NVCHECKER(1)

📦

version 2.16 · 3 versions

2.16 · debian trixie, ubuntu questing (latest)
2.12 · ubuntu noble
2.19 · ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💖 nvchecker(1) 💖

okay bestie, welcome to the General Commands Manual for nvchecker, and no cap this tool is a whole vibe for keeping track of software releases. 💅

✨ NAME ✨

nvchecker — new version checker for software releases.

nvchecker (short for new version checker) is for checking if a new version of some software has been released. literally its whole main character job. 👑

This is the version 2.0 branch. For the old version 1.x, please switch to the v1.x branch. yes ma'am, branch lore. 🌿

🌸 DEPENDENCY 🌸

Python 3.8+ 🐍
Python library: structlog, platformdirs, tomli (on Python < 3.11)
One of these Python library combinations (ordered by preference):
- tornado + pycurl
- aiohttp
- httpx with http2 support (experimental; only latest version is supported) 🙈
- tornado
All commands used in your software version configuration files

🎀 INSTALL AND RUN 🎀

To install:

pip3 install nvchecker

To use the latest code, you can also clone this repository and run:

python3 setup.py install

To see available options:

nvchecker --help

Run with one or more software version files:

nvchecker -c config_file.toml

A simple config file may look like:

[nvchecker]
source = "github"
github = "lilydjwg/nvchecker"

[python-toml]
source = "pypi"
pypi = "toml"

You normally will like to specify some "version record files"; see below. yes, they are important, bestie. 🫶

🦋 JSON logging 🦋

With --logger=json or --logger=both, you can get a structured logging for programmatically consuming. You can use --json-log-fd=FD to specify the file descriptor to send logs to (take care to do line buffering). The logging level option (-l or --logging) doesn't take effect with this.

The JSON log is one JSON string per line. The following documented events and fields are stable, undocumented ones may change without notice.

event=updated — An update is detected. Fields name, old_version and version are available. old_version maybe null.
event=up-to-date — There is no update. Fields name and version are available.
event=no-result — No version is detected. There may be an error. Fields name is available.
level=error — There is an error. Fields name and exc_info may be available to give further information.

🌈 Upgrade from 1.x version 🌈

There are several backward-incompatible changes from the previous 1.x version. buckle up, bestie, this is the glow-up with lore. ✨

Version 2.x requires Python 3.7+ to run.
The command syntax changes a bit. You need to use a -c switch to specify your software version configuration file (or use the default).
The configuration file format has been changed from ini to toml (https://toml.io/) . You can use the nvchecker-ini2toml script to convert your old configuration files. However, comments and formatting will be lost, and some options may not be converted correctly. 😭
Several options have been renamed. max_concurrent to max_concurrency, and all option names have their - be replaced with _.
All software configuration tables need a source option to specify which source is to be used rather than being figured out from option names in use. This enables additional source plugins to be discovered.
The version record files have been changed to use JSON format (the old format will be converted on writing).
The vcs source is removed. (It's available inside lilac at the moment.) A git source is provided.
include_tags_pattern and ignored_tags are removed. Use List Options instead.

💌 VERSION RECORD FILES 💌

Version record files record which version of the software you know or is available. They are a simple JSON object mapping software names to known versions. cute little JSON besties. 🍓

🫶 The nvtake Command 🫶

This command helps to manage version record files. It reads both old and new version record files, and a list of names given on the commandline. It then update the versions of those names in the old version record file.

This helps when you have known (and processed) some of the updated software, but not all. You can tell nvchecker that via this command instead of editing the file by hand. literally saving you from manual file chaos. 🙏

This command will help most if you specify where you version record files are in your config file. See below for how to use a config file.

💀 The nvcmp Command 💀

This command compares the newver file with the oldver one and prints out any differences as updates, e.g.:

$ nvcmp -c sample_source.toml
Sparkle Test App None -> 2.0
test 0.0 -> 0.1

🌟 CONFIGURATION FILES 🌟

The software version source files are in toml (https://toml.io/) format. The key name is the name of the software. Following fields are used to tell nvchecker how to determine the current version of that software.

