Re: What else must I do to avoid installing "suggests"? Was: How to get a "minimal font set"?

[Bob Bernstein <poobah@ruptured-duck.com>]

On Fri, 4 Mar 2016, Joel Roth wrote:

> cat /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/40nosuggestrecommends
> Apt::Install-Suggests false;
> Apt::Install-Recommends false;

Nice. Done. Thanks.

I had reason a couple of nights ago to consult 'man apt-get' 
because it seemed that lots of "suggested" pkgs were being 
installed. The two relevant options I found on the man page:

--no-install-recommends
and
--install-suggests

lead me to believe that the desired default behavior is to go 
ahead and install 'recommends' but not 'suggests'.

When as an experiment I added "--no-install-suggests" (not in 
the man page afaik) to an apt-get commandline, I was surprised 
that no error message leaped up i.e. I did not see "no such 
option."

I'm sorry I don't have better empirical data to offer as to what 
packages were involved, and how many, but my vote for the 
question "Has weirdness crept into apt-get? is "Yes."


All best,

--
I am animated by distrust of all high guesses, and by sympathy
with the old prejudices and workaday opinions of mankind: they
are ill expressed, but they are well grounded.

                                  George Santayana