Debian: Which package owns /usr/bin/vi?

browny_amiga · 03-13-2021, 08:32 PM

Hi,

I'm doing spring cleaning and after many years of successfully avoiding it, VI has to finally go from all my systems. I already deinstalled vim, but to which Debian package does /usr/bin/vi belong to?

dpkg -S /usr/bin/vi
dpkg-query: no path found matching pattern /usr/bin/vi

berndbausch · 03-13-2021, 08:46 PM

One solution is the packages web page.

On the command-line, try apt search REGULAR_EXPRESSION_INVOLVING_VIM. Or apt-cache search.

shruggy · 03-14-2021, 05:33 AM

There are many packages that could provide /usr/bin/vi (vim, vim-athena, vim-gtk3, vim-nox, vim-tiny, elvis-tiny, neovim, nvi, vile, vis). Because of this, it's handled by the alternatives system.

To see which alternative vi currently points to, run

Code:

update-alternatives --display vi

To get only the list of installed alternatives without priorities

Code:

update-alternatives --list vi

To get dpkg -S work with alternatives

Code:

dpkg -S $(readlink -e /usr/bin/vi)