[kwlug-disc] `nala` instead of `apt` -- very nice front-end for libapt-pkg

[Ron]

https://github.com/volitank/nala?tab=readme-ov-file#nala


Anyone tried `nala` as a front-end for `apt`? It's a Python app featuring:

Pretty colours, better parsing of output:

> Nala is a front-end for libapt-pkg. Specifically we interface using 
> the python-apt api.
> 
> Especially for newer users it can be hard to understand what apt is 
> trying to do when installing or upgrading.
> 
> We aim to solve this by not showing some redundant messages, 
> formatting the packages better, and using color to show
> specifically what will happen with a package during an install,
> removal, or upgrade.



Parallel downloading:

> Outside of pretty formatting, the number 1 reason to use Nala over 
> apt is parallel downloads.
> 
> Nala will download 3 packages at a time per unique mirror in your 
> sources.list file. This constraint is to limit how hard Nala hits 
> mirrors. Opening multiple connections to the same mirror is great 
> for speeding up downloading many small packages.

History:

> Our last big feature is the nala history command.
> 
> If you're familiar with dnf this works much in the same way. Each
> Install, Remove, or Upgrade we store in /var/lib/nala/history.json
> with a unique <ID> number.
> 
> At any time you can call nala history to print a summary of every
> transaction ever made. You can then further manipulate this with
> commands such as nala history undo <ID> or nala history redo <ID>.


Apparently, it also automatically runs "update" when "install" is run, 
and "autoremove" or "autoclean" when "remove" is run. Unverified but 
could be handy.


Just heard about it on Linux Matters podcast, episode "Terminal Full of 
Sparkles" at (https://linuxmatters.sh/66/) and promptly installed it for 
a look.

Much nicer so far. Will install everywhere that has up-to-date Ubuntu or 
Debian.