YSK/PSA: If you’re on Mint, Mint’s apt is not Debian’s apt and while they work similarly for common use cases, they diverge pretty quickly beyond that. Both are installed by default but Mint’s takes precedence.*
Case in point: I was looking for which package - specifically one that was not yet installed - contains a certain command line tool and Mint’s apt search does not find it. Debian’s does. **
On the other hand, Mint’s apt has way more subcommands than the default one, which have been useful on occasion.
* Mint’s is at /usr/local/bin/apt and Debian’s is at /usr/bin/apt; The default user $PATH puts /usr/local/bin before /usr/bin.
** FWIW, the tool is/was sponge and it’s in the moreutils package.
Disclaimer: while aptitude was originally designed to replicate the apt CLI interface, I have never run the search command through it. The TUI is marvelous, though.
Nowadays apt supports deleting dangling config files with apt purge "~c" so no need to have aptitude for that feature. However, aptitude why <package> is pretty handy, and if you bump into dependency problems aptitude is quite capable of suggesting valid solutions.
I wonder why apt search on ubuntu and debian must be so bad: on mint each package has a single line and an easy letter telling you if the program is installed or not. On debian/ubuntu each program takes multiple lines, are all green and the only way to distinguish installed ones is to look for an (installed) string at the end of the first line. I like Mint’s apt version so much
YSK/PSA: If you’re on Mint, Mint’s
aptis not Debian’saptand while they work similarly for common use cases, they diverge pretty quickly beyond that. Both are installed by default but Mint’s takes precedence.*Case in point: I was looking for which package - specifically one that was not yet installed - contains a certain command line tool and Mint’s
apt searchdoes not find it. Debian’s does. **On the other hand, Mint’s
apthas way more subcommands than the default one, which have been useful on occasion.* Mint’s is at
/usr/local/bin/aptand Debian’s is at/usr/bin/apt; The default user$PATHputs/usr/local/binbefore/usr/bin.** FWIW, the tool is/was
spongeand it’s in themoreutilspackage.Just use aptitude and be happy.
Disclaimer: while aptitude was originally designed to replicate the apt CLI interface, I have never run the search command through it. The TUI is marvelous, though.
Nowadays apt supports deleting dangling config files with
apt purge "~c"so no need to have aptitude for that feature. However,aptitude why <package>is pretty handy, and if you bump into dependency problems aptitude is quite capable of suggesting valid solutions.Disclaimer: I’ve never used aptitude’s TUI.
I wonder why apt search on ubuntu and debian must be so bad: on mint each package has a single line and an easy letter telling you if the program is installed or not. On debian/ubuntu each program takes multiple lines, are all green and the only way to distinguish installed ones is to look for an (installed) string at the end of the first line. I like Mint’s apt version so much
I wonder how this is implemented in LMDE?
LMDE’s system is the same as regular Mint. I’ve been on LMDE for a few years but was on regular before that.