# spack/spack

A flexible package manager that supports multiple versions, configurations, platforms, and compilers.

Repository: https://github.com/spack/spack
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/spack
Homepage: https://spack.io
Language: Python
License: Apache-2.0
License Family: permissive
Topics: python, spack, package-manager, hpc, build-tools, radiuss, scientific-computing, macos, linux, hpsf, windows
Last push: 2026-08-26T21:48:02+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 93/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 81, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4620, "days_push": 7, "days_rel": 44, "gap_med": 30.5, "n_releases_24m": 15}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 5113, forks 2457 (observed 2026-08-28T04:09:10.792476+00:00)

## What it is
Spack is a flexible, multi-platform package manager designed for supercomputers, Linux, macOS, and Windows. It builds and installs multiple versions and configurations of software side by side, using a spec syntax and pure-Python package recipes.

## Use cases
- install scientific software like hdf5 without root access
- build multiple versions of the same library with different compilers
- install packages targeting a specific CPU microarchitecture
- manage software stacks mixing Python, R, C, C++, and Fortran
- create binary build caches for HPC clusters
- install customized compile-time options for dependencies

## When to choose
- you need many coexisting versions or configurations of packages
- you work on HPC systems or supercomputers without root
- you need to swap compilers or target specific microarchitectures
- you build combinatorial software stacks for testing

## When to avoid
- you only need simple language-ecosystem packages (use pip, npm, cargo)
- you want a minimal end-user desktop package manager
- you need prebuilt binaries exclusively and cannot build from source

## Facets
- artifact type: cli-tool
- maturity: stable
- function: package-manager, build-tool, cli, developer-tools
- domain: developer-tools
- platform: windows, python, cli
- tags: hpc, scientific-computing, multi-version, compilers, supercomputing, dependency-management, command-line, devops, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- spack/spack (main) score 93

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:10.792476+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T18:02:08.434477+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/spack/spack (fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:10.792476+00:00, sha fc365fd915a0)
  - homepage: https://spack.io (fetched 2026-08-29T08:56:56.929789+00:00, sha 4c0e4355be2c)
  - site_page: https://spack.io/about (fetched 2026-08-29T08:56:56.939014+00:00, sha 7efc8b3b4b37)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.