I am confused as to what package to install.
For example, to install the Brave browser,
I can choose from the Manjaro repository:
Or I can choose from AUR to build:
With 8 different choices, a new user is obviously
going to be confused.
My guess is that I should install from the
Manjaro repository when available, but even then,
do I choose brave or brave-bin ?
No you cant. Only brave exists in the repos (and brave-beta … the beta version)
A new user should understand the AUR, how it works, and probably investigate those packages to know the differences and make a decision about which one they want.
https://wiki.manjaro.org/index.php?title=Arch_User_Repository
Yes.
They dont both exist. ‘beta’ exists alongside regular brave … but its beta, as in the development version.
$ pacman -Ss brave
community/brave 1.15.75-1
Web browser that blocks ads and trackers by default (latest binary release).
community/brave-beta 1.16.62-1
Web browser that blocks ads and trackers by default (latest binary release).
To explain a bit further … -bin suffix is used to denote ‘binary’. When you get packages from the repos they are already compiled … so ‘bin’ wouldnt really be necessary, and as you can see from the pacman output above … the repository offerings are already just the packaged binaries.
What do you mean, they both don’t exist ?
I chose brave-bin just now and it downloaded it and
it installed ok and seems to run fine.
Previously, on another computer, I selected brave
instead of brave-bin and it also downloaded and
installed ok.
I did notice that on brave-bin, the download was
less than 6 MB, whereas when I installed brave
before on the other computer, the download
was much more.
So, what was the difference between those 2 downloads ?
They both installed brave, although the brave-bin
download was somewhat faster.
Also, when downloading some packages, a screen will
appear with a list of optional dependencies.
I have no idea whether to check these or not.
Will it be ok to just always check all of them ?
Not possible. Go ahead and download the source yourself and check the size.
@cscs already answered you. FYI, the -bin extension means it’s a binary source rather than compiling from source code.
That’s a question only you can answer. Do you want / need them, or not? That’s why they’re optional.
No offense, but to be straightforward: If you’re really that lost, maybe you should use an operating system that makes decisions for you so you don’t have to think for yourself.
I’m sorry … but theres no 2 ways about it. brave-bin does not exist in the repos.
Heres on online catalog for all the branches: Manjaro - Branch Compare
Show me how exactly you see brave-bin:
pacman -Ss brave-bin
Or maybe
pamac search brave-bin
Sorry, my bad.
I was actually looking at the Pamac package manager on another computer with the Garuda OS and it does show both a brave and a brave-bin in their repository (as you
can see from the image below),
[ Sorry, no image was uploaded; evidently my level of trust
is not high enough, but indeed the Garuda repository
does have both choices and the brave-bin that I
downloaded was less than 6 MB]
and somehow I just assumed it was that way in the Manjaro repository.
(After looking at my Manjaro computer, I can see now that
it’s not that way in the Manjaro repository.)
But on the optional dependencies, is it safe to just check
all of them ? ( I don’t know how I would determine which I
needed and which I don’t)
Personally I think you should check ‘uninstall’ when it comes to anything with ‘brave’ 
Really, why is that ?
And which browser do you recommend ?
Personally, I recommend Vivaldi. But Firefox is also my go to! 
That’s a matter of personal preference. Discussions that start with questions like these are pointless and usually don’t end well.
Well, thanks everyone for the responses.
But one last question,
is there any downside to just checking all
of the optional dependencies when downloading
a package ?
That’s all I can think of - I’d at least try to understand what each dependency does so you can figure out what it’s purpose even is, you might not even need it(thus removing bloat).
That’s the second time you’ve asked the same question after an answer has already been given. You haven’t even acknowledged the responses. This is quickly going nowhere. Please do some searching and research on your own.
Don’t get me wrong, we’re here to help, but don’t be a help vampire.
Sorry, I really do appreciate the responses.
It’s just that I’m new to Manjaro, having used
just Ubuntu based OS’s before.
I’ll try to search more for answers in the future
before posting. (I did search a while about these
optional dependencies, but got no definitive results.)
Thanks again, everyone have a good evening
and a great day tomorrow !
Manjaro repackage Brave from the binaries instead of compiling from source, it is equivalent to brave-bin and brave-beta-bin in the AUR