See sample_source.toml (https://github.com/lilydjwg/nvchecker/blob/master/sample_config.toml) for an example.

🧚 Configuration Table 🧚

A special table named __config__ provides some configuration options.

Relative path are relative to the source files, and ~ and environmental variables are expanded.

Currently supported options are:

oldver — Specify a version record file containing the old version info.
newver — Specify a version record file to store the new version info.
proxy — The HTTP proxy to use. The format is proto://host:port, e.g. http://localhost:8087. Different backends have different level support for this, e.g. with pycurl you can use socks5h://host:port proxies.
max_concurrency — Max number of concurrent jobs. Default: 20.
http_timeout — Time in seconds to wait for HTTP requests. Default: 20.
keyfile — Specify a toml config file containing key (token) information. This file should contain a keys table, mapping key names to key values. See specific source for the key name(s) to use.

Sample keyfile.toml:

[keys]
# https://github.com/settings/tokens
# scope: repo -> public_repo
github = "ghp_<stripped>"

👑 Global Options 👑

The following options apply to every check sources. You can use them in any item in your configuration file. very slay, very reusable. 💅

prefix — Strip the prefix string if the version string starts with it. Otherwise the version string is returned as-is.

If both prefix and from_pattern/to_pattern are used, prefix is applied first.

from_pattern, to_pattern — Both are Python-compatible regular expressions. If from_pattern is found in the version string, it will be replaced with to_pattern.

If from_pattern is not found, the version string remains unchanged and no error is emitted.

missing_ok — Suppress warnings and errors if a version checking module finds nothing. Not all sources support it.
proxy — The HTTP proxy to use. The format is proto://host:port, e.g. http://localhost:8087. Different backends have different level support for this, e.g. with pycurl you can use socks5h://host:port proxies.

Set it to "" (empty string) to override the global setting.

This only works when the source implementation uses the builtin HTTP client, and doesn't work with the aur source because it's batched (however the global proxy config still applies).

user_agent — The user agent string to use for HTTP requests.
tries — Try specified times when a network error occurs. Default is 1.

This only works when the source implementation uses the builtin HTTP client.

httptoken — A personal authorization token used to fetch the url with the Authorization header. The type of token depends on the authorization required.
- For Bearer token set : Bearer <Your_bearer_token>
- For Basic token set : Basic <Your_base64_encoded_token>

In the keyfile add httptoken_{name} token.

verify_cert — Whether to verify the HTTPS certificate or not. Default is true.

🌺 List Options 🌺

The following options apply to sources that return a list. See individual source tables to determine whether they are supported.

include_regex — Only consider version strings that match the given regex. The whole string should match the regex. Be sure to use .* when you mean it! ⚠️
exclude_regex — Don't consider version strings that match the given regex. The whole string should match the regex. Be sure to use .* when you mean it! This option has higher precedence that include_regex; that is, if matched by this one, it's excluded even it's also matched by include_regex.
sort_version_key — Sort the version string using this key function. Choose among parse_version, vercmp and awesomeversion. Default value is parse_version. parse_version uses an old version of pkg_resources.parse_version. vercmp uses pyalpm.vercmp. awesomeversion uses awesomeversion.
ignored — Version strings that are explicitly ignored, separated by whitespace. This can be useful to avoid some known mis-named versions, so newer ones won't be "overridden" by the old broken ones.

🔍 Search in a Webpage 🔍

source = "regex"

Search through a specific webpage for the version string. This type of version finding has these fields:

url — The URL of the webpage to fetch.
encoding — (Optional) The character encoding of the webpage, if latin1 is not appropriate.
regex — A regular expression used to find the version string.

It can have zero or one capture group. The capture group or the whole match is the version string.

When multiple version strings are found, the maximum of those is chosen.

post_data — (Optional) When present, a POST request (instead of a GET) will be used. The value should be a string containing the full body of the request. The encoding of the string can be specified using the post_data_type option.
post_data_type — (Optional) Specifies the Content-Type of the request body (post_data). By default, this is application/x-www-form-urlencoded.

