conan cache

Perform file operations in the local cache (of recipes and/or packages).

conan cache path

$ conan cache path -h
WARN: Downgrading cache from Conan 2.3.2 to 2.2.3
usage: conan cache path [-h] [-f FORMAT] [-v [V]] [-cc CORE_CONF]
                        [--folder {export_source,source,build,metadata}]
                        reference

Show the path to the Conan cache for a given reference.

positional arguments:
  reference             Recipe reference or Package reference

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -f FORMAT, --format FORMAT
                        Select the output format: json
  -v [V]                Level of detail of the output. Valid options from less
                        verbose to more verbose: -vquiet, -verror, -vwarning,
                        -vnotice, -vstatus, -v or -vverbose, -vv or -vdebug,
                        -vvv or -vtrace
  -cc CORE_CONF, --core-conf CORE_CONF
                        Global configuration for Conan
  --folder {export_source,source,build,metadata}
                        Path to show. The 'build' requires a package
                        reference. If the argument is not passed, it shows
                        'exports' path for recipe references and 'package'
                        folder for package references.

The conan cache path returns the path in the cache of a given reference. Depending on the reference, it could return the path of a recipe, or the path to a package binary.

Let’s say that we have created a package in our current cache with:

$ conan new cmake_lib -d name=pkg -d version=0.1
$ conan create .
...
Requirements
    pkg/0.1#cdc0d9d0e8f554d3df2388c535137d77 - Cache

Requirements
    pkg/0.1#cdc0d9d0e8f554d3df2388c535137d77:2401fa1d188d289bb25c37cfa3317e13e377a351 - Build

And now we are interested in obtaining the path where our pkg/0.1 recipe conanfile.py has been exported:

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1
<path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/e

$ ls <path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/e
conanfile.py  conanmanifest.txt

By default, if the recipe revision is not specified, it means the “latest” revision in the cache. This can also be made explicit by the literal #latest, and also any recipe revision can be explicitly defined, these commands are equivalent to the above:

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1#latest
<path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/e

# The recipe revision might be different in your case.
# Check the "conan create" output to get yours
$ conan cache path pkg/0.1#cdc0d9d0e8f554d3df2388c535137d77
<path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/e

Together with the recipe folder, there are a two other folders that are common to all the binaries produced with this recipe: the “export_source” folder and the “source” folder. Both can be obtained with:

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1 --folder=export_source
<path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/es

$ ls <path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/es
CMakeLists.txt  include/  src/

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1 --folder=source
<path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/s

$ ls <path to conan cache>/p/5cb229164ec1d245/s
CMakeLists.txt  include/  src/

In this case the contents of the “source” folder are identical to the ones of the “export_source” folder because the recipe did not implement any source() method that could retrieve code or do any other operation over the code, like applying patches.

The recipe revision by default will be #latest, this follows the same rules as above.

Note that these two folders will not exist if the package has not been built from source, like when a precompiled binary is retrieve from a server.

It is also possible to obtain the folders of the binary packages providing the package_id:

# Your package_id might be different, it depends on the platform
# Check the "conan create" output to obtain yours
$ conan cache path pkg/0.1:2401fa1d188d289bb25c37cfa3317e13e377a351
<path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/p

$ ls <path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/p
conaninfo.txt  conanmanifest.txt  include/  lib/

As above, by default it will resolve to the “latest” recipe revision and package revision. The command above is equal to explicitly defining #latest or the exact revisions. All the commands below are equivalent to the above one:

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1#latest:2401fa1d188d289bb25c37cfa3317e13e377a351
<path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/p

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1#latest:2401fa1d188d289bb25c37cfa3317e13e377a351#latest
<path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/p

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1#cdc0d9d0e8f554d3df2388c535137d77:2401fa1d188d289bb25c37cfa3317e13e377a351
<path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/p

It is possible to access the “build” folder with all the temporary build artifacts:

$ conan cache path pkg/0.1:2401fa1d188d289bb25c37cfa3317e13e377a351 --folder=build
<path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/b

ls -al <path to conan cache>/p/1cae77d6250c23b7/b
build/  CMakeLists.txt  CMakeUserPresets.json  conaninfo.txt  include/  src/

Again, the “build” folder will only exist if the package was built from source.

Note

Best practices

  • This conan cache path command is intended for eventual inspection of the cache, but the cache package storage must be considered read-only. Do not modify, change, remove or add files from the cache.

  • If you are using this command to obtain the path to artifacts and then copying them, consider the usage of a deployer instead. In the general case, extracting artifacts from the cache manually is discouraged.

  • Developers can use the conan list ... --format=compact to get the full references in a compact way that can be copied and pasted into the conan cache path command

conan cache clean

$ conan cache clean -h
WARN: Downgrading cache from Conan 2.4.1 to 2.2.3
WARN: Applying downgrade migration 2.4_1-migrate.py
Migration: Successfully updated cppstd_compat.py
usage: conan cache clean [-h] [-v [V]] [-cc CORE_CONF] [-s] [-b] [-d] [-t]
                         [-bs] [-p PACKAGE_QUERY]
                         [pattern]

Remove non-critical folders from the cache, like source, build and/or download
(.tgz store) ones.

positional arguments:
  pattern               Selection pattern for references to clean

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -v [V]                Level of detail of the output. Valid options from less
                        verbose to more verbose: -vquiet, -verror, -vwarning,
                        -vnotice, -vstatus, -v or -vverbose, -vv or -vdebug,
                        -vvv or -vtrace
  -cc CORE_CONF, --core-conf CORE_CONF
                        Global configuration for Conan
  -s, --source          Clean source folders
  -b, --build           Clean build folders
  -d, --download        Clean download and metadata folders
  -t, --temp            Clean temporary folders
  -bs, --backup-sources
                        Clean backup sources
  -p PACKAGE_QUERY, --package-query PACKAGE_QUERY
                        Remove only the packages matching a specific query,
                        e.g., os=Windows AND (arch=x86 OR compiler=gcc)

This command will remove all temporary folders, along with the source, build and download folder that Conan generates in its execution. It will do so for every matching reference passed in pattern, unless a specific flag is supplied, in which case only the specified folders will be removed.

