Prevent Installation Confusion on Arch
Open 💬 1 comment Opened Aug 26, 2026 by johnaweiss
What variant of Codex are you using?
CLI
What feature would you like to see?
Twice i've somehow gotten two conflicting CLI installations. It seems there are three methods:
- curl -fsSL https://chatgpt.com/codex/install.sh | sh
- pacman -S openai-codex
- sudo npm install -g @openai/codex
Apparently, i mixed the methods in some way. As a result, my updates didn't actually update the installation that got launched with codex, and my AGENTS file was in the wrong dir. I had to do a cleanup on two separate occasions.
Please prevent users from using conflicting methods. All 3 installer/update methods should check for existing installs and get user confirmation before proceeding, or some other way to prevent conflicts.
This may affect other platforms too.
Additional information
_No response_
1 Comment
Some sources say npm is preferred method. Other sources say pacman is best for arch. Google Gemini recommends pacman, which matches general arch practice:
| Feature |
curl(Standalone Script) |npm(Node Package Manager) |pacman/AUR(Native) || :--- | :--- | :--- | :--- |
| System Cleanliness | Keeps system files clean. Installs to
$HOME/.local/bin. | Risk of global package clutter; bypassespacmandatabase. | Best. Tracks all files via the native Arch package database. || Dependency Need | None. Runs a pre-compiled standalone binary. | Requires Node.js and
npminstalled on your system. | Requirespacmanor an AUR helper likeparu/yay. || Updates | Manual (must re-run the script to update). | Manual via
npm update -g @openai/codex. | Automated alongside your normal system updates (sudo pacman -Syu). || Uninstallation | Manual. Requires deleting the binary and purging the
~/.codexdirectory. | Standardnpm uninstall -g @openai/codex. | Clean and simple viasudo pacman -R codexor your AUR helper. |"Since it is now an official package,
pacman -S openai-codexis the superior, most up-to-date native method."