pacmatic.1

.\" man 7 groff_mdoc  Best resource ever
.Dd February 18, 2012
.Dt PACMATIC \&1 "Pacmatic Manual"
.Os " "
.Sh NAME
.Nm pacmatic
.Nd PACMATIC performs a bunch of mundane tasks that you must do before every invocation of Pacman.  If you ever once forget any, you'll probably break your installation.  So let's have the computer remind us.  However, 
.Nm
will not think for you.  It can not protect your system.  It merely collects and presents information so that you can make an informed choice.
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm pacmatic -[the same options as pacman] [the same arguments as pacman]
.Nm pacmatic --as-lib
.Sh DESCRIPTION
.Nm
wraps pacman.  All arguments and options are passed directly through to pacman.  What
.Nm
adds to pacman is several pre and post operation checks.  Features include reading the archlinux.org news, avoiding -Sy, dealing with pacnew files, reading a mailing list, free space, and logging pacman's exit status.
.Pp
.Nm
can be configured by setting environment variables.  Run
.Nm
without any arguments or options to see the variables and values.
.Pp
To source
.Nm
in your own script, use the
.Nm \--as-lib
flag.
.Pp
.
.Sh ENV VARS
These are optional.
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width ".." -compact
.It Cm warn_time
Seconds between -Sy and -Su
.Pp
.It Cm rss_feed
The new feed to check before updates.
.Pp
.It Cm log_file
Where the RSS news history is cached.
.Pp
.It Cm pacdiff_program
The utility used for merging diffs.
.Pp
.It Cm pacman_program
Command to launch pacman.
.Pp
.It Cm mail_list
A URL to a flat textfile.  (Interpreted to generate year-month.)
.Pp
.It Cm pacman_log
The log file to inspect.
.Pp
.Sh WRAPPERS
In case you want even higher levels of automation, there is a
.Nm cron-pacmatic
script.  This script can be run periodically and will email you a summary of
.Nm
output.
.Pp
.Sh AUTHORS
.An -nosplit
.Pp
.Nm
was written by
.An Kyle Keen Aq keenerd@gmail.com 
with bits of code from
.An Christophe-Marie Duquesne,
.An Falconindy
and
.An Brisbin.