I sometimes install .deb files that have a "Provides" field. From what I understand, if e.g. a package called "expack" is listed here then if another .deb file depends on expack it will not need to install it (if I do apt-get). But if I do apt-cache show expack then it will not show that it's installed. So how do I check that the 'expack' dependency is installed (without using a specific package that depends on 'expack', just using only the argument 'expack') ?
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Here's the answer:
apt-cache showpkg expack
Source: Commrent below by Xu-Wang
Also, the whereis command works in most cases to show these packages and their path or location as well.
whereis expack
here's the output:
expack: /usr/games/expack /usr/share/man/man1/expack.1.gz
This shows that expack is installed and the location is "/usr/games/expack" .
Also, packages that are typically provided by other packages in virtual packages will typically show using the apt-cache search command
apt-cache search expack
here's the output
exult-studio - tools for editing and viewing exult games
So, exult-studio provides expack and satisfies the dependency expack according to http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-relationships.html (see 7.5 virtual packages)
where expack = bar and exult-studio = bar-plus.
To see a list of a packages dependencies and to also see if the dependencies are already installed, use the application apt-rdepends
sudo apt-get apt-rdepends
To list dependencies and status of all dependencies as well use apt-rdepends -p
apt-rdepends -p packagename
