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Swynndla - 12.09.2006, 02:08 Uhr
Titel: Removing debian orphans

I found this:
http://distrocenter.linux.com/comments. ... ;cid=90212

Zitat:

If you try a lot of software, installing and uninstalling packages, then after a while you'll have a lot of useless leftover dependencies installed too. Run deborphan to see a list of these. You can apt-get --purge remove `deborphan`. Now do it again, to see more packages that now turn out also to be useless. Do this until there aren't any more, and you've removed a lot of cruft from your system.

It makes sense to me, and if I install an app via apt, it'll also often install other dependencies, but when I remove the app via apt, it only removes the app and not the dependencies.

The command seems to work great. I had to run it 3 or 4 times to clear out everything.

I don't like the thought of my pc being bogged down with dependencies that it doesn't need. I guess you'd have to be carefull though, as it removes things that it thinks isn't used anymore, but this may not be correct, like if you've installed stuff that's not from the debian repo's. Running "deborphan" by itself will list the stuff it thinks can be removed.

For those of you who use h2's du-fixes-h2.sh, that script also gives you the option of removing unused dependencies for you, and it does it in the same way.

kenyee - 12.09.2006, 02:12 Uhr
Titel: RE: Removing debian orphans

Just be sure you don't need everything it says isn't used. Typically, it's stuff that doesn't come in a debian package. E.g., Lotus Domino depends on the ia32-libs on a 64-bit system because it's a 32-bit application and deborphan wants to remove the 32-bit compatibility libs...

mzilikazi - 12.09.2006, 02:40 Uhr
Titel:

It certainly is possible to remove something that you need with deborphan but I personally have only seen this happen once. YMMV

To play it safe you might do something like:

Code:

deborphan|tee orphans-9.6.06.txt

This way you at least have a dated record of what you removed in the event of a breakage.
There is even a text mode UI for deborphan:

Code:

# orphaner

If you're an apt/Debian/Linux n00b you might want to avoid using deborphan.

zulu9 - 12.09.2006, 02:48 Uhr
Titel:

I think you have to be careful with it. On my box it wants to remove libarts1-xine which is needed for video-thumbnails in konqueror.