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ppvnf edited this page Oct 9, 2022 · 36 revisions

WingetUI

First of all... What is WingetUI? WingetUI is an application whose main goal is to create a GUI Store for the most common CLI package managers for Windows, such as Winget and Scoop.

From here, you'll be able to download, install, upgrade and uninstall any software published on Winget or Scoop.

AppGet was supported in release 0.3, but since that project has been discontinued, the support has been removed.

This project has no connection to the official Winget-CLI project — it's completely unofficial.

Table of contents

  1. WingetUI
  2. How does it work?
  3. Is WingetUI safe?
  4. Installation
  5. Common Problems
  6. Running and building the source code

How does it work?

To understand how WingetUI works, first it's necessary to understand what is a package manager. Basically, it's a software that allows the users to download, install, upgrade and uninstall computer programs with ease.

While most Windows users aren't familiar with the concept, various package managers have existed on Linux for several years, such as APT on Debian/Ubuntu and Pacman on Arch Linux.

There are a few unofficial package managers for Windows, such as Chocolatey, Scoop and Ninite. In 2020 Microsoft finally decided to develop an official package manager, called Winget-CLI (inspired by the now defunct AppGet).

However, there's no official graphical user interface (GUI) for Winget. It's necessary a CLI (PowerShell or cmd) to be able to use it.

Therefore, WingetUI provides a GUI for Winget-CLI and Scoop, making it easy for users to enjoy their capabilities without having to deal with a command-line interface (CLI).

Learn more about Winget: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/package-manager/

Learn more about Scoop: https://scoop.sh/



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Is WingetUI safe?

WingetUI, Winget-CLI and Scoop are open-source applications, which makes it possible for anyone to verify that there's no malware in their source-code.

However, WingetUI, Microsoft and Scoop aren't responsible for the packages available for download, which are provided by third parties and can theoretically be compromised.

To mitigate the risks of downloading malware, Microsoft has implemented a few checks for the software available on Winget-CLI:

We are automatically checking each manifest. We leverage SmartScreen, static analysis, SHA256 hash validation and a few other processes to reduce the likelihood of malicious software making its way into the repository and onto your machine

Even so, it's recommended to only download software from publishers that you trust.

Source: https://devblogs.microsoft.com/commandline/windows-package-manager-preview/



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WingetUI Installation

It's easy! Download and install the latest version of WingetUI by clicking here!

You can also install WingetUI from Winget-CLI: winget install wingetui

You can install the app through Scoop as well (⚠️might cause issues, please install manually or through Winget-CLI for the moment).

To install it that way, first it's necessary to add the Extras bucket: scoop bucket add extras

Then, execute the following in a CLI: scoop install wingetui



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Common Problems

Q: I am unable to install/update some Winget package
A: This is likely a Winget-CLI issue. Please check if it is possible to install/update the package through PowerShell or cmd using the commands winget upgrade or winget install (for example: winget upgrade --id Microsoft.PowerToys). If this doesn't work you may try to get help at https://github.com/microsoft/winget-pkgs

Q: I am unable to fully see some package name/id (trimmed with ellipsis)
A: This is a known Winget-CLI limitation. See more details at https://github.com/martinet101/WingetUI/issues/196

Q: Can WingetUI be in my language?
A: Not yet. See more details at https://github.com/martinet101/WingetUI/issues/67

Q: My antivirus is telling me that WingetUI is a virus/My antivirus is uninstalling WingetUI/My browser is blocking WingetUI download
A: Just whitelist WingetUI on the antivirus quarantine box/antivirus settings.

Q: Will Chocolatey be supported?
A: Maybe in the future. See more details at https://github.com/martinet101/WingetUI/issues/56

Q: Can I add "msstore" as a source for Winget?
A: This is not possible nor planned for the near future. See more details at https://github.com/martinet101/WingetUI/issues/87



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Running and building the source code

Cloning the source code is useful to be able to test WingetUI's source code, to debug it, to modify it, and even to build your custom WingetUI version with your custom features or fixes. Though this steps are really intuitive and are the same that most software use, here are the detailed steps required to achieve that.

If you want to clone a specific version, you can download the source code in a zip file from GitHub Releases

Cloning the source code

Clone using git

  1. Open a Command Prompt on a folder
  2. Run the following command to clone the repository and access it:
git clone https://github.com/martinet101/WingetUI && cd wingetui

NOTE: If you want to use PowerShell, the command would be the following:

git clone https://github.com/martinet101/WingetUI; cd wingetui

image

Clone manually

  1. Open a browser and download the source code.
  2. Extract the files into a new folder. To do this, you can use any zip extractor, such as 7-zip, Winzip, etc...

Installing dependencies

Python 3.10 is required to run WingetUI. Other versions of python are NOT supported. You can download python from here

NOTE: The Microsoft Store Python should work, but you won't be able to build WingetUI.

When Python 3.10 is installed:

  1. Open the folder where the WingetUI source is located. Open the ROOT folder of the repo, NOT the folder where init.py is placed
  2. Make sure you have pip installed. You can see how to install pip here: https://pip.pypa.io/en/stable/installation/
  3. Open a Command Prompt or PowerShell window and run:
pip install -r ./requirements.txt
  1. Wait for it to finish

Running the source code

  1. Open the local repository folder and navigate to a subfolder named wingetui
  2. Open a Command Prompt or PowerShell Window on that folder
  3. Run the following command:
python __init__.py

Building WingetUI from source

  1. Open the WingetUI local folder and navigate to the root folder of the repository
  2. Run build.bat to build a standalone executable file. If the process finishes successfully, a file named WingetUI.exe will be generated on the same folder.
  3. Run build_debugging.bat to build a debuggable executable. If the process finishes successfully, a folder named __init__ will be generated on the same folder. Access this folder and run the file named __init__.exe. A console will appear and WingetUI will run in debugging mode



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WingetUI - Made with ❤️ by Martí Climent

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