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APT-GET(8)                                       APT                                      APT-GET(8)



NAME
       apt-get - APT package handling utility -- command-line interface

SYNOPSIS
       apt-get [-asqdyfmubV] [-o=config_string] [-c=config_file] [-t=target_release]
               [-a=architecture] {update | upgrade | dselect-upgrade | dist-upgrade |
               install pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]...  | remove pkg...  |
               purge pkg...  | source pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]...  |
               build-dep pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]...  |
               download pkg [{=pkg_version_number | /target_release}]...  | check | clean |
               autoclean | autoremove | {-v | --version} | {-h | --help}}

DESCRIPTION
       apt-get is the command-line tool for handling packages, and may be considered the user's
       "back-end" to other tools using the APT library. Several "front-end" interfaces exist, such
       as aptitude(8), synaptic(8) and wajig(1).

       Unless the -h, or --help option is given, one of the commands below must be present.

       update
           update is used to resynchronize the package index files from their sources. The indexes
           of available packages are fetched from the location(s) specified in
           /etc/apt/sources.list. For example, when using a Debian archive, this command retrieves
           and scans the Packages.gz files, so that information about new and updated packages is
           available. An update should always be performed before an upgrade or dist-upgrade. Please
           be aware that the overall progress meter will be incorrect as the size of the package
           files cannot be known in advance.

       upgrade
           upgrade is used to install the newest versions of all packages currently installed on the
           system from the sources enumerated in /etc/apt/sources.list. Packages currently installed
           with new versions available are retrieved and upgraded; under no circumstances are
           currently installed packages removed, or packages not already installed retrieved and
           installed. New versions of currently installed packages that cannot be upgraded without
           changing the install status of another package will be left at their current version. An
           update must be performed first so that apt-get knows that new versions of packages are
           available.

       dist-upgrade
           dist-upgrade in addition to performing the function of upgrade, also intelligently
           handles changing dependencies with new versions of packages; apt-get has a "smart"
           conflict resolution system, and it will attempt to upgrade the most important packages at
           the expense of less important ones if necessary. The dist-upgrade command may therefore
           remove some packages. The /etc/apt/sources.list file contains a list of locations from
           which to retrieve desired package files. See also apt_preferences(5) for a mechanism for
           overriding the general settings for individual packages.

       dselect-upgrade
           dselect-upgrade is used in conjunction with the traditional Debian packaging front-end,
           dselect(1).  dselect-upgrade follows the changes made by dselect(1) to the Status field
           of available packages, and performs the actions necessary to realize that state (for
           instance, the removal of old and the installation of new packages).

       install
           install is followed by one or more packages desired for installation or upgrading. Each
           package is a package name, not a fully qualified filename (for instance, in a Debian
           system, apt-utils would be the argument provided, not apt-utils_2.4.14_amd64.deb). All
           packages required by the package(s) specified for installation will also be retrieved and
           installed. The /etc/apt/sources.list file is used to locate the desired packages. If a
           hyphen is appended to the package name (with no intervening space), the identified
           package will be removed if it is installed. Similarly a plus sign can be used to
           designate a package to install. These latter features may be used to override decisions
           made by apt-get's conflict resolution system.

           A specific version of a package can be selected for installation by following the package
           name with an equals and the version of the package to select. This will cause that
           version to be located and selected for install. Alternatively a specific distribution can
           be selected by following the package name with a slash and the version of the
           distribution or the Archive name (stable, testing, unstable).

           Both of the version selection mechanisms can downgrade packages and must be used with
           care.

           This is also the target to use if you want to upgrade one or more already-installed
           packages without upgrading every package you have on your system. Unlike the "upgrade"
           target, which installs the newest version of all currently installed packages, "install"
           will install the newest version of only the package(s) specified. Simply provide the name
           of the package(s) you wish to upgrade, and if a newer version is available, it (and its
           dependencies, as described above) will be downloaded and installed.

           Finally, the apt_preferences(5) mechanism allows you to create an alternative
           installation policy for individual packages.

           If no package matches the given expression and the expression contains one of '.', '?' or
           '*' then it is assumed to be a POSIX regular expression, and it is applied to all package
           names in the database. Any matches are then installed (or removed). Note that matching is
           done by substring so 'lo.*' matches 'how-lo' and 'lowest'. If this is undesired, anchor
           the regular expression with a '^' or '$' character, or create a more specific regular
           expression.

