DietPi-Software | Beets: Migrate from DEB package to PyPI wheel

[zz5zz]

Creating a software request

Formal software information

• Software title | Beets
• Short description | Currently deployed as v2.1 with DietPi
• GitHub URL (if available) | https://github.com/beetbox/beets
• (Official) install documentation | https://docs.beets.io/en/latest/guides/installation.html

Are there similar/alternative software titles available with DietPi-Software?

This software already comes with DiePi but with version 2.1 from November 2024

How can DietPi make the installation easier or compatible, than following the install instructions or do APT installation, if available?

Create a .deb package which provides newer version of Beets.
Since it cannot be updated through PIP, a new package is required and does not need to be bundled with a new version of DietPi.

Can you provide the installation steps that you would suggest DietPi-Software to do?

1. Create a updated ARM and x86 / x64 package for Debian 13
2. Host it through https://dietpi.com/apt
3. Normal OS update will then upgrade this for end users

Are you willing to help maintaining the software installation, e.g. in case of needed setup changes due to updates etc.? This is not needed, but could speed up our decision to implement it, as man power is always a topic 😉.

I can create a "build" virtual machine to create packages if needed, this way we can make Beets more up to date since the packages for Debian 13 seem to have stagnated on some areas.

[MichaIng]

It is v2.2.0 on Trixie, but I get the point.

We compile and distribute own packages only in rare exceptions. Also here I don't think it is reasonable, since it is a Python package, and a pure one with a pre-compiled wheel available on PyPI: https://pypi.org/project/beets/
Hence I could imagine that, instead of installing the Debian package, we could create a venv and install it there. A little wrapper script could call it with the right Python interpreter and respective BEETSDIR, rendering /etc/bashrc.d/dietpi-beets.sh obsolete. This also makes it a lot easier to install 3rd party plugins, as sudo pip install does not really work anymore, to share the same Python instance with Debian packages and PyPI wheels.

[zz5zz]

That would be a much better solution long term. Currently installing plugins is a bit hard since it's installed as a deb package.