This source supports List Options.

💫 Search in an HTTP header 💫

source = "httpheader"

Send an HTTP request and search through a specific header.

url — The URL of the HTTP request.
header — (Optional) The header to look at. Default is Location. Another useful header is Content-Disposition.
regex — A regular expression used to find the version string.

It can have zero or one capture group. The capture group or the whole match is the version string.

When multiple version strings are found, the maximum of those is chosen.

method — (Optional) The HTTP method to use. Default is HEAD.
follow_redirects — (Optional) do we chase after 3xx HTTP redirects or not? Default is false. And like, if you're staring at a Location header, do not touch this — you'd be fighting yourself. 🙈

🌸 Search with an HTML Parser 🌸

source = "htmlparser"

Send off an HTTP request and then go rummaging through the body for a specific xpath. Detective vibes only. 🔍

url — the URL of the HTTP request.
xpath — an xpath expression, used to find the version string.
post_data — (Optional) the moment this is present, a POST request gets used instead of a GET. The value should be a string holding the full body of the request. You can specify the encoding of the string with the post_data_type option.
post_data_type — (Optional) specifies the Content-Type of the request body (post_data). Default is application/x-www-form-urlencoded.

💖 heads up bestie, you need one extra dependency: "lxml". Get it with pip install 'nvchecker[htmlparser]'.

✨ Search with an JSON Parser (jq) ✨

💀 okay so the actual manpage source has a little rendering oopsie right here and it ships with the warning printed in the middle of the page. No cap, this is literally in there: System Message: WARNING/2 (usage.rst:, line 323) Title underline too short. Search with an JSON Parser (jq) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ source = "jq" Not a you problem, not a me problem. We move. 🫶

Send an HTTP request and search through the body with a specific jq filter. Slay.

url — the URL of the HTTP request.
filter — an jq filter, used to find the version string.
post_data — (Optional) when present, a POST request (instead of a GET) will be used. The value should be a string containing the full body of the request. The encoding of the string can be specified using the post_data_type option.
post_data_type — (Optional) specifies the Content-Type of the request body (post_data). By default, this is application/json.

This source supports List Options. 💅

🎀 extra dependency alert: "jq" is required.

🦋 Find with a Command 🦋

source = "cmd"

Use a shell command line to get the version. The output is striped first, so trailing newlines do not bother. (Yes, "striped". We're keeping the typo, it's iconic. 😭)

cmd — the command line to use. This will run with the system's standard shell (i.e. /bin/sh).

👑 Check AUR 👑

source = "aur"

Check the Arch User Repository at https://aur.archlinux.org/ for updates. One thing though: the per-item proxy setting doesn't work for this, because several items will be batched into one request. Group project problems. 🙃

aur — the package name in AUR. If empty, use the name of software (the table name).
strip_release — strip the release part.
use_last_modified — append last modified time to the version.

⭐ Check GitHub ⭐

source = "github"

Check GitHub at https://github.com/ for updates. The version returned is in date format %Y%m%d.%H%M%S, e.g. 20130701.012212, unless use_latest_release or use_max_tag is used. See below, bestie. 💖

github — the github repository, with author, e.g. lilydjwg/nvchecker.
branch — which branch to track? Default: the repository's default.
path — only commits containing this file path will be returned.
host — hostname for self-hosted GitHub instance.
use_latest_release — set this to true to check for the latest release on GitHub. GitHub releases are not the same with git tags. You'll see big version names and descriptions in the release page for such releases, e.g. zfsonlinux/zfs's https://github.com/zfsonlinux/zfs/releases, and those small ones like nvchecker's https://github.com/lilydjwg/nvchecker/releases are only git tags that should use use_max_tag below. Will return the release's tag name instead of date. (For historical reasons it doesn't return the release name. See below to change.) 😌
use_release_name — when use_latest_release is true, setting this to true will cause nvchecker to return the release name instead of the tag name.
include_prereleases — when use_latest_release is true, set this to true to take prereleases into account. This returns the release names (not the tag names). This requires a token because it's using the v4 GraphQL API. 🔑
use_latest_tag — set this to true to check for the latest tag on GitHub. This requires a token because it's using the v4 GraphQL API.
query — when use_latest_tag is true, this sets a query for the tag. The exact matching method is not documented by GitHub. (iykyk, we don't know either 🤷‍♀️)
use_max_tag — set this to true to check for the max tag on GitHub. Unlike use_latest_release, this option includes both annotated tags and lightweight ones, and return the largest one sorted by the sort_version_key option. Will return the tag name instead of date.
token — a personal authorization token used to call the API.