           Fallback to regular expressions is deprecated in APT 2.0, has been removed in apt(8),
           except for anchored expressions, and will be removed from apt-get(8) in a future version.
           Use apt-patterns(5) instead.

       reinstall
           reinstall is an alias for install --reinstall.

       remove
           remove is identical to install except that packages are removed instead of installed.
           Note that removing a package leaves its configuration files on the system. If a plus sign
           is appended to the package name (with no intervening space), the identified package will
           be installed instead of removed.

       purge
           purge is identical to remove except that packages are removed and purged (any
           configuration files are deleted too).

       source
           source causes apt-get to fetch source packages. APT will examine the available packages
           to decide which source package to fetch. It will then find and download into the current
           directory the newest available version of that source package while respecting the
           default release, set with the option APT::Default-Release, the -t option or per package
           with the pkg/release syntax, if possible.

           The arguments are interpreted as binary and source package names. See the --only-source
           option if you want to change that.

           Source packages are tracked separately from binary packages via deb-src lines in the
           sources.list(5) file. This means that you will need to add such a line for each
           repository you want to get sources from; otherwise you will probably get either the wrong
           (too old/too new) source versions or none at all.

           If the --compile option is specified then the package will be compiled to a binary .deb
           using dpkg-buildpackage for the architecture as defined by the --host-architecture
           option. If --download-only is specified then the source package will not be unpacked.

           A specific source version can be retrieved by postfixing the source name with an equals
           and then the version to fetch, similar to the mechanism used for the package files. This
           enables exact matching of the source package name and version, implicitly enabling the
           APT::Get::Only-Source option.

           Note that source packages are not installed and tracked in the dpkg database like binary
           packages; they are simply downloaded to the current directory, like source tarballs.

       build-dep
           build-dep causes apt-get to install/remove packages in an attempt to satisfy the build
           dependencies for a source package. By default the dependencies are satisfied to build the
           package natively. If desired a host-architecture can be specified with the
           --host-architecture option instead.

           The arguments are interpreted as binary or source package names. See the --only-source
           option if you want to change that.

       satisfy
           satisfy causes apt-get to satisfy the given dependency strings. The dependency strings
           may have build profiles and architecture restriction list as in build dependencies. They
           may optionally be prefixed with "Conflicts: " to unsatisfy the dependency string.
           Multiple strings of the same type can be specified.

           Example: apt-get satisfy "foo" "Conflicts: bar" "baz (>> 1.0) | bar (= 2.0), moo"

           The legacy operator '</>' is not supported, use '<=/>=' instead.

       check
           check is a diagnostic tool; it updates the package cache and checks for broken
           dependencies.

       download
           download will download the given binary package into the current directory.

       clean
           clean clears out the local repository of retrieved package files. It removes everything
           but the lock file from /var/cache/apt/archives/ and /var/cache/apt/archives/partial/.

       autoclean (and the auto-clean alias since 1.1)
           Like clean, autoclean clears out the local repository of retrieved package files. The
           difference is that it only removes package files that can no longer be downloaded, and
           are largely useless. This allows a cache to be maintained over a long period without it
           growing out of control. The configuration option APT::Clean-Installed will prevent
           installed packages from being erased if it is set to off.

       autoremove (and the auto-remove alias since 1.1)
           autoremove is used to remove packages that were automatically installed to satisfy
           dependencies for other packages and are now no longer needed.

       changelog
           changelog tries to download the changelog of a package and displays it through
           sensible-pager. By default it displays the changelog for the version that is installed.
           However, you can specify the same options as for the install command.

       indextargets
           Displays by default a deb822 formatted listing of information about all data files (aka
           index targets) apt-get update would download. Supports a --format option to modify the
           output format as well as accepts lines of the default output to filter the records by.
           The command is mainly used as an interface for external tools working with APT to get
           information as well as filenames for downloaded files so they can use them as well
           instead of downloading them again on their own. Detailed documentation is omitted here
           and can instead be found in the file /usr/share/doc/apt/acquire-additional-files.md.gz
           shipped by the apt-doc package.

OPTIONS
       All command line options may be set using the configuration file, the descriptions indicate
       the configuration option to set. For boolean options you can override the config file by
       using something like -f-,--no-f, -f=no or several other variations.

       --no-install-recommends
           Do not consider recommended packages as a dependency for installing. Configuration Item:
           APT::Install-Recommends.

       --install-suggests
           Consider suggested packages as a dependency for installing. Configuration Item:
           APT::Install-Suggests.

       -d, --download-only
           Download only; package files are only retrieved, not unpacked or installed. Configuration
           Item: APT::Get::Download-Only.

