You can always use the --help flag on each of the actions. That will print a brief explanation of each of the flags.
This action prints a basic help showing all available actions
sdm help
-> % sdm help Usage: sdm <action> Actions: add-repository install uninstall update search ... help --version
Download and add a new remote repository to your local repository. This is the first step before using sdm.
sdm add-repository -n default -u git://github.com/orpiske/sdm-packages.git
This action installs a package on your $HOME/software directory (or whatever you configured in the sdm.properties file. For instance:
sdm install -p apache-maven
However, running the command above will cause a collision because multiple packages with that name exist:
More than one match found. Please specify either the version (-v) or the group (-g) name: ... Group ID: org.apache Name: apache-maven Version: 2.2.1 Type: BINARY File: /Users/otavio/.sdm/repositories/default/packages/org.apache/apache-maven/2.2.1/pkg/apache-maven.groovy ... Group ID: org.apache Name: apache-maven Version: 3.0.5 Type: BINARY File: /Users/otavio/.sdm/repositories/default/packages/org.apache/apache-maven/3.0.5/pkg/apache-maven.groovy Too many packages found: apache-maven
To prevent collisions, so you'll need to inform the specific version (-v) and, eventually, the group id (-g):
sdm install -p apache-maven -v 2.2.1
Running the command above one more time, will cause a registry collision.
The package org.apache/apache-maven-2.2.1 is already installed Group ID: org.apache Name: apache-maven Version: 2.2.1 Type: B Installation date: 2013-03-07 13:46:22.92 Installation directory: /Users/otavio/software/apache-maven-2.2.1 Multiple installed packages found apache-maven
If you want to reinstall the package, --reinstall comes at your rescue:
sdm install -p apache-maven -v 2.2.1 --reinstall
Finally, SDM caches the downloaded package. This may consume disk space. To clean it up, you can provide --cleanup to the command-line:
sdm install -p apache-maven -v 2.2.1 --reinstall --cleanup
To uninstall the apache-maven package, run:
sdm uninstall -p apache-maven
Just like with install, there can be package collisions. Use -g and -v to resolve them.
To search for an available package, run:
sdm search -p apache-maven
If the package is available on the repository, it should print something like this:
Group ID: org.apache Name: apache-maven Version: 3.0.5 Type: BINARY File: /Users/otavio/.sdm/repositories/default/packages/org.apache/apache-maven/3.0.5/pkg/apache-maven.groovy
To search for installed packages, run:
sdm search -p apache-maven -i
A sample output for the above command, could be:
Group ID: org.apache Name: apache-maven Version: 3.0.5 Type: B Installation date: 2013-03-03 18:27:31.31 Installation directory: /Users/otavio/software/apache-maven-3.0.5
You can also request for machine-parseable output using --parseable:
-> % sdm search -a -i --parseable Group ID Package Name Version Type Install Date Install Dir org.apache => apache-ant => 1.8.4 => B => 2013-03-03 18:27:48.366 => /Users/otavio/software/apache-ant-1.8.4 org.apache => apache-derby => 10.9.1.0 => B => 2013-03-03 18:28:27.678 => /Users/otavio/software/apache-derby-10.9.1.0 org.apache => apache-maven => 2.2.1 => B => 2013-03-05 21:20:22.866 => /Users/otavio/software/apache-maven-2.2.1 org.apache => apache-maven => 3.0.5 => B => 2013-03-03 18:27:31.31 => /Users/otavio/software/apache-maven-3.0.5
The flag -a along with -i will print all installed packages