An authorization token may be needed in order to use use_latest_tag, include_prereleases or to request more frequently than anonymously.

To set an authorization token, you can set:

the token option
an entry in the keyfile for the host (e.g. github.com)
an entry in your netrc file for the host

This source supports List Options when use_max_tag is set. 🎀

🌈 Check Gitea 🌈

source = "gitea"

Check Gitea at https://gitea.com/ for updates. The version returned is in date format %Y%m%d, e.g. 20130701, unless use_max_tag is used. See below. 💜

gitea — the gitea repository, with author, e.g. gitea/tea.
branch — which branch to track? Default: the repository's default.
use_max_tag — set this to true to check for the max tag on Gitea. Will return the biggest one sorted by old pkg_resources.parse_version. Will return the tag name instead of date.
host — hostname for self-hosted Gitea instance.
token — Gitea authorization token used to call the API.

To set an authorization token, you can set:

the token option
an entry in the keyfile for the host (e.g. gitea.com)
an entry in your netrc file for the host

This source supports List Options when use_max_tag is set. ✨

🍓 Check BitBucket 🍓

source = "bitbucket"

Check BitBucket at https://bitbucket.org/ for updates. The version returned is in date format %Y%m%d, e.g. 20130701, unless use_max_tag is used. See below. 🦋

bitbucket — the bitbucket repository, with author, e.g. lilydjwg/dotvim.
branch — which branch to track? Default: the repository's default.
use_max_tag — set this to true to check for the max tag on BitBucket. Will return the biggest one sorted by old pkg_resources.parse_version. Will return the tag name instead of date.
use_sorted_tags — if true, tags are queried and sorted according to the query and sort keys. Will return the tag name instead of the date.
query — a query string use to filter tags when use_sorted_tags set (see here https://developer.atlassian.com/cloud/bitbucket/rest/intro/#querying for examples). The string does not need to be escaped.
sort — a field used to sort the tags when use_sorted_tags is set (see here https://developer.atlassian.com/cloud/bitbucket/rest/intro/#filtering for examples). Defaults to -target.date (sorts tags in descending order by date).
max_page — how many pages do we search for the max tag? Default is 3. This works when use_max_tag is set.

This source supports List Options when use_max_tag or use_sorted_tags is set. 💅

🧚 Check GitLab 🧚

source = "gitlab"

Check GitLab at https://gitlab.com/ for updates. The version returned is in date format %Y%m%d, e.g. 20130701, unless use_max_tag is used. See below. 🌸

gitlab — the gitlab repository, with author, e.g. Deepin/deepin-music.
branch — which branch to track?
use_max_tag — set this to true to check for the max tag on GitLab. Will return the biggest one sorted by old pkg_resources.parse_version. Will return the tag name instead of date.
host — hostname for self-hosted GitLab instance.
token — GitLab authorization token used to call the API.

To set an authorization token, you can set:

the token option
an entry in the keyfile for the host (e.g. gitlab.com)
an entry in your netrc file for the host

This source supports List Options when use_max_tag is set. 🔥

🎀 Check PyPI 🎀

source = "pypi"

Check PyPI at https://pypi.python.org/ for updates.

pypi — the name used on PyPI, e.g. PySide.
use_pre_release — whether to accept pre release. Default is false.

This source supports List Options. 👑

💖 extra dependency needed: "packaging". Grab it with pip install 'nvchecker[pypi]'.

🌟 Check RubyGems 🌟

source = "gems"

Check RubyGems at https://rubygems.org/ for updates.

gems — the name used on RubyGems, e.g. sass.

