show the date of installation in pip list

[mrrezaie]

Hi, the pip list command only shows the package name and version. There is no info about date and time. It would be great if you add a new column for the date and time of installation.

Thank you in advance.

• I agree to follow the PSF Code of Conduct.

[notatallshaw]

Pip gets package information from the .dist-info directory of a package: https://packaging.python.org/en/latest/specifications/recording-installed-packages/

As far as I'm aware there is no "installation date" available in this spec. Something like the mtime of a given file could be used as a proxy, but this would be problematic across different platforms and wouldn't be consistent or real (could be modified accidentally for a variety of reasons).

Discussions and proposals for new packaging standards are posted here: https://discuss.python.org/c/packaging/14. It's worth searching to see if this has already been discussed or proposed before.