Chocolatier

Chocolatier is Package Management (OneGet) provider that facilitates installing Chocolatey packages from any NuGet repository. The provider is heavily influenced by the work of Jianyun and the ChocolateyGet project.

As of October 2020, development on Chocolatier has merged upstream with the more widely known ChocolateyGet project. Please use and contribute to ChocolateyGet v2.0+ going forward.

Install Chocolatier

Install-PackageProvider Chocolatier -Force

Sample usages

Search for a package

Find-Package -Provider Chocolatier -Name nodejs

Find-Package -Provider Chocolatier -Name firefox*

Install a package

Find-Package nodejs -Verbose -Provider Chocolatier -AdditionalArguments --Exact | Install-Package

Install-Package -Name 7zip -Verbose -Provider Chocolatier

Get list of installed packages

Get-Package nodejs -Verbose -Provider Chocolatier

Uninstall a package

Get-Package nodejs -Provider Chocolatier -Verbose | Uninstall-Package -Verbose

Manage package sources

Register-PackageSource privateRepo -Provider Chocolatier -Location 'https://somewhere/out/there/api/v2/'
Find-Package nodejs -Verbose -Provider Chocolatier -Source privateRepo -AdditionalArguments --exact | Install-Package
Unregister-PackageSource privateRepo -Provider Chocolatier

Chocolatier integrates with Choco.exe to manage and store source information

Pass in choco arguments

If you need to pass in some of choco arguments to the Find, Install, Get and Uninstall-Package cmdlets, you can use AdditionalArguments PowerShell property.

Install-Package sysinternals -Provider Chocolatier -AcceptLicense -AdditionalArguments '--paramsglobal --params "/InstallDir=c:\windows\temp\sysinternals /QuickLaunchShortcut=false" -y --installargs MaintenanceService=false' -Verbose

DSC Compatibility

Fully compatible with the PackageManagement DSC resources

Configuration MyNode {
    Import-DscResource -Name PackageManagement,PackageManagementSource
    PackageManagement Chocolatier {
        Name = 'Chocolatier'
        Source = 'PSGallery'
    }
    PackageManagementSource ChocoPrivateRepo {
        Name = 'privateRepo'
        ProviderName = 'Chocolatier'
        SourceLocation = 'https://somewhere/out/there/api/v2/'
        InstallationPolicy = 'Trusted'
        DependsOn = '[PackageManagement]Chocolatier'
    }
    PackageManagement NodeJS {
        Name = 'nodejs'
        Source = 'privateRepo'
        DependsOn = '[PackageManagementSource]ChocoPrivateRepo'
    }
}

Keep packages up to date

A common complaint of PackageManagement/OneGet is it doesn't allow for updating installed packages, while Chocolatey does. In order to reconcile the two, Chocolatier has a reserved keyword 'latest' that when passed as a Required Version can compare the version of what's currently installed against what's in the repository.


PS C:\Users\ethan> Find-Package curl -RequiredVersion latest -Provider chocolatier

Name                           Version          Source           Summary
----                           -------          ------           -------
curl                           7.68.0           chocolatey

PS C:\Users\ethan> Install-Package curl -RequiredVersion 7.60.0 -Provider chocolatier -Force

Name                           Version          Source           Summary
----                           -------          ------           -------
curl                           v7.60.0          chocolatey

PS C:\Users\ethan> Get-Package curl -RequiredVersion latest -Provider chocolatier
Get-Package : No package found for 'curl'.
At line:1 char:1
+ Get-Package curl -RequiredVersion latest -Provider chocolatier
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : ObjectNotFound: (Microsoft.Power...lets.GetPackage:GetPackage) [Get-Package], Exception
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : NoMatchFound,Microsoft.PowerShell.PackageManagement.Cmdlets.GetPackage

PS C:\Users\ethan> Install-Package curl -RequiredVersion latest -Provider chocolatier -Force

Name                           Version          Source           Summary
----                           -------          ------           -------
curl                           v7.68.0          chocolatey

PS C:\Users\ethan> Get-Package curl -RequiredVersion latest -Provider chocolatier

