[GTALUG] Ubuntu (or debian): apt-get auto-remove?

[Alex Volkov]

I wouldn't completely trust autoremove, as once it tried to
automatically remove X-related packages from my desktop system.

I figured the way autoremove works -- it gives a best guess of what is
not needed, but that guess can sometimes be wrong, you should always
review the package list and be extra suspicious when apt-get tries to
remove hundreds of packages. Generally, system works well for removing
old versions of libraries.

If autoremove is nagging you too much -- just run 'apt-get install
<packagename autoremove doesn't like>' and that will solve the problem.
Nothing will get installed or removed but the package will be ignored by
autoremove in the future.


Alex.


On 13/08/15 10:57 AM, D. Hugh Redelmeier wrote:
> After my update from Ubuntu 12.04 to 14.04, apt-get tells me that there 
> are a lot of packages that apt-get auto-remove could remove.
>
> Is that safe?  What is the underlying idea?
>
> I think that it removes things that were added due to dependencies where 
> those dependencies no longer exist.  In the back of my mind, I worry that 
> sometimes dependencies might be things that I wanted independently of why 
> they were installed, but I'm not sure of that.
>
> Do people fine apt-get auto-remove works great or do you find that it 
> throws a few babies out with the bathwater?
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