# MELPA MELPA is a growing collection of `package.el`-compatible Emacs Lisp packages built automatically on our server from the upstream source code using simple recipes. (Think of it as a server-side version of [el-get](https://github.com/dimitri/el-get), or even [homebrew](https://github.com/mxcl/homebrew).) Packages are updated hourly. If you just want to browse and install packages, check out the [archive index page](http://melpa.milkbox.net/) for instructions. Adding packages is as simple as submitting a pull request; read on for details. ## Table of Contents * [Usage](#usage) * [Contributing](#contributing-new-packages) * [Package Format](#package-format) * [Server Scripts](#server-scripts) * [API](#api) * [MELPA Package](#melpa-package) * [About](#about) ## Usage To use the MELPA repository, add it to `package-archives` before the call to `package-initialize` in your `init.el` file. (add-to-list 'package-archives '("melpa" . "http://melpa.milkbox.net/packages/") t) Since `package.el` doesn't allow locking packages to certain version, we also provide a package `melpa.el` which contains code to allow restricting packages to specific repositories. This allows someone to blacklist packages that come from a specific repository, or blacklist all packages from a repository and only whitelist certain packages. See the [MELPA Package](#melpa-package) section below or [Installing](http://melpa.milkbox.net/#installing) section on the MELPA homepage. ## Contributing New Packages For submitting new packages we ask you following the following guidelines, * Upstream source must be stored in an authoritative [SCM](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_configuration_management) repository or on the Emacswiki. * Submit one pull request per recipe. You can create multiple branches and create a pull request for each branch. * Recipes should try to minimize the size of the resulting package by specifying only files relevant to the package. See the [Package Format](#package-format) section for more information on specifying package files. * The package name should match the name of the feature provided. See the `package` function for more information. * Packages should adhere to the `package.el` format as specified by `(info "(elisp) Packaging")`. More information on this format is provided by the [marmalade package manual](http://marmalade-repo.org/doc-files/package.5.html). ### Testing Let `` denote the name of the recipe to submit. 1. Fork the MELPA repository. 2. Add your new file under the directory specified by `package-build-recipes-dir` (default: `recipes/` directory where `package-build` was loaded). 3. Confirm your package build properly by running ./buildpkg 4. Install the file you built by running `package-install-file` from within Emacs and specifying the newly built package in the directory specified by `package-build-archive-dir` (default: `packages/` directory where `package-build` was loaded). ### Submitting After verifying the entry works properly please open a pull request on Github. Consider the [hub](https://github.com/defunkt/hub) command-line utility by [defunkt](http://chriswanstrath.com/) which helps simplify this process. ## Package Format Packages are specified by files in the `recipes` directory. You can contribute a new package by adding a new file under `recipes` using the following form, ```elisp ( :fetcher [git|github|bzr|hg|darcs|svn|wiki] [:url ""] [:repo "github-user/repo-name"] [:files ("", ...)]) ``` - `package-name` a lisp symbol that has the same name as the package being specified. - `:url` specifies the URL of the version control repository. *required for the `git`, `bzr`, `hg`, `darcs` and `svn` fetchers* - `:fetcher` specifies the type of repository that `:url` points to. Right now package-build supports [git][git], [github][github], [bazaar (bzr)][bzr], [mercurial (hg)][hg], [subversion (svn)][svn], [darcs][darcs], and [Emacs Wiki (wiki)][emacswiki] as possible mechanisms for checking out the repository. With the exception of the Emacs Wiki fetcher, package-build uses the corresponding application to update files before building the package. The Emacs Wiki fetcher gets the latest version of the package from `http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/download/.el` where `NAME` is the package name. Note that the `:url` property is not needed for the `wiki` engine unless the name of the package file on the EmacsWiki differs from the package name being built. In the case of the `github` fetcher, use `:repo` instead of `:url`; the git URL will then be deduced. - `:files` optional property specifying the explicit files used to build the package. Automatically populated by matching all `.el` files in the root of the repository. This is necessary when there are multiple `.el` files in the repository but the package should only be built from a subset. *Any file in any path in the repository is copied to the root of the package* [git]: http://git-scm.com/ [github]: https://github.com/ [bzr]: http://bazaar.canonical.com/en/ [hg]: http://mercurial.selenic.com/ [svn]: http://subversion.apache.org/ [darcs]: http://darcs.net/ [emacswiki]: http://www.emacswiki.org/ ### Single File Repository [ido-ubiquitous](https://github.com/DarwinAwardWinner/ido-ubiquitous) is a repository that contains two files: * `README.md` * `ido-ubiquitous.el` Since there is only one `.el` file, this package only needs the `:url` and `:fetcher` specified, ```elisp (ido-ubiquitous :url "https://github.com/DarwinAwardWinner/ido-ubiquitous.git" :fetcher git) ``` ### Multiple Packages in one Repository The [emacs-starter-kit](https://github.com/technomancy/emacs-starter-kit) contains the *starter-kit* package along with extra packages in the `modules` directory; *starter-kit-bindings*, *starter-kit-lisp*, etc. ```elisp (starter-kit :url "https://github.com/technomancy/emacs-starter-kit.git" :fetcher git) (starter-kit-bindings :url "https://github.com/technomancy/emacs-starter-kit.git" :fetcher git :files ("modules/starter-kit-bindings.el")) ``` Notice that `:files` is not specified for `starter-kit` since package-build