On Sat 08 Jun 2013 at 18:39:45 -0500, Stan Hoeppner wrote: > On 6/8/2013 4:43 AM, Brian wrote: > > > > apt/aptitude have their own idea of what packages are available and do > > not use what is in /var/lib/dpkg/available. So you should not have any > > problem with installing. > > Others mentioned this. If this is the case, why does "aptitude remove > --purge" throw an error trying to read /var/lib/dpkg/available. This > would suggest aptitude calls dpkg during package removal. Is this the case?
When apt and aptitude install they use dpkg -i package.deb and dpkg wants to open /var/lib/dpkg/available as it may need to write to it to update the list of packages it knows about. The file can be empty (making it useless to dselect and 'dpkg --print-avail') but is has to exist for a package to install. Removing a package involves dpkg -r package_name My understanding is that dpkg does not need to open the available file in this case, so I cannot understand why your aptitude command does not complete successfully. > > You could forget about /var/lib/dpkg/available and carry on as you > > usually do. Alternatively, if it bothers you, either install dselect > > and do > > > > dselect update > > > > or download a Packages.gz file and execute > > > > dpkg --update-avail Packages > > I strictly use "aptitude" for package management. But it appears > aptitude is not entirely standalone. Or, is aptitude simply attempting > to keep all of the package lists up to date across the other package > management tools? /var/lib/dpkg/available is mainly of use to dselect. apt and aptitude maintain their own separate, independent package lists in /var/lib. It was incorrect of me to say 'apt-get update' or 'aptitude update' would rebuild /var/lib/dpkg/available. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-user-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/20130609155733.GL26394@desktop