       -f, --fix-broken
           Fix; attempt to correct a system with broken dependencies in place. This option, when
           used with install/remove, can omit any packages to permit APT to deduce a likely
           solution. If packages are specified, these have to completely correct the problem. The
           option is sometimes necessary when running APT for the first time; APT itself does not
           allow broken package dependencies to exist on a system. It is possible that a system's
           dependency structure can be so corrupt as to require manual intervention (which usually
           means using dpkg --remove to eliminate some of the offending packages). Use of this
           option together with -m may produce an error in some situations. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Fix-Broken.

       -m, --ignore-missing, --fix-missing
           Ignore missing packages; if packages cannot be retrieved or fail the integrity check
           after retrieval (corrupted package files), hold back those packages and handle the
           result. Use of this option together with -f may produce an error in some situations. If a
           package is selected for installation (particularly if it is mentioned on the command
           line) and it could not be downloaded then it will be silently held back. Configuration
           Item: APT::Get::Fix-Missing.

       --no-download
           Disables downloading of packages. This is best used with --ignore-missing to force APT to
           use only the .debs it has already downloaded. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Download.

       -q, --quiet
           Quiet; produces output suitable for logging, omitting progress indicators. More q's will
           produce more quiet up to a maximum of 2. You can also use -q=# to set the quiet level,
           overriding the configuration file. Note that quiet level 2 implies -y; you should never
           use -qq without a no-action modifier such as -d, --print-uris or -s as APT may decide to
           do something you did not expect. Configuration Item: quiet.

       -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
           No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on the current system
           state but do not actually change the system. Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking)
           so the system state could change while apt-get is running. Simulations can also be
           executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all apt configuration
           distorting the simulation. A notice expressing this warning is also shown by default for
           non-root users (APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Simulate.

           Simulated runs print out a series of lines, each representing a dpkg operation: configure
           (Conf), remove (Remv) or unpack (Inst). Square brackets indicate broken packages, and
           empty square brackets indicate breaks that are of no consequence (rare).

       -y, --yes, --assume-yes
           Automatic yes to prompts; assume "yes" as answer to all prompts and run
           non-interactively. If an undesirable situation, such as changing a held package, trying
           to install an unauthenticated package or removing an essential package occurs then
           apt-get will abort. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Assume-Yes.

       --assume-no
           Automatic "no" to all prompts. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Assume-No.

       --no-show-upgraded
           Do not show a list of all packages that are to be upgraded. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Show-Upgraded.

       -V, --verbose-versions
           Show full versions for upgraded and installed packages. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Show-Versions.

       -a, --host-architecture
           This option controls the architecture packages are built for by apt-get source --compile
           and how cross-builddependencies are satisfied. By default is it not set which means that
           the host architecture is the same as the build architecture (which is defined by
           APT::Architecture). Configuration Item: APT::Get::Host-Architecture.

       -P, --build-profiles
           This option controls the activated build profiles for which a source package is built by
           apt-get source --compile and how build dependencies are satisfied. By default no build
           profile is active. More than one build profile can be activated at a time by
           concatenating them with a comma. Configuration Item: APT::Build-Profiles.

       -b, --compile, --build
           Compile source packages after downloading them. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Compile.

       --ignore-hold
           Ignore package holds; this causes apt-get to ignore a hold placed on a package. This may
           be useful in conjunction with dist-upgrade to override a large number of undesired holds.
           Configuration Item: APT::Ignore-Hold.

       --with-new-pkgs
           Allow installing new packages when used in conjunction with upgrade. This is useful if
           the update of an installed package requires new dependencies to be installed. Instead of
           holding the package back upgrade will upgrade the package and install the new
           dependencies. Note that upgrade with this option will never remove packages, only allow
           adding new ones. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Upgrade-Allow-New.

       --no-upgrade
           Do not upgrade packages; when used in conjunction with install, no-upgrade will prevent
           packages on the command line from being upgraded if they are already installed.
           Configuration Item: APT::Get::Upgrade.

       --only-upgrade
           Do not install new packages; when used in conjunction with install, only-upgrade will
           install upgrades for already installed packages only and ignore requests to install new
           packages. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Only-Upgrade.

       --allow-downgrades
           This is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting if it is
           doing downgrades. It should not be used except in very special situations. Using it can
           potentially destroy your system! Configuration Item: APT::Get::allow-downgrades.
           Introduced in APT 1.1.

       --allow-remove-essential
           Force yes; this is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting
           if it is removing essentials. It should not be used except in very special situations.
           Using it can potentially destroy your system! Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::allow-remove-essential. Introduced in APT 1.1.

       --allow-change-held-packages
           Force yes; this is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting
           if it is changing held packages. It should not be used except in very special situations.
           Using it can potentially destroy your system! Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::allow-change-held-packages. Introduced in APT 1.1.

