How to list/find installed packages that are not available from any of the configured APT repositories
Tue, 2011.02.15 - 13:17 — müzso
During upgrades between releases of a Debian (or Ubuntu) system you can end up with a lot of trash ... packages left over from earlier releases. Using the following command you can find packages that are not available from any of the APT repositories you've configured in
These packages might have been manually installed or are remnants of a previous OS release. You should review the list and decide for yourself whether to keep them or purge them.
This command does not show packages for which the current version was manually installed from a DEB, but the package is available from a repository too.
For a more thorough list (packages for which the currently installed version is not from a repository ... including packages for which an update is available from the respective repository), try this:
(Don't forget to upgrade all packages to the current latest version or they'll be listed too.)
I've tested the above commands in Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick), but I see no reason why it should not work on other Ubuntu or Debian systems as well.
Update: as a matter of fact, the
PS: the idea for looking in
/etc/apt/sources.list (or /etc/apt/sources.list.d/*):apt-cache policy '.*' | awk '/^[a-zA-Z0-9]+/ { if (m == 1 && vt == 3) print str; str = $0; m = 0; vt = 0; next } /^ *Version table:/ { vt = 1; next } { if (vt > 0) vt++; str = str "\n" $0; if (match($0, "^[ \t]*\\*\\*\\*")) { getline; vt++; str = str "\n" $0; if (index($0, "/var/lib/dpkg/status")) m = 1 } } END { if (m == 1 && vt == 2) print str }'These packages might have been manually installed or are remnants of a previous OS release. You should review the list and decide for yourself whether to keep them or purge them.
This command does not show packages for which the current version was manually installed from a DEB, but the package is available from a repository too.
For a more thorough list (packages for which the currently installed version is not from a repository ... including packages for which an update is available from the respective repository), try this:
apt-cache policy '.*' | awk '/^[a-z0-9]/{pkg = substr($1, 1, length($1) - 1)}/ *\*\*\*/ {getline; if (index($0, "/var/lib/dpkg/status")) print pkg}' | sortI've tested the above commands in Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick), but I see no reason why it should not work on other Ubuntu or Debian systems as well.
Update: as a matter of fact, the
apt-cache policy '.*' command does not work (yet) in Debian Lenny. It accepts only package names and not regular expressions (as the more recent apt-cache in Ubuntu). You can use the following workaround:apt-cache pkgnames | sort | xargs apt-cache policy | awk '/^[a-z0-9]/{pkg = substr($1, 1, length($1) - 1)}/ *\*\*\*/ {getline; if (index($0, "/var/lib/dpkg/status")) print pkg}'PS: the idea for looking in
/var/lib/apt/lists came from this post.
All of my own contents here (if not noted otherwise) are licensed under the
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License. My posts reflect my personal opinion and shall not be associated with any of my employers.
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License. My posts reflect my personal opinion and shall not be associated with any of my employers.
Comments
alternative methods
More answers on http://askubuntu.com/questions/98223/how-do-i-get-a-list-of-obsolete-packages
Re: alternative methods
I got used to the
apt-*commands and didn't even think of looking into aptitude. It's a pity that it's not fully documented in the manpage (there's a separate package containing the full docs, but manpages are more accessible ... or one can just look it up in Google