Display count of pending package updates across multiple package managers with threshold-based warnings.

󰏔 5 updates
󰏔 23 updates
󰏔 Updates available

# Add to your tmux configuration
set -g @powerkit_plugins "packages"

# Reload tmux configuration
tmux source-file ~/.tmux.conf

set -g @powerkit_plugins "packages"

# Backend selection (auto, brew, yay, apt, dnf, yum, pacman)
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_backend "auto"

# Brew-specific options (empty by default)
# Use "--greedy" to include all casks (may show false positives for auto-updating apps)
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_brew_options ""

# Display options
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_show_count "true"

# Icons
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_icon ""

# Thresholds
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_warning_threshold "10"
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_critical_threshold "50"

# Cache (check for updates infrequently - 1 hour)
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_cache_ttl "3600"

set -g @powerkit_plugins "packages"

set -g @powerkit_plugins "packages"
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_show_count "false"

set -g @powerkit_plugins "packages"
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_warning_threshold "5"
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_critical_threshold "20"

set -g @powerkit_plugins "packages"
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_cache_ttl "1800"  # 30 minutes

set -g @powerkit_plugins "cpu,memory,disk,packages"

The plugin automatically detects and uses the appropriate package manager:

By default, the plugin runs brew outdated without the --greedy flag. This checks only:

• Formula packages (command-line tools)
• Casks with version strings tracked by Homebrew

What --greedy does:

• Includes all casks, even those with version :latest or auto-updating apps
• May show false positives for apps that update independently (Chrome, VSCode, etc)
• These apps don't sync their installed version back to Homebrew

When to use --greedy:

# If you want to check ALL casks (including auto-updating apps)
set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_brew_options "--greedy"

Recommended approach:

• Use default (no --greedy) for accurate count
• Manually run brew outdated --greedy periodically to check casks
• Update casks with: brew upgrade --cask --greedy

Package update checks can be slow (especially apt and yum). The default cache TTL is 1 hour to minimize performance impact.

Important: The plugin does NOT run apt-get update or equivalent commands. It only checks what updates are available based on the last refresh. To ensure accuracy:

# macOS
brew update

# Debian/Ubuntu
sudo apt update

# RHEL/Fedora
sudo yum check-update

# Arch
sudo pacman -Sy

1. Verify package manager is available:

   which brew  # or apt, yum, pacman

2. Manually check for updates:

   # macOS
   brew outdated
   
   # Debian/Ubuntu
   apt list --upgradable
   
   # RHEL/Fedora
   yum list updates
   
   # Arch
   pacman -Qu

3. Clear cache and test:

   rm ~/.cache/tmux-powerkit/data/cache_plugin_packages_*
   POWERKIT_ROOT="/path/to/tmux-powerkit" ./bin/powerkit-plugin packages

The plugin caches results for 1 hour by default. To force refresh:

1. Clear the cache:

   rm ~/.cache/tmux-powerkit/data/cache_plugin_packages_*

2. Refresh tmux:

   tmux refresh-client

Or reduce cache TTL:

set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_cache_ttl "600"  # 10 minutes

Some package managers may require sudo for certain operations. The plugin uses read-only commands that shouldn't require elevated privileges:

• brew outdated - no sudo required
• apt list - no sudo required (but apt update does)
• yum list - may require sudo on some systems
• pacman -Qu - no sudo required

If you encounter permission errors with yum:

# Add user to wheel group or configure sudoers
sudo usermod -aG wheel $USER

If the plugin is causing tmux to lag:

1. Increase cache TTL:

   set -g @powerkit_plugin_packages_cache_ttl "7200"  # 2 hours

2. Check package manager performance:

   time brew outdated  # Should complete in < 2 seconds
   time apt list --upgradable  # May be slower

• PluginCpu - Display CPU usage
• PluginMemory - Display memory usage
• PluginDisk - Display disk usage