Make “apt-get update” show the exact output as `apt update`












9















I'm learning the CLI interface of Advanced Packaging Tool. From the output of apt(8) when its stdout isn't a terminal, it isn't suitable for "scripts expecting stable programming interface", so I'm taking a look at apt-get(8).



One difference between apt update and apt-get update is that the latter is missing a final line after all cache has been updated:



8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.


I want to know how I can get this exact line displayed with apt-get(8).










share|improve this question

























  • As far as I knew, apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) and apt-get are different things. They're designed to run differently from what I understood. If one gives you what you want, perhaps make the habit to use that command instead.

    – Brenden McFarling
    2 hours ago
















9















I'm learning the CLI interface of Advanced Packaging Tool. From the output of apt(8) when its stdout isn't a terminal, it isn't suitable for "scripts expecting stable programming interface", so I'm taking a look at apt-get(8).



One difference between apt update and apt-get update is that the latter is missing a final line after all cache has been updated:



8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.


I want to know how I can get this exact line displayed with apt-get(8).










share|improve this question

























  • As far as I knew, apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) and apt-get are different things. They're designed to run differently from what I understood. If one gives you what you want, perhaps make the habit to use that command instead.

    – Brenden McFarling
    2 hours ago














9












9








9








I'm learning the CLI interface of Advanced Packaging Tool. From the output of apt(8) when its stdout isn't a terminal, it isn't suitable for "scripts expecting stable programming interface", so I'm taking a look at apt-get(8).



One difference between apt update and apt-get update is that the latter is missing a final line after all cache has been updated:



8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.


I want to know how I can get this exact line displayed with apt-get(8).










share|improve this question
















I'm learning the CLI interface of Advanced Packaging Tool. From the output of apt(8) when its stdout isn't a terminal, it isn't suitable for "scripts expecting stable programming interface", so I'm taking a look at apt-get(8).



One difference between apt update and apt-get update is that the latter is missing a final line after all cache has been updated:



8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them.


I want to know how I can get this exact line displayed with apt-get(8).







apt






share|improve this question















share|improve this question













share|improve this question




share|improve this question








edited Mar 25 at 6:41







iBug

















asked Mar 25 at 6:26









iBugiBug

1891213




1891213













  • As far as I knew, apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) and apt-get are different things. They're designed to run differently from what I understood. If one gives you what you want, perhaps make the habit to use that command instead.

    – Brenden McFarling
    2 hours ago



















  • As far as I knew, apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) and apt-get are different things. They're designed to run differently from what I understood. If one gives you what you want, perhaps make the habit to use that command instead.

    – Brenden McFarling
    2 hours ago

















As far as I knew, apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) and apt-get are different things. They're designed to run differently from what I understood. If one gives you what you want, perhaps make the habit to use that command instead.

– Brenden McFarling
2 hours ago





As far as I knew, apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) and apt-get are different things. They're designed to run differently from what I understood. If one gives you what you want, perhaps make the habit to use that command instead.

– Brenden McFarling
2 hours ago










3 Answers
3






active

oldest

votes


















9














man apt-get shows:



   -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on
the current system state but do not actually change the system.
Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking) so the system state
could change while apt-get is running. Simulations can also be
executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all
apt configuration distorting the simulation. A notice expressing
this warning is also shown by default for non-root users
(APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item:
APT::Get::Simulate.


So if you just do:



apt-get upgrade --dry-run



it will output:



...
4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.
...





share|improve this answer
























  • Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 6:35











  • Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:38











  • apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 6:40






  • 1





    Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:41






  • 4





    Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:51





















4














Guessing you need to handle the number of available updates, here is a suggestion:



# With no option, returns two numbers, no CR nor LF
/usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check

# With --human-readable, returns numbers, locale LANG text & CR/LF
/usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check --human-readable


No need to sudo

The output is easy to work with



More options:



> /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check  --help
Usage: apt-check [options]

Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-p, --package-names Show the packages that are going to be
installed/upgraded
--human-readable Show human readable output on stdout
--security-updates-unattended
Return the time in days when security updates are
installed unattended (0 means disabled)





share|improve this answer
























  • Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 7:02













  • yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

    – cmak.fr
    Mar 25 at 7:07



















2














From man 8 apt:




... enables some options ...




