On Tue, Mar 15, 2022 at 08:28:41AM -0700, Cousin Stanley wrote: > I was under the impression that > package information returned by .... > > apt-cache show some-package > > for packages that I have not installed > would not be downloaded onto my system > until I actually requested it.
You are mistaken. All of the information given by apt-cache is retrieved from the package metadata that is CACHED on your system already. That's the whole point of the command's name. The files it uses are in /var/lib/apt/lists/ if you want to look at them. On my system: unicorn:~$ grep -A 10 'Package: hugo' /var/lib/apt/lists/ftp.us.debian.org_debian_dists_bullseye_main_binary-amd64_Packages Package: hugo Source: hugo (0.80.0-6) Version: 0.80.0-6+b5 Installed-Size: 47774 Maintainer: Debian Go Packaging Team <team+pkg...@tracker.debian.org> Architecture: amd64 Depends: libsass1 (>= 3.6.3), libc6 (>= 2.4) Recommends: git Description: Fast and flexible Static Site Generator written in Go Homepage: https://gohugo.io/ Built-Using: go-md2man-v2 (= 2.0.0+ds-5), golang-1.15 (= 1.15.9-6), golang-blackfriday (= 1.6.0-1), [...] Yours may have a different filename, depending on which mirrors you use.