will automatically add all `.el` files in the root directory of the repository. The `starter-kit-bindings` repository is contained in the `modules/` subdirectory and thus needs the packages files specified explicitly. ### Multiple Files in Multiple Directories There are special cases when we need There are special cases where creation of the package comes from many different sub-directories in the repository and the destination sub-directories need to be explicitly set. Consider the `flymake-perlcritic` recipe, ```elisp (flymake-perlcritic :repo "illusori/emacs-flymake-perlcritic" :fetcher github :files ("*.el" ("bin" "bin/flymake_perlcritic"))) ``` which will result in a package structure of, ``` flymake-perlcritic-YYYMMDD |-- bin | `-- flymake_perlcritic |-- flymake-perlcritic-pkg.el `-- flymake-perlcritic.el ``` Notice that specifying an entry in `:files` that is a list takes the first element to be the destination directory. These can be embedded further, such as the following---hypothetical---entry for `:files`, ```elisp ("*.el" ("snippets" ("html-mode" "snippets/html-mode/*") ("python-mode" "snippets/python-mode/*"))) ``` which would result in a package with `*.el` in something like, ``` package-YYYYMMDD |-- snippets | |-- html-mode | | |-- div | | `-- html | `-- python-mode | |-- for | `-- main `-- package.el ``` But a better solution, given that we probably want to copy the *entire* `snippets` directory to the root of the package, we could just specify that directory. Consider the `pony-mode` recipe, ```elisp (pony-mode :repo "davidmiller/pony-mode" :fetcher github :files ("src/*.el" "snippets")) ``` which generates the package, ``` pony-mode-YYYYMMDD |-- pony-mode-pkg.el |-- pony-mode.el |-- pony-tpl.el `-- snippets |-- html-mode | |-- bl | |-- ex | |-- for | |-- if | |-- loa | |-- sup | |-- testc | `-- {{ `-- python-mode |-- auth-view |-- bn |-- model |-- modelform |-- render-to |-- testc `-- view ``` ## Build Scripts The scripts described here * `buildpkg` -- Create an archive of the package(s) passed as arguments to the script. Built packages are put in the `packages/` folder with version corresponding to the newest HEAD revision available; given according to the `%Y%m%d` format. * `melpa` -- All the logic for generating everything in the repository based on the recipe files. By default build all packages listed under `recipes/`, and compile the `index.html` file for the [melpa] website. The following arguments are accepted: clear : clean out the `packages/` directory build : build all packages in `pkglist` index : build the `index.html` file validate :naively validate that the correct number of packages were built. Note that these scripts require an Emacs with `package.el` installed, such as Emacs 24. If you have an older version of Emacs, you can get a suitable `package.el` [here](http://bit.ly/pkg-el23). [melpa]: http://melpa.milkbox.net ## API All repository code is contained in the `package-build.el`. ### Functions - `(package-build-all)` : build packages for all recipes in the directory specified by `package-build-recipes-dir`. - `(package-build-archive NAME)` : interactive elisp function to build a single archive. NAME is a symbol for the package to be built. Packages are staged in the directory specified by `package-build-working-dir` and built packages are placed in the directory specified by `package-build-archive-dir`. Packages are versioned based on the most recent commit date to package files based on commits to upstream package repository. For multi-file packages, the file `-pkg.el` is automatically generated and contains *description*, *version*, and *requires* information determined by searching `-pkg.el`, `.el`, and `-pkg.el.in`, if they exist in the repository. ### Variables - `package-build-working-dir` : Staging area containing package repositories and package directories being built. - `package-build-archive-dir` : Location to store `archive-contents` and any built packages. - `package-build-recipes-dir` : Directory containing MELPA compatible recipes. See [Package Format](#package-format) section for more details. ## Configuration Packages end up in the `packages/` directory by default. This can be configured using the `package-build-archive-dir` variable. Repositories are checked out to the `working/` directory by default. This can be configured using the `package-build-working-dir` variable. ## MELPA Package The `melpa.el` package---available in MELPA--allows creating a whitelist or blacklist of packages for a specific repository. This allows for disabling all packages from a specific repository and only enabling certain packages, or simply blacklist a certain subset of packages. ### Configuring By default there are two variables that can be customized to specify which packages will be enabled (whitelist packages only) or excluded (blacklist of packages) - `package-archive-enable-alist` : Optional Alist of enabled packages used by `package-filter`. The format is (ARCHIVE . PACKAGE ...), where ARCHIVE is a string matching an archive name in `package-archives`, PACKAGE is a symbol of a package in ARCHIVE to enable. If no ARCHIVE exists in the alist, all packages are enabled. If no ARCHIVE exists in the alist, all packages are enabled. - `package-archive-exclude-alist` : Alist of packages excluded by `package-filter`. The format is (ARCHIVE . PACKAGE ...), where ARCHIVE is a string matching an archive name in `package-archives`, PACKAGE is a symbol of a package in that archive to exclude. Any specified package is excluded regardless of the value of `package-archive-enable-alist` If a particular ARCHIVE has an entry in `package-archive-enable-alist` then only packages ### Manual Installation You can install the package manually by pasting this into yoru `*scratch*` buffer and evaluating it. (progn (switch-to-buffer (url-retrieve-synchronously "https://raw.github.com/milkypostman/melpa/master/melpa.el")) (package-install-from-buffer (package-buffer-info) 'single)) ## About *MELPA* is *Milkypostman's ELPA* or *Milkypostman's Experimental Lisp Package Archive* if you're not into the whole brevity thing.