Chocolatey is an open-source package manager and installer for Windows.
Chocolatey uses NuGet packaging infrastructure and PowerShell for the automation of installing software on Windows machines. The main goal was to simplify the process of installing and maintaining the software.
Name Chocolatey comes from a pun of NuGet - nougat "because everyone loves Chocolatey nougat."
The project was started in 2011 by Rob Reynolds. Since the successful Kickstarter Campaign, it began to grow much faster.
There are several versions of Chocolatey, depending on the type of use - for a single user, there is an "Open Source" edition. Commercial versions are more focused on centralized management of many computers, like PBQ. This is whole another topic (that I'm not that interested in it). I will focus only on personal use, which has the Apache v2 license, and could be used for personal and organizations (but please check legal).
Community Package Repository
There is no support for the Community Package Repository. If used in organizations, please check the license for each package!
For example, XnView requires a license for use in Company but is free for private or educational use! It is "very easy" to get carried away when the only thing you need to do is paste choco install xnview and press enter.
Community Package Repository is maintained and community moderated. Every package has a strict moderation process (maybe too strict?), including quality checking, installation, antivirus, etc.
Choco basic commands
Installation
Installation is straightforward with cmd as admin
@"%SystemRoot%\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe" -NoProfile -InputFormat None -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command " [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = 3072; iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://chocolatey.org/install.ps1'))" && SET "PATH=%PATH%;%ALLUSERSPROFILE%\chocolatey\bin"
for other installations, check documentation.
allowGlobalConfirmation install packages without confirmation
choco feature enable -n=allowGlobalConfirmation
Upgrade
To update every package, just type
choco upgrade all
My favorite Choco Packages
Browsers
choco install googlechrome
choco install firefox
File Management
choco install totalcommander
choco install winrar
choco install 7zip.install
choco install defraggler
choco install windirstat
choco install filezilla
choco install jdownloader
choco install qbittorrent
choco install dropbox
choco install googledrive
Development
choco install visualstudio-installer
choco install vscode
choco install jetbrains-rider
choco install jetbrainstoolbox
choco install microsoft-windows-terminal
choco install firacode
choco install git
choco install curl
choco install azure-cli
choco install postman
choco install docker-desktop
choco install microsoftazurestorageexplorer
choco install github-desktop
choco install notepadplusplus
choco install rdcman
choco install pandoc
choco install pwsh --pre
Communication
choco install microsoft-teams
choco install skype
choco install element-desktop
Media
choco install xnview
choco install plexmediaserver
choco install sharex
choco install calibre
choco install vlc
Office
choco install office365business
choco install grammarly
choco install obsidian
Misc
choco install powertoys
choco install gnucash
choco install steam
choco install autohotkey.portable