Now I don't understand Synaptic

Now I don't understand Synaptic (Solved)

On 20th July 2010 a.d. there was a security update 'libfreetype6' which for some reason I could not get, not even by manually updating.
I switched to 'Main Server' and today got a whole raft of updates incl. the above plus grub etc.
Now I see that all these updated packages are shown under 'Installed(local or obsolete)' whereas in the past only stuff not present in the official Ubuntu repos. were shown there.
Does this mean I will in future not receive updates to those packages installed using the Main Server, or will Synaptic also check for updates to the packages shown under 'Installed(localor obsolete)' if they are from official Ubuntu repos. ?

Edit: I see the packages are also shown under the 'Installed' section. Edit: An update using local server again solved the mystery - now only stuff I installed outside the
official repos. is shown under 'Installed(local or obsolete)' as it should be.

 

Re: Now I don't understand Synaptic (Solved)

Hi Ocky,

You do know, that everything that is labeled a security update is not necessarily in any software that you really use or need - don't you? I like the KDE way of listing Security Updates from within KPackageKit which in the Ubuntu/Gnome environment has no parallel in Synaptic Package Manager. I posted a thread about this at Ubuntu Forums and only one other person similarly noticed this incompatibility between KPackageKit and Synaptic Package Manager.

I just keep an RSS feed for Ubuntu Security Notices and decide if I need it or not. For example, regarding the latest update to Firefox for security updates I did need to update xulrunner. Quick and simple.

I use the US Server for my repositories. When you bring up Synaptic, you should always do a Reload, and that should then have the latest information as updates are made on a daily basis.

Also, you can check out the contents of /var/lib/dpkg/info with the command:
$ ls -1t *.list > ~ubuntu/Desktop/pkgs-installed.list
for a new point of reference after you install packages when using Synaptic (it is the best way to resolve dependencies).

-- Tom

 

Tom,
Yes I do realise that, but always download all of them rather than checking them all to see whether the applications I have installed need them. In any case I would not be keen to take any risks in that regard.
There are over 7700 files in /var/lib/dpkg/info - whew ! first time I looked there.

Thanks.

PS. I think the command you show should read ls -lt (not 1t).. I am however not sure how it is supposed to be of use to me i.e. I don't really know
what you mean re. 'new point of reference ...'

Similar commands:-

ls -tl /var/lib/dpkg/info/ | less
find out when a package was installed (by install date)
ls -tl /var/lib/dpkg/info/ | grep list > installed-packages.txt
ls -tl /var/lib/dpkg/info/ | head -10 (last 10 packages installed

 

Hi Ocky,

No, the command was correct using the '1' character to only list installed package files on single lines. A new point of reference is something like a new version of a file given that between events you may have installed other packages and need to know the latest accounting of them.

The point of using the '1' character and the *.list was to ignore all other files than the .list files which tell you what files are included in the package! The output file aka new point of reference, is a quick look at how many packages are installed (as far as the system knows). Since I tarball packages without also updating the directory /var/lib/dpkg/info, my system looks like the initial Live CD (which is a deception).

Also, the point of using the command: ls -1t *.list tells you the order the packages were installed into the Live CD release. Usually, casper is the latest one installed at the top of the list.

Another important directory you might like to get familiar with is /var/cache/apt/archives which should contain all of the packages that are installed with the dpkg -i <pkgname> command.

-- Tom

 

Many thanks for the explanation !

(xulrunner-1.9.2.list
firefox.list
firefox-branding.list
firefox-gnome-support.list)
etc. ...