Re: dpkg - the letter prefixes.. what do they mean

[dman <dsh8290@rit.edu>]

On Fri, Mar 01, 2002 at 05:08:50PM -0800, Harry Putnam wrote:
| dman <dsh8290@rit.edu> writes:
| > On Fri, Mar 01, 2002 at 07:48:59AM -0800, Harry Putnam wrote:
[...]
| > | I saw that stuff and couldn't make heads or tails of it.
| > | My feeling is that it explains nothing and is downright confusing.
| >
| > It is confusing, until you actually stop and read it and follow the
| > ascii-art.  The ascii art is arrows pointing from the description line
| > to the column the description refers to.  The letters are just the
| > first letter of the word they represent.  It seems rather intuitive to
| > me (once I decided to actually read that output).
| 
| dman, must be gifted in some way I'm not.

Not likely.  Maybe I'm just too geeky :-).

| But... It is confusing before, during, and after reading it closely
| and several times.  In fact I dare say that even now that I know what
| it means I still see nothing in those lines to clue me in.
| 
| For example, can you show me what, in there tells, what `ii' means?
| Yes, it would be a good guess that it means installed, but then what
| does the second i mean?  Ditto with the others.

Ok, I'll work on my teaching skills a little more :-).

Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold
| Status=Not/Installed/Config-files/Unpacked/Failed-config/Half-installed
|/ Err?=(none)/Hold/Reinst-required/X=both-problems (Status,Err: uppercase=bad)
||/ Name           Version        Description
+++-==============-==============-============================================
ii  vim            6.0.226-1      Vi IMproved - enhanced vi editor


Here we have the output of dpkg -l.  Follow the first 'i' upwards and you see a little "arrow" pointing to the line
    Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold
This is the (very terse) description of what the letter means.  It
represents the state you desire the package to have.  The possible
values are "Unknown" , "Install" , "Remove" , "Purge" and "Hold".  The
abbreviation of each is 'u' , 'i' , 'r' , 'p' and 'h', respectively.
vim shows an "i" in that column, so that means I desire to have it
installed.

Now follow the second 'i' upwards to the line
    Status=Not/Installed/Config-files/Unpacked/Failed-config/Half-installed
The interpretation is the same.  This column refers to the current
status of the package.  The difference between the two columns is the
difference between where it's at and where I want it.  In this case,
vim has an 'i', so that stands for "installed".

The third column is empty.  That's good because if there were a
character there it would indicate some error.

So the result is that "ii " means I want the package installed, it is
installed, and there are no errors.

The note at the end of the "Err" line
    (Status,Err: uppercase=bad)
says that in the Status and Err columns, if the label is an uppercase
character, then the situation is really bad.  If the label is a
lowercase character, then the situation isn't so bad.

Does that work now?

| So let me have my little fun when I get lined out here and submit a
| patch that even dopes like me can follow.

Go ahead and patch the docs, if you like :-).

-D

-- 

But As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.
        Joshua 24:15