Re: What is the difference?

["Hans-J. Ullrich" <hans.ullrich@loop.de>]

Am Mittwoch, 9. März 2011 schrieb Camaleón:
> On Wed, 09 Mar 2011 19:59:30 +0100, Hans-J. Ullrich wrote:
> > I wondered what is the difference between
> > 
> > a) dpkg --get-selections "*" > mylist.txt and
> > b) dpkg --get-selections > mylist.txt
> > 
> > I get different results, but the asterix is a joker, and the results
> > should be the same. The manual did not mention the asterix, and I
> > suppose (as many sites told using the asterix), option a) is orphaned.
> > 
> > Am I correct?
> 
> sm01@stt008:~$ dpkg --get-selections "*" > mylist.txt
> sm01@stt008:~$ dpkg --get-selections > mylist2.txt
> sm01@stt008:~$ diff mylist.txt mylist2.txt
> 791d790
> < popularity-contest				purge
> 
> man dpkg:
> 
> --get-selections [package-name-pattern...]
> Get  list  of  package  selections, and write it to stdout. Without a
> pattern, packages marked with state purge will not be shown.
> 
> So, in b) as you did not provide a pattern (*) you don't get the "purged"
> ones :-?
> 
> Greetings,

Hmm, not quite. There are also packages in a), which are marked as installed, 
but which are NOT installed and NOT purged. So I guess, the asterix must have 
a special meaning.

Hans