Pacsea is a TUI application for browsing and installing Arch and AUR packages. It includes an integrated Arch news and advisory feed and supports keyboard-first navigation.
✨ Idea or bug? Open an issue or check out Idea Discussions
❤️ Thank you to the Pacsea community for your ideas, reports, and support!
| Supported Distributions | Supported Languages |
|---|---|
Browse Arch news, security advisories, package updates, and AUR comments in a unified feed. Filter by source, search with history, bookmark important items, and track read/unread status. All content is cached for offline access and automatically updated in the background.
- Install (stable):
paru -S pacsea-bin # or: yay -S pacsea-bin- Install (latest):
paru -S pacsea-git # or: yay -S pacsea-git- Install via Cargo:
cargo install pacsea- Run:
pacseaPrefer a dry run first? Add
--dry-run.
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Integrated Process Execution | All operations execute directly within the TUI with real-time output streaming, progress bars, and inline password prompts — no external terminals |
| News feed & advisories | Unified news feed combining Arch news, security advisories, package update notifications, and AUR package comments. Includes offline access with automatic caching, filtering by source or date, search with history, bookmarking, read/unread tracking, and background updates |
| Security Scan for AUR Packages | Comprehensive security scanning workflow with multiple tools (ClamAV, Trivy, Semgrep, ShellCheck, VirusTotal, custom patterns, aur-sleuth) and detailed scan summaries |
| Fuzzy Search | Toggle flexible fuzzy search mode to find packages even without exact names |
| Unified search | Fast results across official repos and the AUR |
| Package Update Availability | Automatic background checks with detailed version comparison view |
| Keyboard‑first | Minimal keystrokes, Vim‑friendly navigation |
| Queue & install | Add packages to queue and confirm installs. Run security scans for AUR packages before installing |
| Always‑visible details | Open package links with a click |
| PKGBUILD preview | Toggle viewer; copy PKGBUILD with one click |
| AUR Comments viewer | View community comments for AUR packages with markdown support, clickable URLs, and automatic updates when navigating packages |
| AUR status markings | Visual indicators for out-of-date [OOD] and orphaned [ORPHAN] packages |
| Persistent lists | Recent searches and Install list are saved |
| Installed‑only mode | Review and remove installed packages safely. Configure filter mode to show only leaf packages (default) or all explicitly installed packages |
| Package downgrade | Downgrade installed packages to previous versions using the downgrade tool |
| Distro-aware updates | Automatic detection and use of appropriate mirror tools for Manjaro, EndeavourOS, CachyOS, Artix, and standard Arch |
| Updates modal | View available updates with Preflight integration for safe installation |
| Helpful tools | System update dialog with Force Sync mode (-Syyu), AUR update confirmation when pacman fails, distro-aware mirror management, and Arch News popup |
| Announcements | Version-specific and remote announcements shown at startup with clickable URLs and persistent read status |
- Security-first approach for installing AUR Packages.
- Security Coverage via automatic Scans and Optional Measures (e.g., converting AUR packages to Flatpak (in Planning)), and more
Pacsea adds a security‑first workflow for AUR installs. Before building you can run one or more checks — ClamAV (antivirus), Trivy (filesystem), Semgrep (static analysis), ShellCheck for PKGBUILD/.install, VirusTotal hash lookups, custom suspicious pattern scanning, and aur-sleuth (LLM audit). Scans generate a comprehensive summary showing infections, vulnerabilities by severity, Semgrep findings count, and VirusTotal statistics.
VirusTotal API Setup: Configure your VirusTotal API key directly from the Optional Deps modal. The modal blocks main UI interactions to prevent accidental clicks/keys. For detailed setup instructions, see the How to use Pacsea wiki page.
- Install and verify recommended helper tools directly from a dedicated view with environment-aware defaults.
- Desktop-aware preferences include GNOME Terminal on GNOME, Klipper on KDE, and support for multiple editors (nvim, vim, helix, emacs/emacsclient, nano).
- The modal detects your:
- environment (Wayland/X11, desktop environment, distro)
- and shows relevant options.
- Tools include editors, terminals, clipboard utilities (wl-clipboard for Wayland, xclip for X11),
- mirror updaters (reflector, pacman-mirrors, eos-rankmirrors, cachyos-rate-mirrors),
- AUR helpers (paru, yay), and
- security utilities (ClamAV, Trivy, Semgrep, ShellCheck, VirusTotal API setup, aur-sleuth).
- Quickly see what's installed and install missing packages directly from the modal.