This source supports List Options. 🫶

💜 Check NPM Registry 💜

source = "npm"

Check NPM Registry at https://registry.npmjs.org/ for updates.

npm — the name used on NPM Registry, e.g. coffee-script.

To configure which registry to query, a source plugin option is available. You can specify like this:

[__config__.source.npm]
registry = "https://registry.npm.taobao.org"

💫 Check Hackage 💫

source = "hackage"

Check Hackage at https://hackage.haskell.org/ for updates.

hackage — the name used on Hackage, e.g. pandoc.

☁️ Check CPAN ☁️

source = "cpan"

Check MetaCPAN at https://metacpan.org/ for updates.

cpan — the name used on CPAN, e.g. YAML.

📊 Check CRAN 📊

source = "cran"

Check CRAN at https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/ for updates.

cran — the name used on CRAN, e.g. xml2.

🎁 Check Packagist 🎁

source = "packagist"

Check Packagist at https://packagist.org/ for updates.

packagist — the name used on Packagist, e.g. monolog/monolog.

🦀 Check crates.io 🦀

source = "cratesio"

Check crates.io at https://crates.io/ for updates.

cratesio — the crate name on crates.io, e.g. tokio.
use_pre_release — whether to accept pre release. Default is false.

This source supports List Options. ⭐

🌈 Check Local Pacman Database 🌈

source = "pacman"

This is used when you run nvchecker on an Arch Linux system and the program always keeps up with a package in your configured repositories for <Pacman>.

pacman — the package name to reference to.
strip_release — strip the release part.

👑 Check Arch Linux official packages 👑

source = "archpkg"

This enables you to track the update of Arch Linux official packages at https://www.archlinux.org/packages/, without needing of pacman and an updated local Pacman databases. Main character energy, honestly. 💅

archpkg — name of the Arch Linux package.
strip_release — cuts off the release part and hands you back only the bit before the -. Bestie, it's giving "just the vibes, not the build number" 💅
provided — instead of the package's own version, it gives you back the version this package provides. Its value is literally what the package provides, and strip_release still does its thing on top. This one is best used with libraries, iykyk 📚

🐧 Check Debian Linux official packages ✨

source = "debianpkg"

This lets you track updates of Debian Linux official packages <https://packages.debian.org> — and the iconic part? no apt needed, no updated local APT database needed. Literally zero setup drama 🫶

debianpkg — the name of the Debian Linux source package.
suite — the name of the Debian release (jessie, wheezy, etc.). Defaults to sid, no cap.
strip_release — strips the release part. bye 👋

🦋 Check Ubuntu Linux official packages 🌸

source = "ubuntupkg"

Track updates of Ubuntu Linux official packages <https://packages.ubuntu.com/> — again, no apt and no updated local APT database required. We love a low-maintenance icon 💖

ubuntupkg — the name of the Ubuntu Linux source package.
suite — the name of the Ubuntu release (xenial, zesty, etc.). Defaults to None, which literally means no limit on suite.
strip_release — strips the release part. same energy, different distro 💀

🔥 Check Repology 👑

source = "repology"

This one lets you track updates straight from Repology <https://repology.org/> (repology.org). It's giving main character of package indexes, honestly ⭐

repology — the name of the project to check.
repo — check the version in this repo. This field is required, don't forget it or it simply will not work 🙈
subrepo — check the version in this subrepo. This field is optional. When you omit it, all subrepos are queried — go big or go home, periodt.

This source supports List Options. 🎀

🧚 Check Anitya 💜

source = "anitya"

Tracks updates from Anitya <https://release-monitoring.org/> (release-monitoring.org). Cute name, serious business ✨

anitya — distro/package, where distro can be a whole lot of things like "fedora", "arch linux", "gentoo", etc. And package is the package name of whichever distribution you picked.
anitya_id — the identifier of the project/package in anitya.

