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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?


7.1.1 dpkg

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


7.1.2 dselect

This program is a menu-driven interface to the Debian package management system. It is particularly useful for first-time installations and large-scale upgrades.

dselect can:

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).


7.1.3 dpkg-deb

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

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).


7.1.4 apt-get

apt-get provides a simple way to install packages from 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.

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


7.1.5 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,


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:


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The Debian GNU/Linux FAQ

version 3.0.2, 28 January 2003
Authors, Section 15.1