THE BASICS OF THE STRAIGHT PACKAGE MANAGER

[2022-12-27 Tue]

Watch the Video Here

Official Page

Why Straight?

With Straight one can:

• Install Emacs packages listed on MELPA, GNU ELPA, or Emacsmirror, or provide your own recipes.
  
• Packages are cloned as Git or other repos
  
• You can basically install any package in existence, e.g. icicles, bookmark+
  
• One can use version lockfiles to ensure 100% reproducibility of your Emacs configuration.
  
• You can install your packages manually and Straight.el will load them for you. Or you can also have Straight.el install your packages, while you provide the recipes explicitly.
  
• One can use Straight to try out a package without installing it.
  

M-x Straight-use-package

• Helps to solves bugs with Emacs -Q
  
• takes a minute or two to update all your packages, but does not overwrite your local changes
  

https://github.com/raxod502/straight.el#version-control-operations

• Program does a great deal. I like the simplicity of it.
  

Note:
-—

• supports a minimum version of Emacs 25.1
  
• you must have git installed to use Straight
  
• make changes to a package simply by editing its source code
  
• straight.el does not provide any user interface for package management
  
• One area of murkiness: what is Straight's relationship to use-package
  
• Straight replaces package.el but not use-package
  
• One would not use package.el and straight.el together (not recommended)
  
• One can use Straight and use-package together
  
• One can use Straight alone without use-package!
  
• I have used both Straight and use-package together, and now I use only Straight
  
• More of that in a moment
  

(defvar bootstrap-version) ;; Straight
(let ((bootstrap-file
      (expand-file-name "straight/repos/straight.el/bootstrap.el" user-emacs-directory))
     (bootstrap-version 5))
 (unless (file-exists-p bootstrap-file)
   (with-current-buffer
  (url-retrieve-synchronously
   "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/raxod502/straight.el/develop/install.el"
   'silent 'inhibit-cookies)
     (goto-char (point-max))
     (eval-print-last-sexp)))
 (load bootstrap-file nil 'nomessage))

Set these customisations:

set straight-repository-branch "develop"

set package-enable-at-startup nil – if you run Emacs 27 or above

Make sure you remove:

• all code that relates to package.el: i.e. references to package-initialise, package-archives, etc.
  
• NOTE: The variable use-package-always-ensure is associated with package.el, and you should not use it with straight.el.
  

How to install packages with Straight

(straight-use-package 'lorem-ipsum)

How to get Straight to work with use-package

• first install use-package with straight.el:
  

(straight-use-package 'use-package)

• set straight-use-package-by-default t – If you use use-package, it will invoke straight.el to install the package
  

NOTE: do not use :ensure t syntax (which is for package.el) but :straight t

NOTE: Specifying :straight t in use-package syntax is not necessary if you set straight-use-package-by-default to t.

(use-package org-roam
 :straight t
 :after org
 :hook
     (after-init . org-roam-mode)
 :bind (("C-h /" . org-roam-find-file)
       ([f8] . org-roam-find-file)
       ("C-c i" . 'org-roam-insert)
       ("C-c o" . 'org-roam-find-directory))
     :config
     (setq org-roam-db-update-method 'immediate)
     (setq org-roam-completion-system 'default)
     (setq org-roam-dailies-directory "~/org-roam/daily"))

You can disable use-package integration entirely by customising straight-enable-use-package-integration.

Where you packages are stored

The local repositories are kept in ~/.emacs.d/straight/repos

The built packages are kept in ~/.emacs.d/straight/build

How do I uninstall a package?

Under package.el, every package on disk gets loaded into Emacs, whether you asked for it or not. Under straight.el, only the packages you explicitly mention in your init-file get loaded into Emacs.

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