -n argument is present pacman-mirrors will now exit.

EXAMPLES

Most optional arguments are self explaining others require explanation. The API functions is mainly designed to help packagers and iso-builders. However it can be of use for everyone because it takes the hazzle out of editing your pacman-mirrors configuration.

IMPORTANT TO REMEMBER

It cannot be stressed enough that for every mirrorlist generation you commence, you MUST run pacman -Syy.

• Which countries has mirrors?

  sudo pacman-mirrors -l

• I want to temporary change branch to unstable, use geolocation,

  sudo pacman-mirrors -b unstable --geoip

• I want to permanently change branch to unstable, use mirrors from Germany and France, use only https and http protocol in that order

  sudo pacman-mirrors -ac Germany,France -S unstable -P https http

• Create a mirrorlist with German mirrors

  sudo pacman-mirrors -c Germany

• If you want more countries in your mirrorlist add them

  sudo pacman-mirrors -c Germany France Denmark

• Create a mirrorlist with 5 mirrors up-to-date on your branch

  sudo pacman-mirrors -f 5

• I want to choose my mirrors

  sudo pacman-mirrors -i

• I have a custom mirror list and I want to create a new custom mirror list?

  sudo pacman-mirrors -i --default

• I have a custom mirror list - can I reset it?

  sudo pacman-mirrors -c all

• What branch am I on

  sudo pacman-mirrors -aG

• Change system branch and dont change the mirrorlist

  sudo pacman-mirrors -naS unstable

• Change system branch and replace branch in mirrorlist and quit

  sudo pacman-mirrors -naRS unstable

• Change protocols you will accept but dont touch the mirrorlist

  sudo pacman-mirrors -naP https http

• A packager can write directly to a mounted systems datafiles using either a path or an environment variable replacing the branch in both configuration and mirrorlist leaving the mirrors as is

  sudo pacman-mirrors -anR -p $prefix -S $branch -P https

• It is also possible to specify a mirror in which case the mirrorlist is created and pacman-mirrors terminate

  sudo pacman-mirrors -ap $prefix -S $branch -U $url

REPORTING BUGS

https://github.com/manjaro/pacman-mirrors/issues

SEE ALSO

The pacman-mirrors source code and all documentation may be downloaded from https://github.com/manjaro/pacman-mirrors/archive/master.zip

AUTHORS

Esclapion <esclapion@manjaro.org>
philm <philm@manjaro.org>
Ramon Buldó <rbuldo@gmail.com>
Hugo Posnic <huluti@manjaro.org>
Frede Hundewadt <echo ZmhAbWFuamFyby5vcmcK | base64 -d>