Dpkg

dpkg is Debian's default packaging software. However you will normally use apt-get to install Debian software. Here are package management issues and how you achieve them using dpkg or rpm.

Overview

Issue	rpm	dpkg
how files are called	*.rpm	*.deb
list all installed packages	rpm -qa	dpkg -l
list all installed packages by order of installation date	rpm -qa --last
install a package from a file	rpm -i file.rpm	dpkg -i file.deb
list package content	rpm -ql package	dpkg -L package
find what package provides the installed file /bin/ls	rpm -qf /bin/ls	dpkg --search /bin/ls
look at a package file description	rpm -qpl file.rpm	dpkg -I file.deb
look at a package description	rpm -qi package	apt-cache show package
find which installed package provides /bin/bash	rpm -qf /bin/bash	dpkg -S /bin/bash (to also search in not installed packages you can use apt-file)
find what program provides the file Xlib.h		auto-apt search Xlib.h
extract a package	rpm2cpio blah.rpm | cpio -id	dpkg -x datei.deb target_folder
remove a package, but do not run pre-uninstall scripts before	rpm -e --nopreun xyz	rm /var/lib/dpkg/info/xyz.prerm; dpkg -r xyz

TroubleShooting

Unmet dependencies

root@lvps83-169-3-117:~# apt-get install kde
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
You might want to run `apt-get -f install' to correct these:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
  kde: Depends: kde-core (>= 5:47) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kde-amusements (>= 5:47) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdeaccessibility (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdeaddons (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdeadmin (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdeartwork (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdegraphics (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdemultimedia (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdenetwork (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdepim (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdeutils (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
       Depends: kdewebdev (>= 4:3.4.3) but it is not going to be installed
  psa: Depends: libpam-plesk but it is not going to be installed
E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution).

Once solution was to remove a postuninstall script, /var/lib/dpkg/info/psa-imp.postrm

failed to fetch

Failed to fetch http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/g/gcc-4.3/g++-4.3_4.3.3-5ubuntu4_i386.deb  404 Not Found [IP: 91.189.92.171 80]

Looking at http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/g/gcc-4.3/ it is empty. This was the case because my Ubuntu was not supported any longer.

not found

Here is an example. Calling

sudo apt-get install tcl

Gave me

Failed to fetch http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/t/tcl8.4/tcl8.4_8.4.19-2_i386.deb  404 Not Found [IP: 91.189.92.171 80]
E: Unable to fetch some archives, maybe run apt-get update or try with --fix-missing?

Now the commands

apt-get update

and

apt-get install --fix-missing tcl

did not help. Surfing to http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/t/tcl8.4/ I found there is no tcl8.4_8.4.19-2_i386.deb only tcl8.4_8.4.19-3_i386.deb. So I got this one:

wget http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/t/tcl8.4/tcl8.4_8.4.19-3_i386.deb 

and installed it:

sudo dpkg -i tcl*