Re: aptitude and source packages

[Hendrik Boom <hendrik@pooq.com>]

On Tue, Mar 22, 2005 at 01:11:40AM +0200, Hugo van der Merwe wrote:
> Aptitude uses the same package tracking as apt-get, there is only a
> little extra status with things like "automatic" markings. You can
> therefore practically always alternate apt-get and aptitude, except for
> losing the "automatic" markings, which I like very much. aptitude update
> does what is necessary (you don't need an apt-get update as well).
> However:
> 
> Source packages are not like binary packages, they are not even kept
> track of. You don't have to be root, even, to download one. (If you
> compile a source package to a binary one then install it, of course then
> it will be kept track of.) kernel-source is different, it is actually a
> "binary package" containing the source, I reckon because so many people
> need kernel sources.
> 
> So,
> 
> apt-get build-dep gnucash
> apt-get source gnucash
> 
> > > I'm not positive but I think all src code is unavailable in unstable version 
> > > of debian till it becomes 'stable'..  Seems like they could do that because 
> > > it is changing so often during the testing phase..  
> > > 
> > 
> > I'm using testing.  And wouldn't the binaries change at least as often as the
> > source?  They might have to change when their own source changes,  and might
> > they also be affected when other software they depend on changes?
> 
> The source packages are definately available in unstable. It is however
> possible that some "local mirrors" do not mirror all the source, I
> suppose.
> 
> Binaries can even change "more often" than the source, when only the
> debian-modifications change. (Source packages consist of three files,
> the "upstream" tarball, the debian diffs, and a ".dsc" file describing
> these two and their checksums.)
> 
> Hope this helped,
> Hugo van der Merwe

Thanks. This appears to be the definitive answer.
Aptitude's documentation should probably say that
aptitude doesn't do source.

-- hendrik.