Package: aptitude Version: 0.6.3-3 Severity: important (I'm marking this as important because I think it might point to a deeper conceptual oversight in aptitude; downgrade if appropriate.)
This is using the debian package state as of today. I have squeeze, sid, and experimental in my sources.list, in that order. Consider: $ aptitude search 'aspell-am ~Rrecommends:~i' p aspell-am - Amharic dictionary for aspell ## So, aspell-am is recommended by an installed package. $ aptitude search '~i ~Drecommends:aspell-am' ## What? No installed packages recommend aspell-am? ## OK, because aspell-am provides aspell-dictionary, which is recommended by an ## installed package. $ aptitude search 'aspell-am ~Rrecommends:~i !~Dprovides:(~Rprovides:~i)' ## We can exclude packages that provide an already-satisfied virtual package. --- $ aptitude search 'xz-lzma ~Rrecommends:~i' p xz-lzma - XZ-format compression utilities - compatibility commands $ aptitude search '~i ~Drecommends:xz-lzma' $ aptitude search 'xz-lzma ~Rrecommends:~i !~Rprovides:(~Dprovides:~i)' p xz-lzma - XZ-format compression utilities - compatibility commands ## Argh it didn't work! ## Because xz-lzma provides lzma, which is a *real* package. $ aptitude search 'xz-lzma ~Rrecommends:~i !~Dprovides:~i' ## We can exclude packages that provide an already-installed real package. ---- In summary, these two commands are not duals: $ aptitude search '~i ~Drecommends:X' $ aptitude search 'X ~Rrecommends:~i' but instead you need to do $ aptitude search 'X ~Rrecommends:~i !~Dprovides:~i !~Dprovides:(~Rprovides:~i)' This is very confusing, tedious for admins to figure out, and inconsistent. It seems it'd be much simpler (at least for search) if aptitude treated virtual packages in the same way as real packages, and the "provides" dependency as other normal dependencies. Ximin -- Package-specific info: aptitude 0.6.3 compiled at Jul 10 2010 21:01:05 Compiler: g++ 4.4.4 Compiled against: apt version 4.8.0 NCurses version 5.7 libsigc++ version: 2.2.4.2 Ept support enabled. Gtk+ version 2.20.1 Gtk-- version 2.20.3 Current library versions: NCurses version: ncurses 5.7.20100313 cwidget version: 0.5.16 Apt version: 4.8.0 linux-vdso.so.1 => (0x00007fffb4a8c000) libapt-pkg-libc6.9-6.so.4.8 => /usr/lib/libapt-pkg-libc6.9-6.so.4.8 (0x00007f5672e8e000) libncursesw.so.5 => /lib/libncursesw.so.5 (0x00007f5672c3b000) libsigc-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libsigc-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f5672a35000) libcwidget.so.3 => /usr/lib/libcwidget.so.3 (0x00007f5672769000) libept.so.1 => /usr/lib/libept.so.1 (0x00007f5672517000) libxapian.so.15 => /usr/lib/libxapian.so.15 (0x00007f56721c2000) libz.so.1 => /usr/lib/libz.so.1 (0x00007f5671fab000) libsqlite3.so.0 => /usr/lib/libsqlite3.so.0 (0x00007f5671d15000) libboost_iostreams.so.1.42.0 => /usr/lib/libboost_iostreams.so.1.42.0 (0x00007f5671af9000) libglibmm-2.4.so.1 => /usr/lib/libglibmm-2.4.so.1 (0x00007f567189e000) libgobject-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f5671657000) libgthread-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgthread-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f5671452000) librt.so.1 => /lib/librt.so.1 (0x00007f567124a000) libglib-2.0.so.0 => /lib/libglib-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f5670f6e000) libgtkmm-2.4.so.1 => /usr/lib/libgtkmm-2.4.so.1 (0x00007f56708fa000) libatkmm-1.6.so.1 => /usr/lib/libatkmm-1.6.so.1 (0x00007f56706ad000) libgdkmm-2.4.so.1 => /usr/lib/libgdkmm-2.4.so.1 (0x00007f5670460000) libgiomm-2.4.so.1 => /usr/lib/libgiomm-2.4.so.1 (0x00007f56701ab000) libpangomm-1.4.so.1 => /usr/lib/libpangomm-1.4.so.1 (0x00007f566ff7c000) libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f566f95c000) libcairomm-1.0.so.1 => /usr/lib/libcairomm-1.0.so.1 (0x00007f566f73a000) libgdk-x11-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgdk-x11-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f566f48d000) libatk-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libatk-1.0.so.0 (0x00007f566f26c000) libpangoft2-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpangoft2-1.0.so.0 (0x00007f566f041000) libgdk_pixbuf-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgdk_pixbuf-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f566ee25000) libpangocairo-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpangocairo-1.0.so.0 (0x00007f566ec19000) libcairo.so.2 => /usr/lib/libcairo.so.2 (0x00007f566e99b000) libgio-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgio-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f566e6e9000) libpango-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpango-1.0.so.0 (0x00007f566e49d000) libfreetype.so.6 => /usr/lib/libfreetype.so.6 (0x00007f566e214000) libfontconfig.so.1 => /usr/lib/libfontconfig.so.1 (0x00007f566dfdf000) libgmodule-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libgmodule-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f566dddc000) libglademm-2.4.so.1 => /usr/lib/libglademm-2.4.so.1 (0x00007f566dbd1000) libglade-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libglade-2.0.so.0 (0x00007f566d9b8000) libxml2.so.2 => /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2 (0x00007f566d668000) libm.so.6 => /lib/libm.so.6 (0x00007f566d3e5000) libvte.so.9 => /usr/lib/libvte.so.9 (0x00007f566d14a000) libX11.so.6 => /usr/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00007f566ce0e000) libpthread.so.0 => /lib/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007f566cbf1000) libstdc++.so.6 => /usr/lib/libstdc++.so.6 (0x00007f566c8dd000) libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00007f566c6c7000) libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00007f566c365000) libutil.so.1 => /lib/libutil.so.1 (0x00007f566c162000) libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00007f566bf5e000) libbz2.so.1.0 => /lib/libbz2.so.1.0 (0x00007f566bd4d000) libpcre.so.3 => /lib/libpcre.so.3 (0x00007f566bb1d000) /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00007f5673170000) libpng12.so.0 => /lib/libpng12.so.0 (0x00007f566b8f6000) libXcomposite.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXcomposite.so.1 (0x00007f566b6f3000) libXdamage.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXdamage.so.1 (0x00007f566b4f1000) libXfixes.so.3 => /usr/lib/libXfixes.so.3 (0x00007f566b2ec000) libXext.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXext.so.6 (0x00007f566b0d9000) libXrender.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXrender.so.1 (0x00007f566aecf000) libXinerama.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXinerama.so.1 (0x00007f566accd000) libXi.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXi.so.6 (0x00007f566aabd000) libXrandr.so.2 => /usr/lib/libXrandr.so.2 (0x00007f566a8b5000) libXcursor.so.1 => /usr/lib/libXcursor.so.1 (0x00007f566a6ab000) libpixman-1.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpixman-1.so.0 (0x00007f566a452000) libxcb-render-util.so.0 => /usr/lib/libxcb-render-util.so.0 (0x00007f566a24f000) libxcb-render.so.0 => /usr/lib/libxcb-render.so.0 (0x00007f566a046000) libxcb.so.1 => /usr/lib/libxcb.so.1 (0x00007f5669e2a000) libresolv.so.2 => /lib/libresolv.so.2 (0x00007f5669c14000) libselinux.so.1 => /lib/libselinux.so.1 (0x00007f56699f5000) libexpat.so.1 => /usr/lib/libexpat.so.1 (0x00007f56697cd000) libncurses.so.5 => /lib/libncurses.so.5 (0x00007f5669586000) libXau.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXau.so.6 (0x00007f5669382000) libXdmcp.so.6 => /usr/lib/libXdmcp.so.6 (0x00007f566917d000) Terminal: xterm $DISPLAY is set. `which aptitude`: /usr/bin/aptitude aptitude version information: aptitude linkage: -- System Information: Debian Release: squeeze/sid APT prefers testing APT policy: (990, 'testing'), (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'stable'), (1, 'experimental') Architecture: amd64 (x86_64) Kernel: Linux 2.6.32-5-amd64 (SMP w/2 CPU cores) Locale: LANG=en_GB.utf8, LC_CTYPE=en_GB.utf8 (charmap=UTF-8) Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash Versions of packages aptitude depends on: ii apt [libapt-pkg-libc6.9 0.7.25.3 Advanced front-end for dpkg ii libboost-iostreams1.42. 1.42.0-4 Boost.Iostreams Library ii libc6 2.11.2-2 Embedded GNU C Library: Shared lib ii libcwidget3 0.5.16-3 high-level terminal interface libr ii libept1 1.0.3 High-level library for managing De ii libgcc1 1:4.4.4-8 GCC support library ii libncursesw5 5.7+20100313-2 shared libraries for terminal hand ii libsigc++-2.0-0c2a 2.2.4.2-1 type-safe Signal Framework for C++ ii libsqlite3-0 3.7.0.1-1 SQLite 3 shared library ii libstdc++6 4.4.4-8 The GNU Standard C++ Library v3 ii libxapian15 1.0.20-2 Search engine library ii zlib1g 1:1.2.3.4.dfsg-3 compression library - runtime Versions of packages aptitude recommends: ii apt-xapian-index 0.38 maintenance tools for a Xapian ind ii aptitude-doc-en [aptitude-doc 0.6.3-3 English manual for aptitude, a ter ii libparse-debianchangelog-perl 1.1.1-2.1 parse Debian changelogs and output ii sensible-utils 0.0.4 Utilities for sensible alternative Versions of packages aptitude suggests: pn debtags <none> (no description available) pn tasksel <none> (no description available) -- no debconf information -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". 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