How To Get Package Installed Info Like KDE3 KPackage Used To?

enorbet · 12-01-2013, 04:37 PM

Greetings
I'm not sure how to best pose my question that will give people a frame of reference so they can help me get the best solution,
since I have one that works but seems like unnecessary "jumping through hoops" but I need to try.

It used to be in KDE3 that KPackage would list in the left window all installed packages and the summary on the right window had a tab called "File List" which showed where files were installed. So for example, if I installed a package called "foo" I could see at a glance that version 2.3.4 was installed on 12/1/2012 and that the executable was in "usr/local/bin/foo" and libraries were in "/usr/lib/foo", icons in "/user/share/icons/foo" or wherever and so on. I found this
extremely useful for many operations.

Once I started using KDE4 and up until now I went to the trouble of installing enough KDE3 support libraries to use the old KPackage app which was first changed into something I found less useful, and then, afaik, dropped altogether. I have the instinct that such information is kept somewhere basic and that KPackage v3 simply
read and organized this information. So I am wondering if there is a better/easier way of seeing such info, preferably well organized, instead of having to accommodate KPackage v3?

Can anyone point me in the right direction? If it matters, I still use 32 bit Slackware 14.

TobiSGD · 12-01-2013, 04:58 PM

The directory /var/log/packages contains information about your installed packages. Each packages has a text file, whose name contains package name, version and architecture (and possibly a suffix, like SBo or alien, if you have such packages installed). Each textfile contains information about the package. This is for example the text file that belongs to the links browser:

Code:

PACKAGE NAME:     links-2.8-x86_64-1
COMPRESSED PACKAGE SIZE:     1.9M
UNCOMPRESSED PACKAGE SIZE:     3.1M
PACKAGE LOCATION: ./links-2.8-x86_64-1.txz
PACKAGE DESCRIPTION:
links: links (WWW browser for the console)
links:
links: Links is a console mode WWW browser, supporting colors, correct table
links: rendering, background downloading, frames, Javascript, and a menu
links: driven configuration interface.  The default is text output, but
links: graphical output (using -g) is also supported using the Linux
links: framebuffer console or SVGAlib.
links:
links: links was written by Mikulas Patocka.
links:
links:
FILE LIST:
./
install/
install/slack-desc
usr/
usr/bin/
usr/bin/links
usr/man/
usr/man/man1/
usr/man/man1/links.1.gz
usr/doc/
usr/doc/links-2.8/
usr/doc/links-2.8/mailcap.pl
usr/doc/links-2.8/AUTHORS
usr/doc/links-2.8/ChangeLog
usr/doc/links-2.8/COPYING
usr/doc/links-2.8/README
usr/doc/links-2.8/INSTALL
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/picture-icon.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/black-icon.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/picture-crank-0.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/black-control-rocking.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/adjusted.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/test_pattern.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/elbow.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/picture-crank-up.png
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/kalibrace.html
usr/doc/links-2.8/links_cal/calibration.html
usr/doc/links-2.8/NEWS
usr/doc/links-2.8/SITES

So actually all you need to get information about packages is a file browser and a text editor/viewer. It should be pretty easy to write simple programs to display that information.

enorbet · 12-02-2013, 01:51 PM

Hello and thank you for your response
I have been familiar with /var/log packages for a long time and I do use it when I just want to check a single package. I guess I'm a bit of an oddball because I despise automatic dependency resolving package managers but I do appreciate and enjoy "one-stop shops" for overall system view, maintenance, etc. Because KPackage was expressly compatible with Slackware, it was really useful for uninstalling, calling "pkgtool" right from the interface.

So while I might be able to write some simple code to organize the info in "/var/log/packages" so that I could see the entire contents laid out, I suspect that it would be easier to continue to give KPackage the libraries it needs rather than trust my rusty skills incorporating "pkgtool" to do all the things KPackage integrated, and that I still want to have.

From time ago on Slack IRC channels, I realize few people bothered to use KPackage even to see it's usefulness and when I google it, only a few seem to lament it's passing, so I suppose I am stuck with my old "shade-tree" solution.

Pode · 12-03-2013, 05:28 PM

There are some gui frontends for pkgtool.
Here are two what i tried on Slackware64-14.0:
http://qtgzmanager.wordpress.com/
http://slackpackpkgman.wordpress.com/

The qtgzmanager is on SlackBuilds.org
http://slackbuilds.org/repository/14...m/qtgzmanager/

GVrooman · 12-03-2013, 06:56 PM

Interesting. I never even realized that KPackage existed. I always opened a Konsole window and ran pkgtool. I can see how it would save you a few keystrokes. I just finished downloading 600 megabytes worth of Slackware 13.37 over my dial-up connection, a grueling job that took almost a week. Then I installed it with KDE 3.5.10 and Firefox 17.0.11. I now have a version of Slackware with a modern web browser and all of my favorite KDE apps, a few of which disappeared with KDE 4. I will have to start using KPackage in the future.