Debian package management
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intro[edit]
- dpkg – Debian package … – for handling the packages themselves
- APT – "Advanced Packaging Tool" – on top of dpkg commands, dealing with dependencies and repositories
- apt-... – addons to APT
APT[edit]
- the Debian APT = Advanced Packaging Tool
- apt-cache
- apt-get
- ...
apt-cache -- query the APT cache[edit]
# ... apt-cache pkgnames | sort # perform a full text search on all available package lists for the POSIX regex pattern given # (options available) $ apt-cache search regex... $ apt-cache search --names-only regex... $ apt-cache search --full regex...
apt-get -- APT package handling utility -- command-line interface[edit]
- https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/apt/apt-get.8.en.html
- https://manpages.debian.org/experimental/apt/apt-get.8.en.html
APT: resynchronising the package index files from their sources[edit]
$ sudo apt-get update
APT: installing ...[edit]
$ sudo apt-get install PACKAGE # do not *really* install the PACKAGE, # just download it to the default cache directory: $ sudo apt-get install --download-only PACKAGE # do not *really* install the PACKAGE, # just download it to the cache directory being specified (instead of /var/cache/apt/archives/): $ sudo apt-get install --download-only --option dir::cache=$HOME/tmp PACKAGE # install PACKAGE $ sudo apt-get install PACKAGE
APT: installing the newest versions of all packages currently installed on the system from the sources enumerated in /etc/apt/sources.list[edit]
$ sudo apt-get upgrade $ sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
APT: removing ...[edit]
$ sudo apt-get remove PACKAGE $ sudo apt-get autoremove PACKAGE
apt-rdepends - performs ... dependency listings (also a reverse one)[edit]
$ apt-rdepends --reverse PACKAGE
In case of an optional resp. alternate dependency that's not shown (clearly).
which (installed?) package includes a certain FILE (utility, ...)?[edit]
$ apt-file search PATTERN
which files does a certain PACKAGE include?[edit]
$ apt-file list PACKAGE
dpkg, dpkg-query, dpkg-deb[edit]
dpkg[edit]
installing a Debian package[edit]
$ sudo dpkg --install PACKAGE.deb
removing a Debian package[edit]
$ sudo dpkg --remove PACKAGE
verifying a Debian package[edit]
$ sudo dpkg --verify PACKAGE
dpkg-deb -- Debian package archive (.deb) manipulation tool[edit]
dpkg-deb packs, unpacks and provides information about Debian archives.
Use dpkg to install and remove packages from your system.
which files are included? will be created from this package file?[edit]
$ dpkg-deb --contents PACKAGE.deb
what's the official package name?[edit]
$ dpkg-deb --info PACKAGE.deb
what is the content of the ctrl-tarfile you can extract from PACKAGE.deb?[edit]
$ dpkg-deb --ctrl-tarfile PACKAGE.deb | tar tvf - drwxr-xr-x root/root 0 2018-08-27 17:39 ./ -rw-r--r-- root/root 21773 2018-08-27 17:39 ./md5sums -rw-r--r-- root/root 229 2018-08-27 17:39 ./control -rw-r--r-- root/root 1071 2018-08-27 17:36 ./conffiles -rwxr-xr-x root/root 1228 2018-08-27 17:39 ./postinst
- PACKAGE.deb contains a tarball (ctrl-tarfile).
- the tarball contains ... .
what conffiles does PACKAGE.deb contain?[edit]
$ dpkg-deb --ctrl-tarfile PACKAGE.deb | tar xf - --to-stdout ./conffiles
- PACKAGE.deb contains a tarball (ctrl-tarfile),
- the tarball contains ./conffiles,
- ./conffiles is only a list of what is to be treated as conffiles, it does not contain the conffiles themselves, they are an ordinary part of PACKAGE.deb
dpkg-query[edit]
which packages are installed (together with a couple of details)?[edit]
$ dpkg-query --list
is there an installed package, that sounds like XYZ?[edit]
$ dpkg-query --list | fgrep XYZ
details of an installed package (that you know the name of, e.g. PACKAGE)[edit]
$ dpkg-query --list PACKAGE
all details of specified package[edit]
$ dpkg-query --status PACKAGE
what's the content of an installed package (e.g. PACKAGE)[edit]
$ dpkg-query --listfiles PACKAGE
what conffiles does an installed package (e.g. PACKAGE) include[edit]
$ dpkg-query --showformat='${Conffiles}\n' --show PACKAGE
$ dpkg-query --showformat='${Conffiles}\n' --show PACKAGE | perl -pe 's/^ \s* (.*?) \s* \w+ $/$1/x'
backup all the conffiles of an installed package (e.g. PACKAGE), each one for itself[edit]
$ sudo ~jochen.hayek/bin/create_snapshot.sh $( dpkg-query --showformat='${Conffiles}\n' --show PACKAGE | perl -pe 's/^ \s* (.*?) \s* \w+ $/$1/x' )
backup all the conffiles of an installed package (e.g. PACKAGE) to a single tarball[edit]
$ sudo tar cvf ~/tmp/PACKAGE.conffiles-$(date '+%Y%m%d%H%M%S').tar --directory / $( dpkg-query --showformat='${Conffiles}\n' --show PACKAGE | perl -pe 's/^ \s* (.*?) \s* \w+ $/$1/x' )
which installed package includes a certain FILE (utility, ...)?[edit]
$ dpkg-query --search FILE
misc[edit]
- https://superuser.com/questions/408082/how-do-i-get-a-list-of-available-i-e-uninstalled-packages-in-debian How do I get a list of available (i.e. uninstalled) packages in Debian?
dpkg-source -- Debian source package (.dsc) manipulation tool[edit]
$ dpkg-source --extract ....dsc
needs a:
- *.dsc
- *.debian.tar.*
- *.orig.tar.*
rpm2deb -- converting packages from ... to ...[edit]
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rpm_(software)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alien_(software)
- https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/alien/alien.1p.en.html
- https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/pseudo/fakeroot.1.en.html
- https://manpages.debian.org/unstable/fakeroot-ng/fakeroot.1.en.html
- https://www.howtoforge.com/converting_rpm_to_deb_with_alien : alien -k ... (important)
- https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/9714/what-is-the-need-for-fakeroot-command-in-linux#9720 (important)
- https://salsa.debian.org/perl-team/modules/packages/libdbd-oracle-perl/blob/master/debian/README -- Oracle's Instant Client package comes as RPM -- how to convert to .deb
alien --to-deb ...[edit]
this command line creates a Debian package from an RPM package
(using that e-mail address for the (local Debian) package maintainer).
CAVEAT: won't actually work, because creating a Debian package requires running this as root
$ env EMAIL='john.doe@COMPANY.com' alien --to-deb --keep-version ...
some command line parameters can only get passed to "alien" as environment variables.
fakeroot ...[edit]
you do not have root priviliges, but you need to pretend to have them for achieving certain goals like creating a Debian package:
$ fakeroot ...
special issues[edit]
fiddling with the tree before creating the .deb[edit]
$ env EMAIL='john.doe@COMPANY.com' alien --to-deb --keep-version ... $ cd ... # here you want to change a few bits $ sudo chown ... $ fakeroot debian/rules binary
open questions[edit]
- how to deal with dependencies specified within the RPM package?
- …
history of this article[edit]
This blog article got created 1st, but then the content got moved here to the wiki: