From eeaafbe5c0d5f2ffd87bf7d9f12c13df1bd0adf5 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Daniel Baumann Date: Sun, 23 Sep 2007 10:04:20 +0200 Subject: Adding live-package 0.99-1. --- templates/iso/doc/FAQ/html/ch-pkgtools.en.html | 936 +++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 936 insertions(+) create mode 100644 templates/iso/doc/FAQ/html/ch-pkgtools.en.html (limited to 'templates/iso/doc/FAQ/html/ch-pkgtools.en.html') diff --git a/templates/iso/doc/FAQ/html/ch-pkgtools.en.html b/templates/iso/doc/FAQ/html/ch-pkgtools.en.html new file mode 100644 index 000000000..114bb9fe2 --- /dev/null +++ b/templates/iso/doc/FAQ/html/ch-pkgtools.en.html @@ -0,0 +1,936 @@ + + + + + + + + +The Debian GNU/Linux FAQ - The Debian package management tools + + + + + +

+ +

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+ +

+The Debian GNU/Linux FAQ +
Chapter 7 - The Debian package management tools +

+ +

7.1 What programs does Debian provide for managing its packages?

+ +

+There are multiple tools that are used to manage Debian packages, from graphic +or text-based interfaces to the low level tools used to install packages. All +the available tools rely on the lower level tools to properly work and are +presented here in decreasing complexity level. +

+ +

+It is important to understand that the higher level package management tools +such as aptitude or dselect rely on apt +which, itself, relies on dpkg to manage the packages in the +system. +

+ +

+See the APT +HOWTO for more information about the Debian package management +utilities. This document is available in various languages and formats, see +the APT HOWTO +entry on the DDP Users' Manuals overview. +

+ +

7.1.1 dpkg

+ +

+This is the main package management program. dpkg can be invoked +with many options. Some common uses are: +

+
+Find out all the options: dpkg --help. +
+

+
+Print out the control file (and other information) for a specified package: +dpkg --info foo_VVV-RRR.deb +
+

+
+Install a package (including unpacking and configuring) onto the file system of +the hard disk: dpkg --install foo_VVV-RRR.deb. +
+

+
+Unpack (but do not configure) a Debian archive into the file system of the hard +disk: dpkg --unpack foo_VVV-RRR.deb. Note that this operation +does not necessarily leave the package in a usable state; some files +may need further customization to run properly. This command removes any +already-installed version of the program and runs the preinst (see What is a Debian preinst, postinst, +prerm, and postrm script?, Section 6.6) script associated with the package. +
+

+
+Configure a package that already has been unpacked: dpkg --configure +foo. Among other things, this action runs the postinst (see What is a Debian preinst, postinst, +prerm, and postrm script?, Section 6.6) script associated with the package. +It also updates the files listed in the conffiles for this +package. Notice that the 'configure' operation takes as its argument a package +name (e.g., foo), not the name of a Debian archive file (e.g., +foo_VVV-RRR.deb). +
+

+
+Extract a single file named "blurf" (or a group of files named +"blurf*" from a Debian archive: dpkg --fsys-tarfile +foo_VVV-RRR.deb | tar -xf - blurf* +
+

+
+Remove a package (but not its configuration files): dpkg --remove +foo. +
+

+
+Remove a package (including its configuration files): dpkg --purge +foo. +
+

+
+List the installation status of packages containing the string (or regular +expression) "foo*": dpkg --list 'foo*'. +
+

+ +

7.1.2 APT

+ +

+APT is the Advanced Package Tool and provides the apt-get +program. apt-get provides a simple way to retrieve and install +packages from multiple sources using the command line. Unlike +dpkg, apt-get does not understand .deb files, it +works with the packages proper name and can only install .deb archives from a +source specified in /etc/apt/sources.list. apt-get +will call dpkg directly after downloading the .deb archives[4] from the configured sources. +

+ +

+Some common ways to use apt-get are: +

+
+To update the list of package known by your system, you can run: +
+ +
```
+     apt-get update
+
```
+ +
+(you should execute this regularly to update your package lists) +
+

+
+To upgrade all the packages on your system, run: +
+ +
```
+     apt-get upgrade
+
```
+

+
+To install the foo package and all its dependencies, run: +
+ +
```
+     apt-get install foo
+
```
+

+
+To remove the foo package from your system, run: +
+ +
```
+     apt-get remove foo
+
```
+

+
+To remove the foo package and its configuration files from your system, run: +
+ +
```
+     apt-get --purge remove foo
+
```
+

+
+To upgrade all the packages on your system to a new Debian GNU/Linux release, +run: +
+ +
```
+     apt-get dist-upgrade
+
```
+

+ +

+Note that you must be logged in as root to perform any commands that modify the +system packages. +

+ +

+The apt tool suite also includes the apt-cache tool to query the +package lists. You can use it to find packages providing specific +functionality through simple text or regular expression queries and through +queries of dependencies in the package management system. Some common ways to +use apt-cache are: +

+
+To find packages whose description contain word: +
+ +
```
+     apt-cache search word
+
```
+

+
+To print the detailed information of a package: +
+ +
```
+     apt-cache show package
+
```
+

+
+To print the packages a given package depends on: +
+ +
```
+     apt-cache depends package
+
```
+

+
+To print detailed information of the versions available for a package and the +packages that reverse-depends on it: +
+ +
```
+     apt-cache showpkg package
+
```
+

+ +

+For more information, install the apt package and read +apt-get(8), sources.list(5) and install the +apt-doc package and read +/usr/share/doc/apt-doc/guide.html/index.html. +

+ +

7.1.3 aptitude

+ +

+aptitude is a package manager for Debian GNU/Linux systems that +provides a frontend to the apt package management infrastructure. +aptitude is a text-based interface using the curses library, it +can be used to perform management tasks in a fast and easy way. +

+ +

+aptitude provides the functionality of dselect and +apt-get, as well as many additional features not found in either +program: +

+
+aptitude offers access to all versions of a package. +
+

+
+aptitude logs all its actions in /var/log/aptitude. +
+

+
+aptitude makes it easy to keep track of obsolete software by +listing it under "Obsolete and Locally Created Packages". +
+

+
+aptitude includes a fairly powerful system for searching +particular packages and limiting the package display. Users familiar with +mutt will pick up quickly, as mutt was the +inspiration for the expression syntax. +
+

+
+aptitude tracks which packages have been installed due to +dependencies and removes them automatically when the packages that needed them +are removed from the system. +
+

+
+aptitude can automatically install Recommended: +packages[5]. +
+

+
+aptitude in full screen mode has su functionality +embedded and can be run by a normal user. It will call su (and +ask for the root password, if any) when you really need administrative +privileges +
+

+ +

+You can use aptitude through a visual interface (simply run +aptitude) or directly from the command line. The command line +syntax used is very similar to the one used in apt-get. For +example, to install the foo package, you can run aptitude +install foo. +

+ +

+Note that aptitude is the recommended program by Debian to install +a package and/or to upgrade your system. +

+ +

+For more informations, read the manual page aptitude(8) and +install the aptitude-doc-en package. +

+ +

7.1.4 dselect

+ +

+This program is a menu-driven interface to the Debian package management +system. It is particularly useful for first-time installations. Some users +might feel more comfortable using aptitude which is also +recommended over dselect for large-scale upgrades. For more +information on aptitude please see aptitude, +Section 7.1.3. +

+ +

+dselect can: +

+
+guide the user as he/she chooses among packages to install or remove, ensuring +that no packages are installed that conflict with one another, and that all +packages required to make each package work properly are installed; +
+

+
+warn the user about inconsistencies or incompatibilities in their selections; +
+

+
+determine the order in which the packages must be installed; +
+

+
+automatically perform the installation or removal; and +
+

+
+guide the user through whatever configuration process are required for each +package. +
+

+ +

+dselect begins by presenting the user with a menu of 7 items, each +of which is a specific action. The user can select one of the actions by using +the arrow keys to move the highlighter bar, then pressing the +<enter> key to select the highlighted action. +

+ +

+What the user sees next depends on the action he selected. If he selects any +option but Access or Select, then +dselect will simply proceed to execute the specified action: e.g., +if the user selected the action Remove, then dselect would proceed +to remove all of the files selected for removal when the user last chose the +Select action. +

+ +

+Both the Access menu item and the Select menu item +lead to additional menus. In both cases, the menus are presented as split +screens; the top screen gives a scrollable list of choices, while the bottom +screen gives a brief explanation ("info") for each choice. +

+ +

+Extensive on-line help is available, use the '?' key to get to a help screen +at any time. +

+ +

+The order in which the actions are presented in the first dselect +menu represents the order in which a user would normally choose +dselect to install packages. However, a user can pick any of the +main menu choices as often as needed (including not at all, depending on what +one wants to do). +

+
+Begin by choosing an Access Method. This is the method by +which the user plans on accessing Debian packages; e.g., some users have Debian +packages available on CD-ROM, while others plan to fetch them using anonymous +FTP. The selected "Access Method" is stored after +dselect exits, so if it does not change, then this option need not +be invoked again. +
+

+
+Then Update the list of available packages. To do this, +dselect reads the file "Packages.gz" which should be +included in the top level of the directory where the Debian packages to be +installed are stored. (But if it is not there, dselect will offer +to make it for you.) +
+

+
+Select specific packages for installation on his system. +After choosing this menu item, the user is first presented with a full screen +of help (unless the `--expert' command line option was used). Once the user +exits the Help screen, he sees the split-screen menu for choosing packages to +install (or remove). +
+ +
+The top part of the screen is a relatively narrow window into the list of +Debian's 15400 packages; the bottom part of the screen contains description of +the package or group of packages which are highlighted above. +
+ +
+One can specify which packages should be operated on by highlighting a package +name or the label for a group of packages. After that, you can select +packages: +
+
+
to be installed:
+
+
+This is accomplished by pressing the `+' key. +
+
+
+
+
to be deleted:
+
+
+Packages can be deleted two ways: +
+
- +
  +removed: this removes most of the files associated with the package, but +preserves the files listed as configuration files (see What is a Debian conffile?, Section +6.5) and package configuration information. This is done by pressing the +`-' key. +
  +
+
- +
  +purged: this removes every file that is part of the package. This is +done by pressing the `_' key. +
  +
+ +
+Note that it's not possible to remove "All Packages". If you try +that, your system will instead be reduced to the initial installed base +packages. +
+
+
+
+
to be put "on hold"
+
+
+This is done by pressing `=', and it effectively tells dselect not +to upgrade a package even if the version currently installed on your system is +not as recent as the version that is available in the Debian repository you are +using (this was specified when you set the Access Method, and +acquired when you used Update). +
+ +
+Just like you can put a package on hold, you can reverse such setting by +pressing `:'. That tells dselect that the package(s) may be +upgraded if a newer version is available. This is the default setting. +
+
+
+ +
+You can select a different order in which the packages are presented, by using +the `o' key to cycle between various options for sorting the packages. The +default order is to present packages by Priority; within each priority, +packages are presented in order of the directory (a.k.a. section) of the +archive in which they are stored. Given this sort order, some packages in +section A (say) may be presented first, followed by some packages in section B, +followed by more packages (of lower priority) in section A. +
+ +
+You can also expand meanings of the labels at the top of the screen, by using +the `v' (verbose) key. This action pushes much of the text that formerly fit +onto the display off to the right. To see it, press the right arrow; to scroll +back to the left, press the left arrow. +
+ +
+If you select a package for installation or removal, e.g., +foo.deb, and that package depends on (or recommends) another +package, e.g., blurf.deb, then dselect will place the +you in a sub-screen of the main selection screen. There you can choose among +the related packages, accepting the suggested actions (to install or not), or +rejecting them. To do the latter, press Shift-D; to return to the former, +press Shift-U. In any case, you can save your selections and return to the +main selection screen by pressing Shift-Q. +
+

+
+Users returning to the main menu can then select the "Install" menu +item to unpack and configure the selected packages. Alternatively, users +wishing to remove files can choose the "Remove" menu item. At any +point, users can choose "Quit" to exit dselect; users' selections are +preserved by dselect. +
+

+ +

7.1.5 Other package management tools

+ +

7.1.5.1 dpkg-deb

+ +

+This program manipulates Debian archive(.deb) files. Some common +uses are: +

+
+Find out all the options: dpkg-deb --help. +
+

+
+Determine what files are contained in a Debian archive file: dpkg-deb +--contents foo_VVV-RRR.deb) +
+

+
+Extract the files contained in a named Debian archive into a user specified +directory: dpkg-deb --extract foo_VVV-RRR.deb tmp extracts each of +the files in foo_VVV-RRR.deb into the directory tmp/. +This is convenient for examining the contents of a package in a localized +directory, without installing the package into the root file system. +
+

+ +

+Note that any packages that were merely unpacked using dpkg-deb +--extract will be incorrectly installed, you should use dpkg +--install instead. +

+ +

+More information is given in the manual page dpkg-deb(1). +

+ +

7.1.5.2 dpkg-split

+ +

+This program splits large package into smaller files (e.g., for writing onto a +set of floppy disks), and can also be used to merge a set of split files back +into a single file. It can only be used on a Debian system (i.e. a system +containing the dpkg package), since it calls the program +dpkg-deb to parse the debian package file into its component +records. +

+ +

+For example, to split a big .deb file into N parts, +

+
+Execute the command dpkg-split --split foo.deb. This will produce +N files each of approximately 460 KBytes long in the current directory. +
+

+
+Copy those N files to floppy disks. +
+

+
+Copy the contents of the floppy disks onto the hard disk of your choice on the +other machine. +
+

+
+Join those part-files together using dpkg-split --join +"foo*". +
+

+ +

7.2 Debian claims to be able to update a running program; how is this accomplished?

+ +

+The kernel (file system) in Debian GNU/Linux systems supports replacing files +even while they're being used. +

+ +

+We also provide a program called start-stop-daemon which is used +to start daemons at boot time or to stop daemons when the kernel runlevel is +changed (e.g., from multi-user to single-user or to halt). The same program is +used by installation scripts when a new package containing a daemon is +installed, to stop running daemons, and restart them as necessary. +

+ +

7.3 How can I tell what packages are already installed on a Debian system?

+ +

+To learn the status of all the packages installed on a Debian system, execute +the command +

+ +

+     dpkg --list
+

+ +

+This prints out a one-line summary for each package, giving a 2-letter status +symbol (explained in the header), the package name, the version which is +installed, and a brief description. +

+ +

+To learn the status of packages whose names match the string any pattern +beginning with "foo" by executing the command: +

+ +

+     dpkg --list 'foo*'
+

+ +

+To get a more verbose report for a particular package, execute the command: +

+ +

+     dpkg --status packagename
+

+ +

7.4 How can I find out what package produced a particular file?

+ +

+To identify the package that produced the file named foo execute +either: +

+
+dpkg --search filename +
+ +
+This searches for filename in installed packages. (This is +(currently) equivalent to searching all of the files having the file extension +of .list in the directory /var/lib/dpkg/info/, and +adjusting the output to print the names of all the packages containing it, and +diversions.) +
+ +
+A faster alternative to this is the dlocate tool. +
+

+
+zgrep foo Contents-ARCH.gz +
+ +
+This searches for files which contain the substring foo in their +full path names. The files Contents-ARCH.gz (where ARCH +represents the wanted architecture) reside in the major package directories +(main, non-free, contrib) at a Debian FTP site (i.e. under +/debian/dists/sarge). A Contents file refers only to +the packages in the subdirectory tree where it resides. Therefore, a user +might have to search more than one Contents files to find the +package containing the file foo. +
+ +
+This method has the advantage over dpkg --search in that it will +find files in packages that are not currently installed on your system. +
+

+
+apt-file search foo +
+ +
+Similar to the above, it searches files which contain the substring or regular +expression foo in their full path names. The advantage over the +sample above is that there is no need to retrieve the +Contents-ARCH.gz files as it will do this automatically for all +the sources defined in /etc/apt/sources.list when you run (as +root) apt-file update. +
+

+ +

7.5 Why doesn't get `foo-data' removed when I uninstall `foo'? How do I make sure old unused library-packages get purged?

+ +

+Some packages that are split in program (`foo') and data (`foo-data'). This is +true for many games, multimedia applications and dictionaries in Debian and has +been introduced since some users might want to access the raw data without +installing the program or because the program can be run without the data +itself, making it optional. +

+ +

+Similar situations occur when dealing with libraries: generally these get +installed since packages containing applications depend on them. When the +application-package is purged, the library-package might stay on the system. +Or: when the application-package no longer depends upon e.g. libdb4.2, but +upon libdb4.3, the libdb4.2 package might stay when the application-package is +upgraded. +

+ +

+In these cases, `foo-data' doesn't depend on `foo', so when you remove the +`foo' package it will not get automatically removed by most package management +tools. The same holds true for the library packages. This is necessary to +avoid circular dependencies. If you use aptitude (see aptitude, Section 7.1.3) as your package management tool +it will, however, track automatically installed packages and remove them when +no packages remain that need them in your system. +

+ +