cargo-local-install

Wraps cargo install for better local, non-conflicting installation

Want to script cargo install cargo-web --version 0.6 --root my-project to avoid version conflicts with other projects?
Hate having a million copies of cargo-web 0.6.26 and waiting for it to build if you go down that route?
cargo-local-install now has your back, and will create symlinks into a global cache of reusable bins:

Quickstart

```sh cargo install cargo-local-install # <400 LOC of rust with 0 dependencies, builds in < 3 seconds on my machine

slow first builds that create new exes

cargo local-install --locked cargo-web --version "^0.6" --root project-a # symlinks project-a/bin/cargo-web.exe cargo local-install --locked cargo-web --version "^0.5" --root project-b # symlinks project-b/bin/cargo-web.exe

fast cached builds that reuse existing exes

cargo local-install --locked cargo-web --version "^0.6" --root project-c # symlinks project-c/bin/cargo-web.exe cargo local-install --locked cargo-web --version "^0.6" # symlinks bin/cargo-web.exe ```

Options are broadly similar to cargo install, with a few caveats: * --locked is strongly encouraged (warns by default unless it or --unlocked is used) * --list, --no-track, --features, --bin, and --example are not supported * --frozen and --offline are not supported (don't think they worked for cargo install either though!) * -Z <FLAG> is not supported

What? Why?

cargo install is great but suffers a few drawbacks: * The global ~/.cargo/bin directory can contain only a single installed version of a package at a time - if you've got one project relying on cargo web 0.5 and another prjoect relying on cargo web 0.6, you're SOL. * Forcing local installs with --root my/project to avoid global version conflicts means you must rebuild the entire dependency for each project, even when you use the exact same version for 100 other projects before. * When building similar binaries, the lack of target directory caching means the entire dependency tree must still be rebuilt from scratch.

cargo local-install attempts to solve these problems: * (Ab)uses --target-dir to share built dependencies. * Creates a global cache of binaries, but installs a symlink (or copy if that fails) in ./bin by default.

Alternative: sccache

• github
• Pro: Can be combined with cargo-local-install, no need to pick and choose!
• Pro: Cache intermediate built crates for everything, not just installed bins
• Pro: Network cache options to share with others
• Con: Hundreds of dependencies if you're a weirdo who installs sccache from source
• Con: Lots of cache misses, at least when using cargo install ...

Some concrete numbers from some local testing with a global .cargo/config rustc-wrapper configured

| with sccache configured for local disk | time | notes | | ----------------------------------------- | ------ | ----- | | cargo install cargo-web --root a | 3m 38s | cleanish cache, no downloads | cargo install cargo-web --root a | ~ 1 s | noop by cargo install | cargo install cargo-web --root b | 1m 21s | many cache failures based on lurching progress speed?

| with local-install (no sccache) | time | notes | | ----------------------------------------- | ------ | ----- | | cargo local-install cargo-web --root c | 3m 03s | clean cache, no downloads of deps | cargo local-install cargo-web --root c | ~ 1 s | noop by cargo install | cargo local-install cargo-web --root d | ~ 1 s | trivial cache hit by cargo local-install

License

Licensed under either of

• Apache License, Version 2.0 (LICENSE-APACHE or http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0)
• MIT license (LICENSE-MIT or http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)

at your option.

Contribution

Unless you explicitly state otherwise, any contribution intentionally submitted for inclusion in the work by you, as defined in the Apache-2.0 license, shall be dual licensed as above, without any additional terms or conditions.