Examples:

  • Remove all non-critical files:

    $ conan cache clean "*"

  • Remove all temporary files:

    $ conan cache clean "*" --temp

  • Remove the download folders for the zlib recipe:

    $ conan cache clean "zlib*" --download

  • Remove everything but the download folder for the zlib recipe:

    $ conan cache clean "*" --source --build --temp

conan cache check-integrity

$ conan cache check-integrity -h
WARN: Downgrading cache from Conan 2.4.1 to 2.2.3
WARN: Applying downgrade migration 2.4_1-migrate.py
Migration: Successfully updated cppstd_compat.py
usage: conan cache check-integrity [-h] [-v [V]] [-cc CORE_CONF]
                                   [-p PACKAGE_QUERY]
                                   pattern

Check the integrity of the local cache for the given references

positional arguments:
  pattern               Selection pattern for references to check integrity
                        for

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -v [V]                Level of detail of the output. Valid options from less
                        verbose to more verbose: -vquiet, -verror, -vwarning,
                        -vnotice, -vstatus, -v or -vverbose, -vv or -vdebug,
                        -vvv or -vtrace
  -cc CORE_CONF, --core-conf CORE_CONF
                        Global configuration for Conan
  -p PACKAGE_QUERY, --package-query PACKAGE_QUERY
                        Only the packages matching a specific query, e.g.,
                        os=Windows AND (arch=x86 OR compiler=gcc)

The conan cache check-integrity command checks the integrity of Conan packages in the local cache. This means that it will throw an error if any file included in the conanmanifest.txt is missing or does not match the declared checksum in that file.

For example, to verify the integrity of the whole Conan local cache, do:

$ conan cache check-integrity "*"
mypkg/1.0: Integrity checked: ok
mypkg/1.0:454923cd42d0da27b9b1294ebc3e4ecc84020747: Integrity checked: ok
mypkg/1.0:454923cd42d0da27b9b1294ebc3e4ecc84020747: Integrity checked: ok
zlib/1.2.11: Integrity checked: ok
zlib/1.2.11:6fe7fa69f760aee504e0be85c12b2327c716f9e7: Integrity checked: ok

conan cache backup-upload

$ conan cache backup-upload -h
Migration: Successfully updated settings.yml
Migration: Successfully updated cppstd_compat.py
usage: conan cache backup-upload [-h] [-v [V]] [-cc CORE_CONF]

Upload all the source backups present in the cache

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -v [V]                Level of detail of the output. Valid options from less
                        verbose to more verbose: -vquiet, -verror, -vwarning,
                        -vnotice, -vstatus, -v or -vverbose, -vv or -vdebug,
                        -vvv or -vtrace
  -cc CORE_CONF, --core-conf CORE_CONF
                        Global configuration for Conan

The conan cache backup-upload will upload all source backups present in the local cache to the backup server, (excluding those which have been fetched from the excluded urls listed in the core.sources:exclude_urls conf), regardless of which package they belong to, if any.

conan cache save

$ conan cache save -h
Migration: Successfully updated settings.yml
Migration: Successfully updated cppstd_compat.py
usage: conan cache save [-h] [-f FORMAT] [-v [V]] [-cc CORE_CONF] [-l LIST]
                        [--file FILE]
                        [pattern]

Get the artifacts from a package list and archive them

positional arguments:
  pattern               A pattern in the form
                        'pkg/version#revision:package_id#revision', e.g:
                        zlib/1.2.13:* means all binaries for zlib/1.2.13. If
                        revision is not specified, it is assumed latest one.

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -f FORMAT, --format FORMAT
                        Select the output format: json
  -v [V]                Level of detail of the output. Valid options from less
                        verbose to more verbose: -vquiet, -verror, -vwarning,
                        -vnotice, -vstatus, -v or -vverbose, -vv or -vdebug,
                        -vvv or -vtrace
  -cc CORE_CONF, --core-conf CORE_CONF
                        Global configuration for Conan
  -l LIST, --list LIST  Package list of packages to save
  --file FILE           Save to this tgz file

Read more in Save and restore packages from/to the cache.

conan cache restore

$ conan cache restore -h
WARN: Downgrading cache from Conan 2.4.1 to 2.2.3
WARN: Applying downgrade migration 2.4_1-migrate.py
Migration: Successfully updated cppstd_compat.py
usage: conan cache restore [-h] [-f FORMAT] [-v [V]] [-cc CORE_CONF] file

Put the artifacts from an archive into the cache

positional arguments:
  file                  Path to archive to restore

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -f FORMAT, --format FORMAT
                        Select the output format: json
  -v [V]                Level of detail of the output. Valid options from less
                        verbose to more verbose: -vquiet, -verror, -vwarning,
                        -vnotice, -vstatus, -v or -vverbose, -vv or -vdebug,
                        -vvv or -vtrace
  -cc CORE_CONF, --core-conf CORE_CONF
                        Global configuration for Conan

Read more in Save and restore packages from/to the cache.