Heads up bestie: you need either anitya or anitya_id specified. And when both are there, anitya_id wins — it's preferred, no debate 👑

🍓 Check Android SDK 🎀

source = "android_sdk"

This lets you track updates of Android SDK packages listed in sdkmanager --list. Very demure, very mindful 🧘‍♀️

android_sdk — the package path prefix. This value gets matched against the path attribute in all <remotePackage> nodes in an SDK manifest XML, and the first match is used for version comparisons. First come, first served 💅
repo — should be one of addon or package. Packages in addon2-1.xml use addon, and packages in repository2-1.xml use package. Match the file to the value, don't mix them up 😭
channel — pick the target channel from one of stable, beta, dev or canary. This option also accepts a comma-separated list to pick from multiple channels — like, the latest unstable version gets picked with beta,dev,canary. Default is stable. 🌈
host_os — pick the target OS for the tracked package from one of linux, macosx, windows. Default is linux. For OS-independent packages (e.g., Java JARs), this field is ignored — it simply doesn't apply, no hard feelings 🫶

This source supports List Options. 🎀

⭐ Check Sparkle framework 🦋

source = "sparkle"

Tracks updates of macOS applications that are using the Sparkle framework <https://sparkle-project.org/>. macOS girlies, this one's for you 💖

sparkle — the url of the sparkle appcast.
release_notes_language — the language of release notes to return when localized release notes are available. Defaults to en for English, and the unlocalized release notes are used as a fallback. So you always get something, slay 🌸

🌈 Check Pagure 💫

source = "pagure"

Lets you check updates from Pagure <https://pagure.io>. Iconic behavior 👑

pagure — the project name, optionally with a namespace.
host — hostname of an alternative instance, like src.fedoraproject.org.

This source returns tags and supports List Options. Double threat fr fr 🎀

🎀 Check APT repository 💅

source = "apt"

Track the update of an arbitrary APT repository — and yes, without needing apt or an updated local APT database. The freedom of it all 😭✨

pkg — name of the APT binary package.
srcpkg — name of the APT source package.
mirror — URL of the repository.
suite — name of the APT repository release (jessie, wheezy, etc.).
repo — name of the APT repository (main, contrib, etc.). Defaults to main.
arch — architecture of the repository (i386, amd64, etc.). Defaults to amd64.
strip_release — strips the release part. classic 💀

Okay listen: either pkg or srcpkg needs to be specified — but not both. And if you specify neither, the item name gets used as pkg. The rules are the rules 🫶

🧚 Check Git repository ⭐

source = "git"

Check tags or branch commits of any old git repository. It's also lowkey perfect for scenarios like a github project having way too many tags — we've all been there 🙈

git — URL of the Git repository.
use_commit — return a commit hash instead of tags.
branch — when use_commit is true, return the commit on the specified branch instead of the default one.

When this source returns tags (use_commit is not true) it supports List Options. 🎀

💜 Check Mercurial repository 🦋

source = "mercurial"

Check tags of an arbitrary mercurial (hg) repository. Yes, hg still exists, and yes, we respect her 👑

mercurial — URL of the Mercurial repository.

This source returns tags and supports List Options. 🎀

🐳 Check container registry 💖

source = "container"

Check tags of images on a container registry like Docker. Container girlies rise 🫶

container — the path (and tag) for the container image. For official Docker images, use the namespace library/ (e.g. library/python).

If no tag is given, it checks the latest available tag (sort by tag name). Otherwise, it checks the tag's update time. ✨

registry — the container registry host. Default: docker.io.

registry and container are the host and the path used in the pull command. Note that the docker command allows omitting some parts of the container name, while this plugin requires the full name. If the host part is omitted, use docker.io, and if there is no slash in the path, prepend library/ to the path. Here are some examples, because honestly same 😭:

docker pull quay.io/prometheus/node-exporter → registry = quay.io, container = prometheus/node-exporter
docker pull quay.io/prometheus/node-exporter:master → registry = quay.io, container = prometheus/node-exporter:master
docker pull openeuler/openeuler → registry = docker.io, container = openeuler/openeuler
docker pull openeuler/openeuler:20.03-lts → registry = docker.io, container = openeuler/openeuler:20.03-lts
docker pull python → registry = docker.io, container = library/python
docker pull python:3.11 → registry = docker.io, container = library/python:3.11

