aptitude is a front-end to

APT Apt. is an abbreviation for apartment. Apt may also refer to: Places * Apt Cathedral, a former cathedral, and national monument of France, in the town of Apt in Provence * Apt, Vaucluse, a commune of the Vaucluse département of France * A ...

, the

Debian Debian (), also known as Debian GNU/Linux, is a Linux distribution composed of free and open-source software, developed by the community-supported Debian Project, which was established by Ian Murdock on August 16, 1993. The first version of D ...

package manager A package manager or package-management system is a collection of software tools that automates the process of installing, upgrading, configuring, and removing computer programs for a computer in a consistent manner. A package manager deals wi ...

. It displays a list of software packages and allows the user to interactively pick packages to install or remove. It has a search system utilizing flexible search patterns. It was initially created for Debian, but has appeared in

RPM Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or with the notation min−1) is a unit of rotational speed or rotational frequency for rotating machines. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 defines a unit of rotation as the dimensionl ...

-based distributions as well.

User interfaces

''aptitude'' is based on the

ncurses ncurses (new curses) is a programming library providing an application programming interface (API) that allows the programmer to write text-based user interfaces (TUI) in a terminal-independent manner. It is a toolkit for developing "GUI-like" ...

computer terminal A computer terminal is an electronic or electromechanical hardware device that can be used for entering data into, and transcribing data from, a computer or a computing system. The teletype was an example of an early-day hard-copy terminal and ...

library, with which it provides an interface that incorporates some elements commonly seen in

graphical user interface The GUI ( "UI" by itself is still usually pronounced . or ), graphical user interface, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicator such as primary notation, inste ...

s (GUIs) (such as

pull-down menu In user interface design, a menu is a list of options or commands presented to the user of a computer or embedded system. A menu may either be a system's entire user interface, or only part of a more complex one. Navigation A user chooses a ...

s). In addition to the ncurses interface, aptitude provides an extensive

command-line interface A command-line interpreter or command-line processor uses a command-line interface (CLI) to receive commands from a user in the form of lines of text. This provides a means of setting parameters for the environment, invoking executables and pro ...

(CLI). Even though aptitude is one executable file, it provides command-line functions similar to those of the family of tools provided by APT (apt-get, apt-cache, apt-listchanges, etc.). aptitude also emulates most

command-line argument A command-line interpreter or command-line processor uses a command-line interface (CLI) to receive commands from a user in the form of lines of text. This provides a means of setting parameters for the environment, invoking executables and pro ...

s, allowing it to act as a full replacement for . In the past, it was recommended that aptitude and apt-get not be used interchangeably. This is no longer true, as both programs now correctly track and share a common list of packages that were automatically installed to satisfy dependencies.

History

''aptitude'' was created in 1999. At the time two other terminal-based APT-like front-ends were available: the

dselect dselect is a computer program used to manage software packages in the Debian operating system. dselect is one of the oldest front-ends to dpkg, and the bulk of its development happened when it was originally written by Ian Jackson, who wrote ...

program, which had been used to manage packages on Debian before APT was created, and the console-apt program, a project that was considered to be the

heir apparent An heir apparent, often shortened to heir, is a person who is first in an order of succession and cannot be displaced from inheriting by the birth of another person; a person who is first in the order of succession but can be displaced by the b ...

to dselect. ''aptitude'' was created to experiment with a more

object-oriented programming Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of "objects", which can contain data and code. The data is in the form of fields (often known as attributes or ''properties''), and the code is in the form of pr ...

design than that used in console-apt, in the hope that this would result in a more flexible program with a broader set of features. The first public release of ''aptitude'' was version 0.0.1 on November 18, 1999. It was very limited: it had the ability to view the list of available packages, but could not actually download or install any packages. By version 0.0.4a, this ability had been added, with many other improvements; this version was included in Debian 2.2, code name: . In late 2000, the whole

user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine f ...

module was rewritten; a new

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...

was created, based on the

libsigc++ libsigc++ is a C++ library for typesafe callbacks. libsigc++ implements a callback system for use in abstract interfaces and general programming. libsigc++ is one of the earliest implementations of the signals and slots concept implemented usi ...

callback Callback may refer to: * Callback (comedy), a joke which refers to one previously told * Callback (computer programming), executable code that is passed as a parameter to other code * Callback (telecommunications), the telecommunications event th ...

library A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vir ...

and concepts from modern

widget toolkit A widget toolkit, widget library, GUI toolkit, or UX library is a library or a collection of libraries containing a set of graphical control elements (called ''widgets'') used to construct the graphical user interface (GUI) of programs. Most widg ...

s such as

GTK+ GTK (formerly GIMP ToolKit and GTK+) is a free and open-source cross-platform widget toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces (GUIs). It is licensed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License, allowing both free and proprie ...

and Qt. This enabled the interface to become much more similar to GUIs than it had been previously, with features such as

s and pop-up dialogs. One of ''aptitude's'' more unusual features, a tiny implementation of

Minesweeper A minesweeper is a small warship designed to remove or detonate naval mines. Using various mechanisms intended to counter the threat posed by naval mines, minesweepers keep waterways clear for safe shipping. History The earliest known usage of ...

, was added at this time. The first official ''aptitude'' release following this rewrite was 0.2.0., ''aptitude'' 0.2.11.1 was released with Debian 3.0 ''Woody''. By this time, the project (renamed to ) had been effectively abandoned by its maintainers, and it was removed from Woody. aptitude has also been ported to jailbroken

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

as part of the

Cydia Cydia is a graphical user interface of APT (Advanced Package Tool) for iOS. It enables a user to find and install software not authorized by Apple on jailbroken iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch devices. It also refers to digital distribution pl ...

package manager.

Easter egg

''aptitude'' states that, unlike APT, it does not have "Super Cow Powers". In apt-get "super cow powers" can be found by issuing the command . However, in aptitude issuing moo will give the user a prompt saying there are no

Easter eggs Easter eggs, also called Paschal eggs, are eggs that are decorated for the Christian feast of Easter, which celebrates the resurrection of Jesus. As such, Easter eggs are common during the season of Eastertide (Easter season). The oldest tra ...

. However, by issuing , then , and so on the user will see a series of statements denying the "Super Cow Powers" or telling them to go away, some ending with a picture (a reference to

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Antoine Marie Jean-Baptiste Roger, comte de Saint-Exupéry, simply known as Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (, , ; 29 June 1900 – 31 July 1944), was a French writer, poet, aristocrat, journalist and pioneering aviator. He became a laureate of s ...

's ''

The Little Prince ''The Little Prince'' (french: Le Petit Prince, ) is a novella by French aristocrat, writer, and military pilot Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It was first published in English and French in the United States by Reynal & Hitchcock in April 1943 an ...

'') not unlike the original apt-get Easter egg. Different versions of the program have different sequences. In addition, the package description states that "aptitude is also Y2K-compliant, non-fattening, naturally cleansing, and housebroken."

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Aptitude (software) Debian Dpkg Linux PMS graphical front-ends Free software that uses ncurses Software using the GPL license Free software programmed in C++

User interfaces

History

Easter egg

See also

References

External links