dpkg list
 

Hi there,

I issued this command:

$ As a result I got a file with a list which is mile-long. In the second column there is a single word "install." It is printed against the name of every package. Does it mean that this package is already installed or needs to be installed?

It looks they are all installed but I am not sure because the answer to

for instance is confusing.

Thanks, - Alex

This is taken from the man page of dpkg
yields this:
where the "ii" at the beginning of the final line means it's installed.
The entry for aptitude in the pkg-list created per your command yields this:
We can conclude that "install" in the pkg-list means alrealy installed. I'm not clear why you find the output of dpkg -l xterm confusing.

jdk

The confusing part starts with Desired... etc:

What does it all mean? It is pure gibberish to me.

Thanks, - Alex

That is how you transfer the list of installed packages between installs. With a variant with --set-selections on the other install. So yes, it's a list of installed packages. If you want that list in a different format of sorts.

# dpkg -l

If you want a list of ALL available packages.

# dpkg-query --load-avail -l '*'

And probably dozens of other ways for the same basic stuff.

Yep, Linux is enormous.