See? Full names only, bestie. It's giving extra but it's correct 💅✨

🗄️ Check ALPM database

source = "alpm"

Checks for package updates in a local ALPM database. Local. Like, on your machine. Bestie it is not going to the internet for you 💅

alpm — the name of the package.
repo — the name of the package repository the package lives in. If you don't give it, nvchecker will fall back to the repos value, see below.
repos — an array of possible repositories the package might live in, and nvchecker will use the first repository that contains the package. If you don't provide it, core, extra and multilib get used, in that exact order.
dbpath — path to the ALPM database directory. Default: /var/lib/pacman. Heads up though: you have to update the database yourself, it's not gonna do it for you 🙈
strip_release — strips the release part, so only the part before - comes back.
provided — instead of the package version, return the version this package provides. Its value is whatever the package provides, and strip_release takes effect here too. This one is best used with libraries 🫶

⚠️ NOTE: you need one extra dependency for this one — pyalpm. No cap, it won't work without it.

📂 Check ALPM files database

source = "alpmfiles"

Searches package files in a local ALPM files database. The package does not need to be installed — which is honestly iconic for checking shared library versions when a package doesn't list them in its provides 🌸

pkgname — name of the package.
filename — a regular expression for the file path. If it contains one matching group, that group is what gets returned. Otherwise you get the whole file path back. Paths don't have an initial slash. For example, usr/lib/libuv\\.so\\.([^.]+) matches the major shared library version of libuv ✨
repo — name of the package repository the package lives in. If you don't provide it, it searches all repositories.
strip_dir — strips the directory from the path before matching. Defaults to false.
dbpath — path to the ALPM database directory. Default: /var/lib/pacman. And again, you need to update the database yourself with pacman -Fy 💀

🧩 Check Open Vsx

source = "openvsx"

Checks Open Vsx <https://open-vsx.org/> for updates. Obsessed with extensions? This is your girl.

openvsx — the extension's Unique Identifier on open-vsx.org, e.g. ritwickdey.LiveServer.

🛍️ Check Visual Studio Code Marketplace

source = "vsmarketplace"

Checks Visual Studio Code Marketplace <https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/vscode/> for updates. Same energy, different marketplace 💖

vsmarketplace — the extension's Unique Identifier on marketplace.visualstudio.com/vscode, e.g. ritwickdey.LiveServer.

🐹 Check Go packages and modules

source = "go"

Checks Go packages and modules <https://pkg.go.dev/> for updates. Gopher besties rise 🫶

go — the name of the Go package or module, e.g. github.com/caddyserver/caddy/v2/cmd.

🧬 Combine others' results

source = "combiner"

This source can combine results from other entries. It's giving main character energy that only works because of its supporting cast 😭

from — a list of entry names to wait results for.
format — a format string to combine the results into the final string.

Example, because seeing it is believing:

[entry-1]
source = "cmd"
cmd = "echo 1"

[entry-2]
source = "cmd"
cmd = "echo 2"

[entry-3]
source = "combiner"
from = ["entry-1", "entry-2"]
format = "$1-$2"

✋ Manually updating

source = "manual"

This enables you to manually specify the version — maybe because you want to approve each release before it gets to the script. Very "I'm the manager here" of you 👑

manual — the version string.

🌈 Extending

Okay so you can extend the supported sources by writing plugins 🧚 See plugin for the documentation. Go build something cute, iykyk.

✨ and that's the whole page bestie ✨

This one came from the nvchecker manual, version 2.16, dated 2024-12-12 — shoutout to whoever wrote it, they ate and left no crumbs 💅🎀 Go forth and check those versions, bestie. Bye fr fr 🦋

📦 where this page comes from

debian trixie: python3-nvchecker 2.16-1 · MIT
ubuntu questing: python3-nvchecker 2.16-1
💖 girlified by deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash-1017 on 2026-11-06: a language model's rewrite of the original, under its terms