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+---
+title: "Recursive Package Downloading & Installation"
+date: 2026-02-04
+draft: false
+meta_desc: "A technical deep dive into how `pulumi install` works"
+meta_image: meta.png
+authors:
+    - ian-wahbe
+tags:
+    - features
+    - infrastructure-as-code
+schema_type: auto
+
+# Optional: Social media promotional copy (for reference only, does not auto-post)
+social:
+    twitter:
+    linkedin:
+---
+
+`pulumi install` installs everything you need to run a Pulumi project. That means [plugins](TODO: docs page for source based plugins), [local SDKs](/docs/iac/guides/building-extending/packages/local-packages/) &
+language dependencies. A good mental model for `pulumi install` is that the following script works:
+
+```bash
+$ git clone https://github.com/your-org/any-repo && cd any-repo/your-pulumi-program
+$ pulumi install
+$ pulumi up
+```
+
+Actually delivering on that promise is harder then you might think, and it's all due to [source based plugins](TODO: docs page for source based plugins).
+
+<!--more-->
+
+## What are source based plugins
+
+To understand the problem, we need to look at the anatomy of a source based plugin. A source based plugin is a
+*directory* that contains a [`PulumiPlugin.yaml`](/docs/iac/guides/building-extending/components/build-a-component/#pulumipluginyaml) file:
+
+```go
+type PluginProject struct {
+	Runtime ProjectRuntimeInfo `json:"runtime" yaml:"runtime"`
+	Packages map[string]PackageSpec `json:"packages,omitempty" yaml:"packages,omitempty"`
+    ...
+}
+```
+
+*Source: [project.go:942-953](https://github.com/pulumi/pulumi/blob/f1880936441c60b3ba6faa1d4f80c922fbd6c7bc/sdk/go/common/workspace/project.go#L942-L953)*
+
+`Runtime` is the name of the language that the plugin is written in. `Packages` is the complicated part: `Packages` is a
+map of [Pulumi Packages](/docs/iac/concepts/packages/) that need to be installed **with local SDKs** before we can run the source based
+plugin. Let's walk through an example:
+
+Consider the following plugin directory:
+
+```
+./
+├── PulumiPlugin.yaml
+├── index.ts
+├── package.json
+├── package-lock.json
+└── tsconfig.json
+```
+
+```yaml
+runtime: nodejs
+packages:
+  my-package: https://github.com/moolumi/my-package
+```
+
+```typescript
+import * as pulumi from "@pulumi/pulumi";
+import * as myPackage from "@moolumi/my-package";
+
+interface ComponentArgs {
+  message: pulumi.Input<string>;
+}
+
+export class Component extends pulumi.ComponentResource {
+  result: pulumi.Output<string>;
+
+  constructor(name: string, args: ComponentArgs, opts: pulumi.ComponentResourceOptions) {
+    super("example:index:Component", name, args, opts)
+
+    const r = new myPackage.Resource(`${name}-resource`, {
+      message: args.message`,
+    }, { parent: this });
+
+    this.result = r.result;
+  }
+}
+```
+
+```json
+{
+    "name": "my-component",
+    "dependencies": {
+        "@moolumi/my-package": "file:sdks/moolumi-my-package",
+        "@pulumi/pulumi": "^3.218.0"
+    },
+    "devDependencies": {
+        "@types/node": "^24.0.0",
+        "typescript": "^5.9.2"
+    }
+}
+```
+
+To install `my-component`, we would need to, in order:
+
+1. Clone & install `https://github.com/moolumi/my-package`
+1. Get the [Pulumi Schema](/docs/iac/guides/building-extending/packages/schema/) for `my-package`: `pulumi package get-schema ${install-dir(my-package)} > my-package-schema.json`
+1. Generate a local SDK for `my-package`: `pulumi package gen-sdk my-package-schema.json --language typescript --out sdk/moolumi-my-package`
+1. Install the locally generated SDK: `cd sdk/moolumi-my-package && npm install`
+1. Install the dependencies for `my-component`: `npm install`
+
+{{% notes type="info" %}}
+The steps for an installation include an installation. Installing components is recursive.
+{{% /notes %}}
+
+## Installing source based plugins
+
+Source based plugins can reference other packages, including source based plugins. This means that every plugin
+installation forms a [DAG](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Directed_acyclic_graph).
+
+**Simple dependency chain:**
+
+```mermaid
+graph LR
+    Project --> my-component
+    my-component --> my-package
+```
+
+**Complex dependency graph:**
+
+```mermaid
+graph TD
+    Project --> component-a
+    Project --> component-b
+    Project --> component-c
+
+    component-a --> component-d
+    component-a --> component-e
+    component-a --> component-f
+
+    component-b --> component-d
+    component-b --> component-e
+    component-b --> component-f
+
+    component-c --> component-d
+    component-c --> component-e
+    component-c --> component-f
+
+    component-d --> resource-g
+    component-d --> resource-h
+
+    component-e --> resource-g
+    component-e --> resource-h
+
+    component-f --> resource-g
+    component-f --> resource-h
+```
+
+Because source based plugins declare their own dependencies, the `pulumi` CLI doesn't know what dependencies a source
+based plugin has until it's already been downloaded. That leaves us with 2 ways to perform a full download:
+
+1. First download all source based plugins, then install them.
+1. Download & install plugins at the same time.
+
+The first option provides a much simpler mental model: download plugins until you understand the full DAG, then perform
+a (parallel) depth first traversal of the DAG to install plugins.
+
+The second option is more performant but also more complex: create a mutable DAG & update it as new dependency
+information becomes available. This requires the ability to register create nodes in your DAG without knowing their
+dependency information.
+
+We actually ended up implementing both options. [#20945](https://github.com/pulumi/pulumi/pull/20945) added a "download, then install" algorithm to `pulumi
+install`. [#21320](https://github.com/pulumi/pulumi/pull/21320) followed up with a more general "mutable DAG" traversal.
+
+## Mutable DAG traversal
+
+...
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