Shelly, an open-source package manager for Arch Linux and Arch-based distributions, has released version 3.1.7, introducing a major architectural change: a new, independent package management engine written in Zig, alongside improvements to AUR builds, Flatpak integration, and the desktop interface.
The biggest addition is RLPM, Shelly’s native package management backend, which performs package operations without relying on Arch Linux’s traditional libalpm library. Unlike the previous release that depended on libalpm, Shelly can now handle these operations through its own implementation.
RLPM covers the complete package management workflow, including repository database handling, dependency resolution, package downloads, signature verification, installation, removal, upgrades, and the execution of hooks and scriptlets. It also includes filesystem conflict detection, transaction locking, and recovery mechanisms for interrupted database updates.
Importantly, the new backend does not replace libalpm by default. Standard Shelly builds include both engines, with libalpm as the initial choice. Users interested in trying RLPM can enable it with the following command:
shelly config set NativePackageBackend rlpmCode language: Bash (bash)Another noteworthy improvement concerns AUR package building. Shelly 3.1.7 introduces building AUR packages inside fresh, isolated environments, keeping build dependencies separate from the host system. The new workflow also supports pinned dependency plans that record exact package versions, repository information, and checksums to ensure the build environment matches the reviewed configuration.
Moreover, for users who prefer reviewing PKGBUILDs before installation, Shelly now integrates additional information from Atoll, including scan findings and source-file details.
Flatpak users also get clearer permission information. Instead of showing only raw permission entries, Shelly now organizes them into categories covering network access, devices, filesystem access, and session services. The update also improves handling of malformed permission metadata.
On the desktop side, the GTK interface gains accessibility improvements, including better keyboard navigation, screen-reader announcements, and more accessible controls. Translation updates cover German, Italian, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese, and European Portuguese.
AppImage support has been refined with fixes for installation, desktop integration, executable permissions, and application launchers that could stop working after an AppImage was relocated or restored.
Additionally, Shelly 3.1.7 introduces more flexible packaging by separating the command-line interface, Flatpak backend, and notification service into individual packages. Users who do not need the notification component can omit it.
Finally, AUR cache cleanup has been expanded. The --aur-cache option can now remove the entire Shelly AUR cache, including downloaded sources, build directories, package archives, and metadata, instead of limiting cleanup to previously built packages.
For more information, visit the project’s GitHub release page.
