pip --quiet doesn't show the install actions being taken

[zestyping]

What's the problem this feature will solve?

When I run pip, what I most want to see is "What is pip doing?"

Unfortunately, the current choices seem to be:

1. Run pip install ..., which generates many pages of useless "Requirement already satisfied" messages
2. Run pip install -q ..., which generates nothing, not even messages about what is being installed

Describe the solution you'd like

I'd like a pip option that prints out the actions pip is actually doing, and doesn't print out things it isn't doing.

Ideally, this would be the meaning of -q, and the current behaviour for -q would be enabled with -qq. But for backward compatibility, it would be acceptable to have a new option that simply suppresses all the "Requirement already satisfied" messages.

It would be acceptable to suppress all the "Requirement already satisfied" messages, or to replace them all with a single summary message that lists all the already-satisfied requirements on one line. What I don't want is so many pages of output that it's hard to find the actions actually taken buried among output that I don't care about.

Alternative Solutions

pip help only lists -q as a way to control the amount of output; I tried that and it didn't do what I'd like it to do.

Additional context

That's it! I can't think of any more details — hoping this is as straightforward a feature request as it seems to me.

Code of Conduct

• I agree to follow the PSF Code of Conduct.

[aisven]

Out of need I just searched for exactly this feature request and I am glad it exists.

By the way this, or something very similar, had also been asked for in 2014 in #1537 however back then a decision was made that adding a specific option would not be worth it.

I second @zestyping that this feature could indeed be very useful. People seem to just kinda cope with finding the messages about actual changes amongst all the "requirement already satisfied" messages. I think an extra option could save people quite some time. It might be relatively easy to implement as well.

[uranusjr]

I don’t think it’s a good idea to hide Requirement already satisfied lines by default (they do convey important information), but making -q “not actually quiet” would be a big breaking change and not so viable either. The only technically possible solution would be to add a new option, which, as you already noticed, is not worth it.

This needs a more inventive or fundamental rstructuring of logging to be made possible. Perhaps if (when) we implement better “log collapsing” with Rich, the amount of information should be less of a problem.

cc @pradyunsg

[uranusjr]

In the mean time, closing this since there is no really any actionables for this particular feature request. Rich status bar implementation is tracked in #10461.