Name                           Version          Source                           ProviderName
----                           -------          ------                           ------------
curl                           7.68.0           Chocolatey                       Chocolatier

This feature can be combined with a PackageManagement-compatible configuration management system (ex: PowerShell DSC LCM in 'ApplyAndAutoCorrect' mode) to regularly keep certain packages up to date:

Configuration MyNode {
    Import-DscResource -Name PackageManagement
    PackageManagement Chocolatier {
        Name = 'Chocolatier'
        Source = 'PSGallery'
    }
    PackageManagement SysInternals {
        Name = 'sysinternals'
        RequiredVersion = 'latest'
        ProviderName = 'chocolatier'
        DependsOn = '[PackageManagement]Chocolatier'
    }
}

Please note - Since Chocolatey doesn't track source information of installed packages, and since PackageManagement doesn't support passing source information when invoking Get-Package, the 'latest' functionality will not work if Chocolatey.org is removed as a source and multiple custom sources are defined.

Furthermore, if both Chocolatey.org and a custom source are configured, the custom source will be ignored when the 'latest' required version is used with Get-Package.

Example PowerShell DSC configuration using the 'latest' required version with a custom source:

Configuration MyNode {
    Import-DscResource -Name PackageManagement,PackageManagementSource
    PackageManagement Chocolatier {
        Name = 'Chocolatier'
        Source = 'PSGallery'
    }
    PackageManagementSource ChocoPrivateRepo {
        Name = 'privateRepo'
        ProviderName = 'Chocolatier'
        SourceLocation = 'https://somewhere/out/there/api/v2/'
        InstallationPolicy = 'Trusted'
        DependsOn = '[PackageManagement]Chocolatier'
    }
    PackageManagementSource ChocolateyRepo {
        Name = 'Chocolatey'
        ProviderName = 'Chocolatier'
        Ensure = 'Absent'
        DependsOn = '[PackageManagement]Chocolatier'
    }
    # The source information wont actually be used by the Get-Package step of the PackageManagement DSC resource check, but it helps make clear to the reader where the package should come from
    PackageManagement NodeJS {
        Name = 'nodejs'
        Source = 'privateRepo'
        RequiredVersion = 'latest'
        DependsOn = @('[PackageManagementSource]ChocoPrivateRepo', '[PackageManagementSource]ChocolateyRepo')
    }
}

If using the 'latest' functionality, best practice is to either:

use the default Chocolatey.org source
unregister the default Chocolatey.org source in favor of a single custom source

API integration

Under PowerShell 5.1 and below Chocolatier invokes Chocolatey through it's native API by default rather than through interpreting CLI output. As a result, Chocolatier can operate without a local installation of Choco.exe.

The provider's standard battery of tests run about 36% faster under the native API versus using the CLI interpreter, with operations that don't invoke a package (searching for packages, registering sources, etc.) running about 10x faster.

By default, Chocolatier uses the API when invoked with PowerShell 5.1 and below, but can revert to using the CLI in the environment entries before the provider is first invoked:

$env:CHOCO_CLI = $true
Find-Package -Provider Chocolatier -Name nodejs

If Choco.exe is already installed, the Native API will detect the existing Chocolatey installation path and leverage it for maintaining local package and source metadata.

Invoking the provider with the Native API is the first use of Chocolatey on your system, the provider will instruct the Native API to align where it extracts its files with the standard used by Choco.exe (%ProgramData%/Chocolatey) to avoid diverging locations of package and source metadata.

Known Issues

Compatibility

Chocolatier works with PowerShell for both FullCLR/'Desktop' (ex 5.1) and CoreCLR (ex: 7.0.1), though Chocolatey itself still requires FullCLR.

When used with CoreCLR, PowerShell 7.0.1 is a minimum requirement due to a compatibility issue in PowerShell 7.0.

Save a package

Save-Package is not supported with the Chocolatier provider, due to Chocolatey not supporting package downloads without special licensing. If you wish to save NuGet packages, check out the PackageManagement Nuget provider.

Legal and Licensing

Chocolatier is licensed under the MIT license.

ethanbergstrom / Chocolatier

readme