       --force-yes
           Force yes; this is a dangerous option that will cause apt to continue without prompting
           if it is doing something potentially harmful. It should not be used except in very
           special situations. Using force-yes can potentially destroy your system! Configuration
           Item: APT::Get::force-yes. This is deprecated and replaced by --allow-unauthenticated ,
           --allow-downgrades , --allow-remove-essential , --allow-change-held-packages in 1.1.

       --print-uris
           Instead of fetching the files to install their URIs are printed. Each URI will have the
           path, the destination file name, the size and the expected MD5 hash. Note that the file
           name to write to will not always match the file name on the remote site! This also works
           with the source and update commands. When used with the update command the MD5 and size
           are not included, and it is up to the user to decompress any compressed files.
           Configuration Item: APT::Get::Print-URIs.

       --purge
           Use purge instead of remove for anything that would be removed. An asterisk ("*") will be
           displayed next to packages which are scheduled to be purged.  remove --purge is
           equivalent to the purge command. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Purge.

       --reinstall
           Re-install packages that are already installed and at the newest version. Configuration
           Item: APT::Get::ReInstall.

       --list-cleanup
           This option is on by default; use --no-list-cleanup to turn it off. When it is on,
           apt-get will automatically manage the contents of /var/lib/apt/lists to ensure that
           obsolete files are erased. The only reason to turn it off is if you frequently change
           your sources list. Configuration Item: APT::Get::List-Cleanup.

       -S, --snapshot
           This option controls the snapshot chosen for archives with Snapshot: enable in the source
           entry. For example, -S 20220102T030405Z selects a snapshot from January 2nd, 2022 at
           03:04:05 UTC. Configuration Item: APT::Snapshot; see also the sources.list(5) manual
           page.

       -t, --target-release, --default-release
           This option controls the default input to the policy engine; it creates a default pin at
           priority 990 using the specified release string. This overrides the general settings in
           /etc/apt/preferences. Specifically pinned packages are not affected by the value of this
           option. In short, this option lets you have simple control over which distribution
           packages will be retrieved from. Some common examples might be -t '2.1*', -t unstable or
           -t sid. Configuration Item: APT::Default-Release; see also the apt_preferences(5) manual
           page.

       --trivial-only
           Only perform operations that are 'trivial'. Logically this can be considered related to
           --assume-yes; where --assume-yes will answer yes to any prompt, --trivial-only will
           answer no. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Trivial-Only.

       --mark-auto
           After successful installation, mark all freshly installed packages as automatically
           installed, which will cause each of the packages to be removed when no more manually
           installed packages depend on this package. This is equally to running apt-mark auto for
           all installed packages. Configuration Item: APT::Get::Mark-Auto.

       --no-remove
           If any packages are to be removed apt-get immediately aborts without prompting.
           Configuration Item: APT::Get::Remove.

       --auto-remove, --autoremove
           If the command is either install or remove, then this option acts like running the
           autoremove command, removing unused dependency packages. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::AutomaticRemove.

       --only-source
           Only has meaning for the source and build-dep commands. Indicates that the given source
           names are not to be mapped through the binary table. This means that if this option is
           specified, these commands will only accept source package names as arguments, rather than
           accepting binary package names and looking up the corresponding source package.
           Configuration Item: APT::Get::Only-Source.

       --diff-only, --dsc-only, --tar-only
           Download only the diff, dsc, or tar file of a source archive. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Diff-Only, APT::Get::Dsc-Only, and APT::Get::Tar-Only.

       --arch-only
           Only process architecture-dependent build-dependencies. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Arch-Only.

       --indep-only
           Only process architecture-independent build-dependencies. Configuration Item:
           APT::Get::Indep-Only.

       --allow-unauthenticated
           Ignore if packages can't be authenticated and don't prompt about it. This can be useful
           while working with local repositories, but is a huge security risk if data authenticity
           isn't ensured in another way by the user itself. The usage of the Trusted option for
           sources.list(5) entries should usually be preferred over this global override.
           Configuration Item: APT::Get::AllowUnauthenticated.

       --no-allow-insecure-repositories
           Forbid the update command to acquire unverifiable data from configured sources. APT will
           fail at the update command for repositories without valid cryptographically signatures.
           See also apt-secure(8) for details on the concept and the implications. Configuration
           Item: Acquire::AllowInsecureRepositories.

       --allow-releaseinfo-change
           Allow the update command to continue downloading data from a repository which changed its
           information of the release contained in the repository indicating e.g a new major
           release. APT will fail at the update command for such repositories until the change is
           confirmed to ensure the user is prepared for the change. See also apt-secure(8) for
           details on the concept and configuration.

