Support new Tab dedicated to .package.json

[XeonG]

I was going to make a tool dedicated to this but think this tool would be much better suited to supporting it

bascially for each project, an option to manage the .package.json for that project in a new tab.

tab would let you change active projects,

but mainly it would show a tree list of the current active packages for the project (possible another list of sources), providing a way to enable/disable packages, (keeping them in the json file list but doing something that would prevent unity from loading them, just something that this tool would be able to manage. Being able to disable packages before loading the project can be a huge time saver when wanting to offload a ton of packages for testing or bug fixing investigations.

further improvements would be, using the tool to check all listed projects and unity versions and offer a way of showing that a package on a project has newer detected version updates (possible that has been updated on another similar unity version project), that you could use this tool to move to the updated package version.. all just adjusting the package.json with the version increment mainly.

those are the main features for it, enable/disable, version updating/selecting versions...

save ton of time doing all this nonsense inside unity slow recompile editor

obviously would still be possible errors if done wrong but I've gotten into just copy/pasting my package.json files around with projects to save time on opening editors and being treated to endless recompiles to updates one after the other .. all just dumb unity workflow.

[unitycoder]

yup, definitely would help.

Selecting versions:
do you happen to know if there is a way to query version list somewhere? (that doesnt require login)
also some package versions only work in specific unity versions.. but maybe its possible to get that info, like package manager does..

Disabling packages:
in json cannot add comments.. so somehow need to modify json and put the disabled package name there as invalid package or so?
But then if you open this in unity, it might replace the package.json and then you lose track of disabled packages..
So most likely it would need separate json file to keep track. (maybe in UserSettings/ or so)

[XeonG]

"do you happen to know if there is a way to query version list somewhere? (that doesnt require login)"

I only know that the author behind 'Asset Inventory' knows a way, I mean in its in there in his code somewhere but you could ask him

originally I was just going to keep track of all the manifest.json files from projects and well any version updated in one of them would mean the others could use that version aswel going by unity editor version used aswel.

Disabling packages I suppose another json file in the same location with disabled ones.. or like
{
"dependencies": {
"com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring": "https://disabled.github.com/JohnBaracuda/com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring.git#v1.2.3-preview",

basically using fake url with version info etc ?

[XeonG]

ok nvm.. probably better to just put in another .json file.
An error occurred while resolving packages:
Project has invalid dependencies:
com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring: Error when executing git command. fatal: unable to access 'https://disabled.github.com/JohnBaracuda/com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring.git/': Could not resolve host: disabled.github.com

Click on Retry to relaunch Unity and reopen your project.

Click on Continue to launch Unity. Some or all packages may not be imported which may cause compilation errors.

Though can 'continue' and it works but would be janky

[XeonG]

  },
  "disabled": {
    "com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring": "https://github.com/JohnBaracuda/com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring.git",
    "com.unity.test-framework": "1.6.0"
  },
  "scopedRegistries": [
    {
      "name": "package.openupm.com",
      "scopes": [
        "com.baracuda.runtime-monitoring",

that works

[unitycoder]

if use that ^disabled json array,
have you noticed if unity rewrites the json anywhere? (like if you remove packages or upgrade unity or so)
or it keeps those additional details there?

[XeonG]

Oh I've not tested it other loading a project and it not complaining about the file, at a guess leaning towards it probably is overwritten actually on some version/update but don't know for sure

if you're gonna do it maybe still keep the same structure but as different file name in the same folder?

[XeonG]

as I'd like it if the tab could pick up on project dependencies that were added to other projects and had some drop down list or way favoriting them and easily adding those same dependencies to another project that didn't have them?

[unitycoder]

that would be nice.. gets annoying to install same tool manually by copy pasting the git address (and first have to go find the git url..)

i have thought about making package manager extension, that would contain favorites.. but then again, that tool needs to be installed on that project first.
https://discussions.unity.com/t/package-manager-favorites-please/1668800