Categories : apt
Finding Newer Package Versions (backports) 🔼
workflow description 🔼
Devuan offers thousand of packages. But ,a package, as time passes, it changes and new versions are released by the package's maintainers ( @) and the upstream project's programmers.
Example. Devuan offers in Daedalus ( @) kvirc 5.0.0 [@/pkginfo](https://pkginfo.devuan.org/cgi-bin/policy-query.html?c=package&q=kvirc&x=submit). But as we see in Excalibur and unstable(Ceres) 5.2.6 is released. So in a libre-source project's lifetime irregularities in the release cycles are more than common. Looking at the release history of kvirc @ we see that version 5.0 development started in 2017 and released in 2019. And then for 5 years there was no realease until 2024 with 5.2.0. Deadalus was released in late 2023 and thus missed 5.2.0. So installing kvirc would give us a ircclient that doesnt know about the libera network because the freenode fallout happened after 5.0 released.
So assuming that a newer release will improve a given info-process workflow a user would possibly want to keep a stable Devuan and having the newest package release. Having a way to install the latest versions ofcourse cant happen with all the packages. Especially libraries. That could undermine the stability of a distro.
If the developers of Devuan/Debian consider that a newer version doesnt brake the stability the can put it in a special repository location called Backports.
enabling backports 🔼
Add Backports to sources.list:
$ nano /etc/apt/sources.list
.....
+ deb http://deb.devuan.org/merged daedalus-backport main
(alternatevely: add a ".list" extension file to /etc/apt/sources.list.d/).
Then execute:
$ apt update or apt-get update
Checking for backported packages. 🔼
precondition : having enabled backports
$ sudo apt-cache policy emacs
emacs:
Εγκατεστημένα: 1:28.2+1-15+deb12u3
Υποψήφιο: 1:28.2+1-15+deb12u3
Πίνακας Έκδοσης:
1:29.4+1-4~bpo12+1 100
100 http://deb.devuan.org/merged daedalus-backports/main amd64 Packages
*** 1:28.2+1-15+deb12u3 500
500 http://deb.devuan.org/merged daedalus/main amd64 Packages
We see in the above output from apt-cache policy emacs that althougth emacs 28.2 is installed ( ***) there is in backports 29.4 available.
Installing a backported package 🔼
$ sudo apt-get install -t daedalus-backports emacs
Using Backports 🔼
The examples assume using daedalus. Change to your version.
context 🔼
- installing devuan packages
cheatsheet 🔼
apt install <package>/bookworm-backports apt-get install <package>/bookworm-backports
What is Backports? 🔼
You are running Devuan stable, because you prefer the Debian stable tree. It runs great, there is just one problem: the software is a little bit outdated compared to other distributions. This is where backports come in.
what packages are backported? 🔼
On way is to download Packages.gz files from the backport section of the realease you are interested in.
@ Debian backports
Backports in Devuan 🔼
context 🔼
@ Debian backports @ Debian wiki / backports
Adding Backports to our apt Sources. 🔼
By Apt Sources i mean here ,unless specifically stated otherwise, the main community maintained and supported apt repositories. Other apt repositories are tagged as third party.
$ sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list
deb http://deb.devuan.org/merged daedalus-backports main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
Updating our local apt cache sources 🔼
When our local apt system has not updated the apt sources it knows then as we see in the command below our devuan system can not see backported version.
$ sudo apt-cache policy claws-mail
[sudo] password for chomwitt:
claws-mail:
Candidate: 4.1.1-2+b1
Version table:
4.1.1-2+b1 500
500 http://deb.devuan.org/merged daedalus/main amd64 Packages
So we must make apt essentialy download the list of available backported packages:
$ sudo apt-get update
If we run apt-cache policy claws-mail again we will see that the backported newer version is also available.
Installing backports on the command line 🔼
The backports repository by default is low-priority. So, if we want to install a backported package, we have to set specifically in the apt options that choice .
Lets see an installation example of claws-mail :
$ sudo apt-get install claws-mail/daedalus-backports
Alternative syntax:
$ sudo apt-get install daedalus-backports claws-mail
Validate installation of the backported package 🔼
Lets validate know our installed version:
$ dpkg -l claws-mail
ii claws-mail 4.3.1-1~bpo12+1 amd64 Fast, lightweight and user-friendly GTK based email client
Pull backported depedencies 🔼
A backported package could depend on other backported packages. In that case we must add the '-t'(--target-release) option. That will guide apt to prefer backported depedencies when needed.( [@ref](https://wiki.debian.org/Backports))
$ sudo apt-get install -t daedalus-backports <package>