           Specialist options (--allow-releaseinfo-change-field) exist to allow changes only for
           certain fields like origin, label, codename, suite, version and defaultpin. See also
           apt_preferences(5). Configuration Item: Acquire::AllowReleaseInfoChange.

       --show-progress
           Show user friendly progress information in the terminal window when packages are
           installed, upgraded or removed. For a machine parsable version of this data see
           README.progress-reporting in the apt doc directory. Configuration Items: Dpkg::Progress
           and Dpkg::Progress-Fancy.

       --with-source filename
           Adds the given file as a source for metadata. Can be repeated to add multiple files. See
           --with-source description in apt-cache(8) for further details.

       -eany, --error-on=any
           Fail the update command if any error occured, even a transient one.

       -h, --help
           Show a short usage summary.

       -v, --version
           Show the program version.

       -c, --config-file
           Configuration File; Specify a configuration file to use. The program will read the
           default configuration file and then this configuration file. If configuration settings
           need to be set before the default configuration files are parsed specify a file with the
           APT_CONFIG environment variable. See apt.conf(5) for syntax information.

       -o, --option
           Set a Configuration Option; This will set an arbitrary configuration option. The syntax
           is -o Foo::Bar=bar.  -o and --option can be used multiple times to set different options.

FILES
       /etc/apt/sources.list
           Locations to fetch packages from. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::SourceList.

       /etc/apt/sources.list.d/
           File fragments for locations to fetch packages from. Configuration Item:
           Dir::Etc::SourceParts.

       /etc/apt/apt.conf
           APT configuration file. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::Main.

       /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/
           APT configuration file fragments. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::Parts.

       /etc/apt/preferences
           Version preferences file. This is where you would specify "pinning", i.e. a preference to
           get certain packages from a separate source or from a different version of a
           distribution. Configuration Item: Dir::Etc::Preferences.

       /etc/apt/preferences.d/
           File fragments for the version preferences. Configuration Item:
           Dir::Etc::PreferencesParts.

       /var/cache/apt/archives/
           Storage area for retrieved package files. Configuration Item: Dir::Cache::Archives.

       /var/cache/apt/archives/partial/
           Storage area for package files in transit. Configuration Item: Dir::Cache::Archives
           (partial will be implicitly appended)

       /var/lib/apt/lists/
           Storage area for state information for each package resource specified in sources.list(5)
           Configuration Item: Dir::State::Lists.

       /var/lib/apt/lists/partial/
           Storage area for state information in transit. Configuration Item: Dir::State::Lists
           (partial will be implicitly appended)

SEE ALSO
       apt-cache(8), apt-cdrom(8), dpkg(1), sources.list(5), apt.conf(5), apt-config(8), apt-
       secure(8), The APT User's guide in /usr/share/doc/apt-doc/, apt_preferences(5), the APT
       Howto.

DIAGNOSTICS
       apt-get returns zero on normal operation, decimal 100 on error.

BUGS
       APT bug page[1]. If you wish to report a bug in APT, please see
       /usr/share/doc/debian/bug-reporting.txt or the reportbug(1) command.

AUTHORS
       Jason Gunthorpe

       APT team

NOTES
        1. APT bug page
           http://bugs.debian.org/src:apt



APT 2.4.14                                 08 January 2021                                APT-GET(8)
apt-get(8)
NAME SYNOPSIS DESCRIPTION
update upgrade dist-upgrade dselect-upgrade install reinstall remove purge source build-dep satisfy check download clean changelog indextargets
OPTIONS
--no-install-recommends --install-suggests -d, --download-only -f, --fix-broken -m, --ignore-missing, --fix-missing --no-download -q, --quiet -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act -y, --yes, --assume-yes --assume-no --no-show-upgraded -V, --verbose-versions -a, --host-architecture -P, --build-profiles -b, --compile, --build --ignore-hold --with-new-pkgs --no-upgrade --only-upgrade --allow-downgrades --allow-remove-essential --allow-change-held-packages --force-yes --print-uris --purge --reinstall --list-cleanup -S, --snapshot -t, --target-release, --default-release --trivial-only --mark-auto --no-remove --only-source --arch-only --indep-only --allow-unauthenticated --no-allow-insecure-repositories --allow-releaseinfo-change --show-progress -eany, --error-on=any -h, --help -v, --version -c, --config-file -o, --option
FILES SEE ALSO DIAGNOSTICS BUGS AUTHORS
Jason Gunthorpe APT team
NOTES

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