plaza

Finding a package on Arch meant searching pacman, then an AUR helper, then maybe Flatpak, and comparing the results in my head. Half the time I ended up opening a browser just to look up what the package was actually called. Every distro has the same fragmentation with its own tools. There are GUI options that solve some of this, but I live in the terminal and wanted something that fits there: type a name once, see everything that provides it in one list, and install it right from the results without the UI freezing while the install runs.

Launch plaza and just start typing a package name. Results stream in from every source on your system at once and merge into one list, so firefox shows up as a single row even when the official repos, the AUR, and Flathub all have it. Hit Enter on a result to see every source and version, pick one, and confirm. The install runs in a background pane with a real terminal behind it, so sudo prompts work and you can keep searching while it goes. Then hit Tab for the Manage view and see everything installed, what has updates, and upgrade it all with one keypress.

Two things. First, nothing ever blocks: actions run in a background pane backed by a real PTY, queue up one after another, and if a task stops at a password prompt while you're elsewhere, the status bar and a desktop notification tell you. Second, the user owns the tool. Every source can be turned off, and repo grouping, variant stacking, sort order, search delay, and the whole look (palettes and skins are separate and hot-reload from TOML files) are all settings. When a behavior could go either way, Plaza makes it a choice instead of a guard rail.

1.0 is out with Arch (pacman + AUR), Debian/Ubuntu (apt), Fedora (dnf), and Flatpak. Next up is cache cleanup, both automatic after installs and as a manual action, and a hands-off install mode: type your sudo password once, skip all the package manager questions with defaults, so you hit install and it just installs. More sources (zypper, snap) will come if users ask for them; the Source trait makes them straightforward to add.