deborphan (1)

NAME

deborphan - Orphaned package finder

SYNOPSIS

deborphan [OPTION]... [PACKAGE]...

DESCRIPTION

deborphan finds packages that have no packages depending on them. The default operation is to search only within the libs and oldlibs sections to hunt down unused libraries.

If it is invoked with an optional list of packages, only the dependencies on those packages will be checked. The results are printed to stdout as if the option --show-deps had been given. Searching for specific packages will show the package, regardless of its priority. It is possible to specify -, to read a list of packages from standard input.

OPTIONS

-f, --status-file=FILE

Use FILE as the status file.

-h, --help

Display a short help message and exit.

-v, --version

Display version information and exit.

OUTPUT MODIFIERS

-d, --show-deps

Show a list of all installed packages and name the packages that depend on them.

-P, --show-priority

Show the priority of the packages found.

-s, --show-section

Show the sections the packages are in.

--no-show-section

Override showing sections when the default is to show them (see --all-packages).

-z, --show-size

Show the installed size of the packages found.

SEARCH MODIFIERS

-a, --all-packages

Check all the packages, instead of only those in the libs section. Best used (if at all used) in combination with --priority. This option implies --show-section.

-e, --exclude=LIST

Excludes the packages named in LIST (a comma separated list) from the evaluation as if they didn't exist in the status file.

-H, --force-hold

Ignore "hold" dpkg-flags on packages and thus display these packages. Without this option packages with the "hold" flag set will not be displayed. Please refer to dpkg(1) for more information about package flags. Due a bug in aptitude (Debian bug #137771) hold flags created by aptitude are ignored by deborphan.

--ignore-suggests

--ignore-recommends

Do not check if there is a package `suggesting' (--ignore-suggests) or `recommending' (--ignore-recommends) the package. When both options are used together, deborphan behaves as if the `nice-mode' mentioned below has been turned off.

-n, --nice-mode

Turn off nice-mode. Nice-mode checks if there is a package `suggesting' or `recommending' the package. If one is found, the package will be marked as in use, or, when --show-deps is used, print out the package suggesting the package as if it were depending on it.

-p, --priority=PRIORITY

Show only those packages with a priority equal to, or greater than PRIORITY. PRIORITY may be in the range of 1-5, or one of required, important, standard, optional, extra. Default value for PRIORITY is 2 (important).

--find-config

This option searches for uninstalled packages which still have configuration files on the system. It implies the -a option.

--libdevel

Search in section libdevel in addition to libs and oldlibs.

KEEP FILE MANAGEMENT

-A, --add-keep PKG1...PKGn

Add packages to the list of packages which are never to be reported, regardless of their state. You may specify '-' to use standard input. Note that package names are case-sensitive.

-k, --keep-file=FILE

Use FILE to store the list of kept-back packages.

-L, --list-keep

Show the list of packages that are being kept back.

-R, --del-keep PKG1...PKGn

Remove packages from the list of packages which are never to be reported. You may specify '-' to use standard input. If there are no dependencies for this package next time deborphan is invoked, it will be reported again.

-Z, --zero-keep

Purge the entire list of packages that are being kept back. The only option possible in combination with this option is -A.

GUESSING

--guess-*

--no-guess-*

deborphan can try to guess what packages may not be of much use to you by examining the package's name and/or description. It will pretend the package is in the main/libs section, and report it as if it were a library. This method is in no way perfect or even reliable, so beware when using this! It is also possible to tell deborphan e.g. to guess all interpreters but not Perl by using --guess-interpreters --no-guess-perl or to guess all but not Mono by using --guess-all --no-guess-mono. Please note that the --no-guess- option must occur after the --guess- option it modifies, this makes it possible to declare more complex things like to guess all, except interpreters but additionally try to guess perl.

The following options are to be prefixed by --guess- or (except only) by --no-guess-:

common

This option tries to find common packages, i.e. packages with names ending in -common.

data

This option tries to find data packages, i.e. packages with names ending in -data.

debug

This option tries to find debugging libraries, i.e. packages with names ending in -dbg.

dev

This option tries to find development packages, i.e. packages with names ending in -dev. Also see option --libdevel.

doc

This option tries to find documentation packages, i.e. packages with names ending in -doc.

dummy

This option tries to find dummy packages, i.e. packages with dummy or transitional in their short description.

kernel

This option tries to find kernel-modules. It tries to match (-modules|^nvidia-kernel)-.*[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+.

interpreters

Try to find all interpreter modules (i.e. imply ruby, pike, python, perl and mono).

mono

This option tries to find mono libraries. It tries to match ^libmono.

perl

This option tries to find perl modules. It tries to match ^lib.*-perl$.

pike

This option tries to find pike modules. It tries to match ^pike[[:digit:]]*-.

python

This option tries to find python modules. It tries to match ^python[[:digit:]]*-.

ruby

This option tries to find ruby modules. It tries to match ^lib.*-ruby[[:digit:].]*$.

section

This option tries to find libraries that were accidentally placed in the wrong section. It tries to match ^lib, but not if it ends in one of: -dbg, -doc, -perl, or -dev.

all

Try all of the above.

only

Ignore the package's section completely, and just go for the name and/or description. This option must be used in conjunction with one or more of the --guess options listed above, or deborphan will not display anything.

FILES

/var/lib/dpkg/status

Statuses of available packages. See the section INFORMATION ABOUT PACKAGES in dpkg's man-page for more information.

/var/lib/deborphan/keep

A newline-separated list of packages to keep. Package names are in no particular order.

SEE ALSO

dpkg(8), dselect(8), orphaner(8), editkeep(8), cruft(8), xargs(1)

BUGS

If you report a bug, please include your /var/lib/dpkg/status file. That would help in reproducing the bugs.

AUTHORS

deborphan was written by Cris van Pelt <"Cris van Pelt"@tribe.eu.org>, then maintained by Peter Palfrader <weasel@debian.org> but is nowadays maintained Carsten Hey <c.hey@web.de>