Re: Querying packages

[Ron Johnson <ron.l.johnson@cox.net>]

On Wed, 2003-11-05 at 13:45, Paulo Jorge wrote:
> Greetings,
> 
> I'm trying to write a script that querys the local package database to
> find out which packages can be upgraded and the priority of the
> available update. Do you know how can I obtain this information from the
> database?

The package apt-show-versions rocks.

$ apt-cache show apt-show-versions
Package: apt-show-versions
Priority: optional
Section: admin
Installed-Size: 22
Maintainer: Christoph Martin <christoph.martin@uni-mainz.de>
Architecture: all
Version: 0.04
Depends: perl | perl-5.005 | perl-5.004, apt
Filename: pool/main/a/apt-show-versions/apt-show-versions_0.04_all.deb
Size: 10682
MD5sum: 3bdcad52f9796d57b03cd8674e00f575
Description: Lists available package versions with distribution
 apt-show-versions parses the dpkg status file and the APT lists for
 the installed and available package versions and distribution and
 shows upgrade options within the specific distribution of the selected
 package.
 .
 This is really useful if you have a mixed stable/testing environment
 and want to list all packages which are from testing and can be
 upgraded in testing.


-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Ron Johnson, Jr. ron.l.johnson@cox.net
Jefferson, LA USA

The difference between drunken sailors and Congressmen is that
drunken sailors spend their own money.