Running winget.pro on your own computer

Running winget.pro locally (that is, on the same PC where winget commands are then used to install software) is mostly done during development. For production use, consider one of the other deployment options.

Set up the development environment

pip install -Ur requirements/base-full.txt

Initialise the database

Run python manage.py migrate
Run python manage.py createsuperuser
Run python manage.py runserver
Log into /admin and follow the instructions to create a Tenant.

Start the server

Execute the following command if it is not still running:

python manage.py runserver

This starts to server on http://localhost:8000. winget however requires the server to accept https:// requests. This can be done during development with the SSL proxy from this repository. Please see the sslproxy/ directory for instructions. Typically, you will run the following command:

python sslproxy.py

Now you can add a REST source in winget (note the httpS):

winget source add -n dev -a https://localhost:8443/ab... -t "Microsoft.Rest"

Here, ab... is the UUID of the Tenant.

You can perform queries against the new source. Eg.:

winget search "search term" -s dev

Sniffing Microsoft's implementation

Microsoft's implementation is the msstore source shown in winget source list. Typically, it runs under:

https://storeedgefd.dsx.mp.microsoft.com/v9.0

To sniff it, the easiest way is to use a network inspection tool such as Fiddler Classic. This however uses its own SSL certificate, which winget rejects. To work around this, set the REG_DWORD registry value HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\AppInstaller\EnableBypassCertificatePinningForMicrosoftStore to 1.