dpkg-scanpackages(1)                      dpkg utilities                     dpkg-scanpackages(1)



NAME
       dpkg-scanpackages - create Packages index files

SYNOPSIS
       dpkg-scanpackages [option...] binary-dir [override-file [path-prefix]] > Packages

DESCRIPTION
       dpkg-scanpackages  sorts  through  a tree of Debian binary packages and creates a Packages
       file, used by apt(8), dselect(1), etc, to tell the user what packages  are  available  for
       installation. These Packages files are the same as those found on Debian archive sites and
       CD-ROMs. You might use dpkg-scanpackages yourself if making a directory of local  packages
       to install on a cluster of machines.

       Note: If you want to access the generated Packages file with apt you will probably need to
       compress the file with bzip2(1) (generating a Packages.bz2 file) or gzip(1) (generating  a
       Packages.gz  file).  apt  ignores uncompressed Packages files except on local access (i.e.
       file:// sources).

       binary-dir is the name of the tree of the binary packages to process  (for  example,  con‐
       trib/binary-i386).   It  is  best to make this relative to the root of the Debian archive,
       because every Filename field in the new Packages file will start with this string.

       override-file is the name of a file to read which contains information about how the pack‐
       age fits into the distribution (it can be a compressed file); see deb-override(5).

       path-prefix is an optional string to be prepended to the Filename fields.

       If more than one version of a package is found only the newest one is included in the out‐
       put. If they have the same version and only differ in  architecture  only  the  first  one
       found is used.

OPTIONS
       -t, --type type
              Scan for *.type packages, instead of *.deb.

       -e, --extra-override file
              Scan  file  to  find  supplementary  overrides  (the  file  can be compressed). See
              deb-extra-override(5) for more information on its format.

       -a, --arch arch
              Use a pattern consisting of *_all.deb and *_arch.deb instead of  scanning  for  all
              debs.

       -h, --hash hash-list
              Only  generate  file hashes for the comma-specified list specified.  The default is
              to generate all currently supported hashes.  Supported values: md5, sha1, sha256.

       -m, --multiversion
              Include all found packages in the output.

       -M, --medium id-string
              Add an X-Medium field containing the value id-string. This field is required if you
              want to generate Packages.cd files for use by the multicd access method of dselect.

       -?, --help
              Show the usage message and exit.

       --version
              Show the version and exit.

DIAGNOSTICS
       dpkg-scanpackages  outputs the usual self-explanatory errors. It also warns about packages
       that are in the wrong subdirectory, are duplicated, have a Filename field in their control
       file,  are  missing  from the override file, or have maintainer substitutions which do not
       take effect.

SEE ALSO
       dpkg(1), dselect(1), deb-override(5), deb-extra-override(5), dpkg-scansources(1).



Debian Project                              2012-05-07                       dpkg-scanpackages(1)