`pip config` should support `add` and `remove` commands

[stonecharioteer]

What's the problem this feature will solve?

I use the pip config command quite a lot, but it does not allow me to add multiple entries to trusted-hosts or to remove a value from the config. This would greatly improve usability for me.

Describe the solution you'd like

Being able to add a value to trusted hosts or index-url with:

pip config add global.trusted-host artifactory.mycompany.com
pip config remove global.trusted-host artifactory.mycompany.com

Alternative Solutions

Currently I just use preexisting configs and keep swapping them out. However, this is an interim solution that is really not helping. Our company has a tight lockdown on the network, and when we switch to external networks, we need to remove the index-urls and add external ones to trusted hosts. We would rather not directly download from pypi or files.pythonhosted.org on company VPN.

Additionally, this is very different from pip config set which sets and unsets absolute values. In this scenario, I could engineer a mix of values from separate configs. This would allow me to swap out registries and add them back without macguyvering solutions like I do today.

Additional context

This is why I had originally created the following issues: #7803 and #7804

[pradyunsg]

@stonecharioteer Could you fill the issue template, and, potentially clarify how this would differ from pip config set?

[stonecharioteer]

Apologies, I hit the enter key way too soon.

[stonecharioteer]

Updated

[deveshks]

If I understand the use-case correctly, You want to be able to set multiple values in pip config for a key, or add to existing values.

With set, you can only provide one value, and that either creates a new value, or replaces the existing one, as seen below.

$ pip config set global.trusted-host artifactory1.mycompany1.com
Writing to /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf

$ cat /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf
[global]
trusted-host = artifactory1.mycompany1.com

$ pip config set global.trusted-host artifactory2.mycompany2.com
Writing to /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf

$ cat /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf
[global]
trusted-host = artifactory2.mycompany2.com

So in your case, doing pip config add global.trusted-host artifactory1.mycompany1.com and pip config add global.trusted-host artifactory2.mycompany1.com will give you.

$ cat /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf
[global]
trusted-host = artifactory1.mycompany1.com
    artifactory2.mycompany2.com

And with unset, we get rid of the all option presents.

$ pip config get global.trusted-host
artifactory1.mycompany1.com
artifactory2.mycompany2.com
(venv) DeveshSinghMac:~ devesh$ cat /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf
[global]
trusted-host = artifactory1.mycompany1.com
    artifactory2.mycompany2.com
(venv) DeveshSinghMac:~ devesh$ pip config unset global.trusted-host
Writing to /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf
(venv) DeveshSinghMac:~ devesh$ cat /Users/devesh/.config/pip/pip.conf
(venv) DeveshSinghMac:~ devesh$ 

But in your case, pip config remove global.trusted-host artifactory1.mycompany1.com and pip config remove global.trusted-host artifactory2.mycompany1.com will get rid of options one by one if present (perhaps if there is only one remaining, we should get rid of [global] section itself)

[pradyunsg]

(perhaps if there is only one remaining, we should get rid of [global] section itself)

An empty section won't affect what the parsed contents are, so that's more "polish" than "correctness". :)

[stonecharioteer]

@deveshks you summarized my thoughts to the point! A command like that would be super useful in a corporate world. @pradyunsg knows where I am coming from :D

[deveshks]

@deveshks you summarized my thoughts to the point!

No worries, happy to help

A command like that would be super useful in a corporate world. @pradyunsg knows where I am coming from :D

I am not sure how useful will this option be for the general public. If the pip maintainers are okay with including such a feature, me or you can take a stab at this.

[stonecharioteer]

@deveshks I'll give this a go. I would like to expand about this. Regarding the order of the inputs, I would like to preserve the order users put these in. This will definitely help a lot of organizations behind proxies. They don't know that it is possible to add multiple sources, but this will help them understand, I can also go ahead and edit the docs once I am done. I'll raise a PR soon.

@pradyunsg I'll name the commands pip config add and pip config rm. I originally assumed npm had an add command under the config subcommand, but it does not. git has something similar, git config --add is a thing, but there is no git config --rm command.

I will go ahead and send you a PR, we can discuss the nomenclature there, if that is alright. I know pip has an edit command, but that does not solve everything, especially where automation is concerned.