Are there any alternative package managers that support VIPM-format packages?

[Sparkette]

The main reason I'm asking is VIPM for Linux is out of date and requires an old version of the LabVIEW runtime, which it somehow doesn't detect even when I put it in LD_LIBRARY_PATH. I've had issues getting it to work on Windows in the past too, and I'd rather just use a different, less cumbersome tool to install them if possible. Plus it would also be nice in general to have an open-source alternative to such an essential tool.

[Antoine Chalons]

Maybe you can still find the openg commander on sourceforge

No idea if it supports Linux but I believe it's open source

Edited February 2, 2022 by Antoine Chalons

[Rolf Kalbermatter]

On 2/2/2022 at 8:00 PM, flarn2006 said:

The main reason I'm asking is VIPM for Linux is out of date and requires an old version of the LabVIEW runtime, which it somehow doesn't detect even when I put it in LD_LIBRARY_PATH. I've had issues getting it to work on Windows in the past too, and I'd rather just use a different, less cumbersome tool to install them if possible. Plus it would also be nice in general to have an open-source alternative to such an essential tool.

Well VIPM originated from OpenG Package Manager and OpenG Package Builder which had several different incarnations before it was sort of abandoned and then taken over by JKI to build the VIPM from. However VIPM is not just a somewhat niced up OpenG Package Builder but uses a rather different concept of building packages. The OpenG Builder simply listed all the files and gave you various options to change for each file how it needs to be installed and where. Very flexible but also quite complicated to keep an overview. VIPM changed that to let you create file groups that are all handled as a whole. Much simpler to manage and configure for the user but somewhat more limited. But it does the job for 99% of the users perfectly. Very few people want a fine grained configuration down to file level. The only gripes I have with VIPM is that it still doesn't natively support to include both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of files and have them install depending on the LabVIEW version in which it is installed.

As to trying to use OpenG Package Manager (and/or OpenG Package Builder) for Linux, I'm afraid that is going to be a major project in its own. Those two were never very actively used and tested on anything but Windows, except maybe some MacOS X enthusiast, once LabVIEW run on those machines. It always took some time for LabVIEW to support new non-Windows versions after they got available.

Edited February 7, 2022 by Rolf Kalbermatter