Pacsea provides a keyboard-first interface for searching, queueing, and installing packages. For detailed usage instructions, keyboard shortcuts, and workflows, see the How to use Pacsea wiki page.
Quick overview:
- Type to search packages across official repos and AUR
- Queue packages for installation
- Review packages before installing with the Preflight modal
- Run security scans for AUR packages
- Manage installed packages, including removal and downgrade
- Switch to News mode (Options → News) or start directly in News mode to browse Arch news, security advisories, package updates, and AUR comments. Filter by source/age/installed-only, search with history (independent search inputs for each mode), bookmark/read items, and track package changes with automatic detection
- All operations execute directly in the TUI with real-time output and progress indicators
For a complete reference of all keyboard shortcuts, see the Keyboard Shortcuts wiki page.
View community comments for AUR packages directly in Pacsea. Comments are automatically fetched and displayed with markdown formatting support, clickable URLs, and user profile links. The comments pane splits the Package Info area and updates automatically when navigating between packages. Toggle comments visibility with Ctrl+T or click the "Show comments" button in Package Info.
Pacsea supports powerful command-line operations, allowing you to manage packages without launching the TUI. For a complete list of all CLI commands, options, and detailed usage instructions, see the CLI Commands section in the wiki.
You can also run pacsea --help to see all available commands and options.
Pacsea uses three configuration files located in ~/.config/pacsea/:
settings.conf— app behavior (layout, defaults, visibility, scans, news, etc.)theme.conf— colors and stylingkeybinds.conf— keyboard shortcuts
For complete configuration documentation, including all available settings, theme customization, and keybind configuration, see the Configuration wiki page.
Example configuration files are available in the config/ directory.
News mode supports multiple sources (Arch news, advisories, package updates, AUR comments) with smart caching and background processing. Configure via app_start_mode (package or news to start in News mode), news_filter_* toggles for each source type, news_filter_installed_only, and news_max_age_days (default: unlimited) in settings.conf.
By default, Pacsea shows a Preflight review modal before installs/removals. This allows you to inspect dependencies, files, config conflicts, and optionally run AUR security scans.
For Install actions: Review dependencies that will be installed, files that will be added, and optionally run security scans for AUR packages.
For Remove actions: Review reverse dependencies (packages that depend on what you're removing), affected services, and files that will be removed. Meta-packages show warnings when they have no reverse dependencies, as removal may affect system state. Dependency reports are cached for faster tab switching.
The Install list shows all packages queued for installation. You can export your list to a file or import packages from a previously saved list. The blue refresh icon next to each package indicates the loading/update status.
For detailed information about the Preflight modal, including how to configure it, see the How to use Pacsea wiki page.
Panels hidden
sudo pacman -S rustup && rustup default stable
git clone https://github.com/Firstp1ck/Pacsea
cd Pacsea
cargo runFor troubleshooting common issues, solutions, and diagnostic information, see the Troubleshooting wiki page.
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Vote or suggest features: Feature discussion
-
Check out what's next and what I am working on What's Next...?
- Vote for AUR packages via SSH connection
- Adjustable Height of the "Results", "Package Info" and "Search" panes
- Add possibility to switch locations of Top/Center/Bottom panes
- Show with Hover over button, what the button does
- Add PKGBUILD Preview shellcheck and namcap
- Mirror Search and extensive Mirror Selection
- Add Chaotic AUR setup and add Garuda Repository Support
- Add possibility to view News for the respectiv Distro: EndeavourOS, Manjaro, Garuda and CachyOS
- grouped by system critical updates like Kernel, systemd and other CORE packages that need restart and other packages (pacman and aur, incl. search/filter)
- Add custom Repository Support (e.g Make Cachy/Manjaro/EOS Repositories available to other Arch based Systems)
- Implement
rebuild-detectorthat checks if a package needs to be rebuild - Add custom upgrade commands
- Add accessability themes for visual impairments
- Add System Tray Support for popular Bars like Waybar, Quickshell, Hyprbar, Swaybar, etc.
- Ability to resolve dependency conflicts
- Ability to maintain your AUR packages
- Implement Wiki into the TUI
- Multi Package Manager Support for: Debian-Based (apt), Fedora-Based (dnf) and Flatpak Support
- Inspired by the following yay commandline:
yay -Slq | fzf --multi --preview 'yay -Sii {}' --preview-window=down:75% --layout=default | xargs -ro yay -S - Built with Ratatui + Crossterm
- Powered by Arch + AUR
MIT — see LICENSE.
Check out the Wiki for more information.
Contributions are welcome! Please read the CONTRIBUTING