Then I went through /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/configure-index.gz (using zcat(1) to show text content) and noticed this option:



apt::cmd::show-update-stats


So I worked out the following command that did exactly what I wanted:



# apt-get -o apt::cmd::show-update-stats=true update


Tested to be working on Xenial and Bionic.






share|improve this answer
























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    3 Answers
    3






    active

    oldest

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    3 Answers
    3






    active

    oldest

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    active

    oldest

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    active

    oldest

    votes









    9














    man apt-get shows:



       -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
    No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on
    the current system state but do not actually change the system.
    Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking) so the system state
    could change while apt-get is running. Simulations can also be
    executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all
    apt configuration distorting the simulation. A notice expressing
    this warning is also shown by default for non-root users
    (APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item:
    APT::Get::Simulate.


    So if you just do:



    apt-get upgrade --dry-run



    it will output:



    ...
    4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.
    ...





    share|improve this answer
























    • Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:35











    • Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:38











    • apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:40






    • 1





      Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:41






    • 4





      Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:51


















    9














    man apt-get shows:



       -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
    No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on
    the current system state but do not actually change the system.
    Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking) so the system state
    could change while apt-get is running. Simulations can also be
    executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all
    apt configuration distorting the simulation. A notice expressing
    this warning is also shown by default for non-root users
    (APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item:
    APT::Get::Simulate.


    So if you just do:



    apt-get upgrade --dry-run



    it will output:



    ...
    4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.
    ...





    share|improve this answer
























    • Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:35











    • Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:38











    • apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:40






    • 1





      Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:41






    • 4





      Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:51
















    9












    9








    9







    man apt-get shows:



       -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
    No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on
    the current system state but do not actually change the system.
    Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking) so the system state
    could change while apt-get is running. Simulations can also be
    executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all
    apt configuration distorting the simulation. A notice expressing
    this warning is also shown by default for non-root users
    (APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item:
    APT::Get::Simulate.


    So if you just do:



    apt-get upgrade --dry-run



    it will output:



    ...
    4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.
    ...





    share|improve this answer













    man apt-get shows:



       -s, --simulate, --just-print, --dry-run, --recon, --no-act
    No action; perform a simulation of events that would occur based on
    the current system state but do not actually change the system.
    Locking will be disabled (Debug::NoLocking) so the system state
    could change while apt-get is running. Simulations can also be
    executed by non-root users which might not have read access to all
    apt configuration distorting the simulation. A notice expressing
    this warning is also shown by default for non-root users
    (APT::Get::Show-User-Simulation-Note). Configuration Item:
    APT::Get::Simulate.


    So if you just do:



    apt-get upgrade --dry-run



    it will output:



    ...
    4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.
    ...






    share|improve this answer












    share|improve this answer



    share|improve this answer










    answered Mar 25 at 6:34









    tudortudor

    3,07151948




    3,07151948













    • Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:35











    • Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:38











    • apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:40






    • 1





      Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:41






    • 4





      Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:51





















    • Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:35











    • Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:38











    • apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 6:40






    • 1





      Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:41






    • 4





      Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

      – tudor
      Mar 25 at 6:51



















    Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 6:35





    Yeah, I went through man 8 apt-get and found that option, but the output was different from apt.

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 6:35













    Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:38





    Different how? I just checked on my system and it's identical. I thought it was identical because apt is really a programmatic wrapper around apt-get and that's the reason why the warning exists.

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:38













    apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 6:40





    apt shows 8 packages can be upgraded. Run 'apt list --upgradable' to see them., while your answer shows 4 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 0 to remove and 0 not to upgrade.

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 6:40




    1




    1





    Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:41





    Yes, that's because you have 8 to upgrade where I have 4. Or are you referring to the text being different?

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:41




    4




    4





    Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:51







    Yes, that's exactly what the warning is about. apt will not guarantee you that text, and they may not even guarantee you that number. apt-get however has a strict output requirement because it's used by other softwares (like UIs and daemons) to process it in various ways. So you can either change your code to accept apt-get's output or you can | sed 's/to upgrade/packages can be upgraded/g', for example (and risk your code breaking later).

