关于apt和aptitude

缘起

在看Debian新维护人员手册时，看到aptitude。aptitude也是一个包管理器，很奇怪，和apt-get到底是什么关系，就搜索了一下。

正文

Askubuntu上回到说：

Aptitude是用户级程序，而apt-get被高级用户程序所使用。Aptitude更加用户友好，在apt-get和apt-cache之间添加了抽象层。基于相同的原因，apt-get比dpkg更加友好。实际使用取决用户知识和什么工作的更好。Aptitude和apt-get使用相同的软件仓库。

一般而言:User <- aptitude <- apt-get / apt-cache <- dpkg .

apt-get和aptitude都是dpkg的前端，两者都很方便，aptitude更新并且更容易使用。Aptitude统一了apt-*的功能，aptitude即可以安装也可以查找，还有一个基于文字的图形界面。

 

Stackexchange的回答:

Apt-get和aptitude命令行接口相似，后者提供终端菜单接口（上图所示），一些小的区别：

• l aptitude will automatically remove eligible packages, whereas apt-get requires a separate command to do so
• l Aptitude将自动移除符合条件的软件包，而apt-get需要一个单独的名利来处理(autoremove)
• l The commands for upgrade vs. dist-upgrade have been renamed in aptitude to the probably more accurate names safe-upgrade and full-upgrade, respectively.
• l upgrade和dist-upgrade在aptitude中被重新命名为更为确切的 safe-upgrade和full-upgrade
• l aptitude actually performs the functions of not just apt-get, but also some of its companion tools, such as apt-cache and apt-mark.
• l Aptitude实际执行了不止apt-get的功能，也提供相应的对应的工具，例如apt-cache和apt-mark
• l aptitude has a slightly different query syntax for searching (compared to apt-cache)
• l 和apt-cache相比，aptitude的查询语法稍微有点不同
• l aptitude has the why and why-not commands to tell you which manually installed packages are preventing an action that you might want to take.
• l Aptitude拥有why和why-not命令来提示手动安装的包可能妨碍将要采取的行动
• l If the actions (installing, removing, updating packages) that you want to take cause conflicts, aptitude can suggest several potential resolutions. apt-get will just say "I'm sorry Dave, I can't allow you to do that."
• l 如果将要采取的行动（安装，移除和升级）将会导致冲突。Aptitude将提供一些潜在的解决方案。apt-get只是告述你“抱歉，你不能这么做！”

In short, aptitude more properly belongs in the category with Synaptic and other higher-level package manager frontends. It just happens to also have a command-line interface that resembles apt-get.

简而言之，apttiude更加接近Synaptic这样的高级软件包管理前端，只是碰巧他的命令行接口和apt-get类似。

什么是wajig, What is wajig?

Remember how I mentioned those "companion" tools like apt-cache and apt-mark? Well, there's a bunch of them, and if you use them a lot, you might not remember which ones provide which commands. wajig is one solution to that problem. It is essentially a dispatcher, a wrapper around all of those tools. It also applies sudo when necessary. When you say wajig install foo, wajig says "Ok, install is provided by apt-get and requires admin privileges," and it runs sudo apt-get install foo. When you say wajig search foo, wajig says "Ok, search is provided by apt-cache and does not require admin privileges," and it runs apt-cache search foo. If you use wajig instead of apt-get, apt-mark, apt-cache and others, then you'll never have this problem:

记得上面提到的伙伴工具（apt-cache和apt-mark）?很好，如果经常使用它们,你可能不记他们哪些提供命令。wajig是这一问题的解决方案。它本质上是一个调度器,包装所有这些工具。它也需要在必要时应用sudo。当你说wajig安装foo,wajig说“好的,安装由apt-get,需要提供管理员权限,“并且它运行sudo apt-get install foo。当你说wajig搜索foo,wajig说:“好吧,搜索是由apt-cache和不需要管理员权限,“接着它运行apt-cache search foo。如果使用wajig代替apt-get apt-cache以及apt-mark,那么你永远不会有这样的问题:

$ apt-get search foo
E: Invalid operation search

If you want to know what wajig is doing behind the scenes, which tools it is using to implement a particular command, it has --simulate and  modes.

如果你想知道wajig在幕后做什么,使用哪些工具来实现特定的命令,wajig提供两种模式：--simulate和--teaching。

Two wajig commands that I often use are wajig listfiles foo and wajig whichpkg /usr/bin/foo.

两个经常使用wajig命令：wajig listfiles foo和wajig which pkg /usr/bin/foo。

小结

aptitude的字符界面是通过ncurses库实现的，不过字符界面可能没有GUI的Synaptic好用，但是ncurses的程序小巧，启动快，占内存小。ncurses可以从http://invisible-island.net/ncurses/，在《Linux程序设计 第四版》中有介绍这个库的简单使用，不过除了在某些服务器程序的图形配置中看到种风格的程序，其他的很少见。此外，aptitude的字符界面意外的好用。