Description

manifest.py files currently support installing from micropython-lib with require(); I propose extending the syntax to match that of mip, namely by adding support for a package.json hosted elsewhere (URL, GitHub, or GitLab) and individual .py files by URL.

My initial implementation thoughts are:

• Allow github:, gitlab:, and http:// links to be passed to require() in addition to normal package names
• Add an optional version=<x> keyword argument to match the mip.install() interface
• Port the existing mip functionality either from the module or from mpremote to download modules to a local cache directory during manifest processing
• Add these downloaded files to the ManifestFile database so they can be frozen into the firmware with the existing manifest machinery

Please let me know if you have any thoughts/comments/suggestions.

Justification: I'm currently working on a project that uses a number of external libraries I freeze into firmware. I'm using git submodules to pull in library dependencies within the project and package()/modules() to include these into the firmware, however:

• I anticipate expanding to multiple firmware variations, which may use different sets of libraries; it may become tedious to set up all required submodules and fetch the correct ones for the firmware being built
• This doesn't provide support for freezing a single .py file (unlike mip) from a repository without cloning the entire repository. For example, I'd like to include the typing.mpy file in my firmware for the libraries I use, but I would rather not include the entire repository for it as a submodule.

Code Size

No response

Implementation

I intend to implement this feature and would submit a Pull Request if desirable

Code of Conduct

Yes, I agree