    – tudor
    Mar 25 at 6:51















    4














    Guessing you need to handle the number of available updates, here is a suggestion:



    # With no option, returns two numbers, no CR nor LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check

    # With --human-readable, returns numbers, locale LANG text & CR/LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check --human-readable


    No need to sudo

    The output is easy to work with



    More options:



    > /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check  --help
    Usage: apt-check [options]

    Options:
    -h, --help show this help message and exit
    -p, --package-names Show the packages that are going to be
    installed/upgraded
    --human-readable Show human readable output on stdout
    --security-updates-unattended
    Return the time in days when security updates are
    installed unattended (0 means disabled)





    share|improve this answer
























    • Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 7:02













    • yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

      – cmak.fr
      Mar 25 at 7:07
















    4














    Guessing you need to handle the number of available updates, here is a suggestion:



    # With no option, returns two numbers, no CR nor LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check

    # With --human-readable, returns numbers, locale LANG text & CR/LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check --human-readable


    No need to sudo

    The output is easy to work with



    More options:



    > /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check  --help
    Usage: apt-check [options]

    Options:
    -h, --help show this help message and exit
    -p, --package-names Show the packages that are going to be
    installed/upgraded
    --human-readable Show human readable output on stdout
    --security-updates-unattended
    Return the time in days when security updates are
    installed unattended (0 means disabled)





    share|improve this answer
























    • Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 7:02













    • yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

      – cmak.fr
      Mar 25 at 7:07














    4












    4








    4







    Guessing you need to handle the number of available updates, here is a suggestion:



    # With no option, returns two numbers, no CR nor LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check

    # With --human-readable, returns numbers, locale LANG text & CR/LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check --human-readable


    No need to sudo

    The output is easy to work with



    More options:



    > /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check  --help
    Usage: apt-check [options]

    Options:
    -h, --help show this help message and exit
    -p, --package-names Show the packages that are going to be
    installed/upgraded
    --human-readable Show human readable output on stdout
    --security-updates-unattended
    Return the time in days when security updates are
    installed unattended (0 means disabled)





    share|improve this answer













    Guessing you need to handle the number of available updates, here is a suggestion:



    # With no option, returns two numbers, no CR nor LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check

    # With --human-readable, returns numbers, locale LANG text & CR/LF
    /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check --human-readable


    No need to sudo

    The output is easy to work with



    More options:



    > /usr/lib/update-notifier/apt-check  --help
    Usage: apt-check [options]

    Options:
    -h, --help show this help message and exit
    -p, --package-names Show the packages that are going to be
    installed/upgraded
    --human-readable Show human readable output on stdout
    --security-updates-unattended
    Return the time in days when security updates are
    installed unattended (0 means disabled)






    share|improve this answer












    share|improve this answer



    share|improve this answer










    answered Mar 25 at 6:59









    cmak.frcmak.fr

    2,4441121




    2,4441121













    • Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 7:02













    • yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

      – cmak.fr
      Mar 25 at 7:07



















    • Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

      – iBug
      Mar 25 at 7:02













    • yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

      – cmak.fr
      Mar 25 at 7:07

















    Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 7:02







    Is this the exact thing used to generate motd on SSH login?

    – iBug
    Mar 25 at 7:02















    yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

    – cmak.fr
    Mar 25 at 7:07





    yes it looks like the same output, but i dunno how does motd

    – cmak.fr
    Mar 25 at 7:07











    2














    From man 8 apt:




    ... enables some options ...




    Then I went through /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/configure-index.gz (using zcat(1) to show text content) and noticed this option:



    apt::cmd::show-update-stats


    So I worked out the following command that did exactly what I wanted:



    # apt-get -o apt::cmd::show-update-stats=true update


    Tested to be working on Xenial and Bionic.






    share|improve this answer




























      2














      From man 8 apt:




      ... enables some options ...




      Then I went through /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/configure-index.gz (using zcat(1) to show text content) and noticed this option:



      apt::cmd::show-update-stats


      So I worked out the following command that did exactly what I wanted:



      # apt-get -o apt::cmd::show-update-stats=true update


      Tested to be working on Xenial and Bionic.






      share|improve this answer


























        2












        2








        2







        From man 8 apt:




        ... enables some options ...




        Then I went through /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/configure-index.gz (using zcat(1) to show text content) and noticed this option:



        apt::cmd::show-update-stats


        So I worked out the following command that did exactly what I wanted:



        # apt-get -o apt::cmd::show-update-stats=true update


        Tested to be working on Xenial and Bionic.






        share|improve this answer













        From man 8 apt:




        ... enables some options ...




        Then I went through /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/configure-index.gz (using zcat(1) to show text content) and noticed this option:



        apt::cmd::show-update-stats


        So I worked out the following command that did exactly what I wanted:



        # apt-get -o apt::cmd::show-update-stats=true update


        Tested to be working on Xenial and Bionic.







        share|improve this answer












        share|improve this answer



        share|improve this answer










        answered Mar 25 at 6:30









        iBugiBug

        1891213




        1891213






























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