Maxim Cournoyer <maxim.cournoyer@gmail.com> writes:

> Could you elaborate on how you create and then use such cache?

It's very dumb, really: it just drops the output of `guix package
--search "."` to a file :D

> Is it useful when used inside Emacs only, say in a *shell* buffer?

Well, you can use `recsel' or any text processing tool over it, but
beside that, not much I'm afraid.

> If so, what does it bring over using emacs-guix, which caches in memory
> the package definitions?

In terms of caching, nothing, but the Helm interface has some
significant perks over emacs-guix:

- Perform transactions (install/remove) over multiple packages.

- Perform actions over multiple packages: browse home-page, show
(reverse) deps, find-files (with helm-find-files -- awesome! :p).

That's about it.  It's much more basic than emacs-guix but convenient
enough that I still find some use for it :)

That said, this `helm-system-packages-guix.el` was mostly a proof of
concept, it's far from being as neat and complete as emacs-guix.
A proper Helm/Ivy interface for emacs-guix would be much better,
maybe some day.

--
Pierre Neidhardt