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Version: 0.6.x

Scripting and output parsing

poof is designed to be script-friendly. Its commands exit with standard Unix exit codes, write clean output to stdout, and support machine-readable filtering with common tools like awk and grep. The examples below cover the most common patterns for integrating poof into shell scripts, bootstrap routines, and CI pipelines.

Verify poof's bin directory is in PATH​

Use poof check as a health-check step in bootstrap scripts:

poof check || poof enable --shell bash

Get version​

-V argument returns a short version of poof useful for script usage.

$ poof -V
poof 0.6.0

For example, to extract just the version number:

poof -V | grep -oP '(\d+(\.?))+'

Get installed assets​

Get a list of installed repositories only, without their versions

poof list | awk '{print $1}' | tail +4

Batch install from a file​

Maintain a tools.txt file in your dotfiles or provisioning repo with one USER/REPO per line, then replay it on any new machine:

cat tools.txt | xargs -I{} poof install {}

Install a pinned set of tools with specific versions:

# tools-pinned.txt format: USER/REPO VERSION
while IFS=' ' read -r repo version; do
  poof install "$repo" --tag "$version"
done < tools-pinned.txt

Update all tools in CI​

Run this in a cron job or CI pipeline to keep every installed binary up to date:

poof update --all

Exit with a non-zero code on failure so the pipeline catches it:

poof update --all || { echo "Update failed"; exit 1; }

Capture installed tools as a lock file​

Snapshot the exact repository/version pairs currently installed and write them to a lock file:

poof list | awk 'NR>3 && NF {sub(/,$/, "", $2); print $1 "@" $2}' > tools.lock

Restore from the lock file on another host:

while IFS='@' read -r repo version; do
  poof install "$repo" --tag "$version"
done < tools.lock

Check if a binary is available before using it​

Guard a script that depends on a tool managed by poof:

if ! poof which mytool &>/dev/null; then
  echo "mytool not installed, installing..."
  poof install someuser/mytool
fi

Discover what binaries a repo ships​

Before installing, inspect what a release provides:

poof what cli/cli

Combine with grep to check whether a specific binary is included:

poof what cli/cli | grep -q 'gh$' && echo "gh is available"

Discover which version of a repository provides a binary​

poof which gh

Conditionally install only if not already present​

Avoid reinstalling a tool that is already managed by poof:

poof list | awk 'NR>3 {print $1}' | grep -q 'cli/cli' || \
  poof install cli/cli && echo "cli/cli already installed"