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Much of why Debian is a strong Linux distribution comes from the core of Debian namely its package management. Everything in Debian – every application, every component – everything – is built into a package, and then that package is installed onto your system (either by the Installer, or by you).
There are over 29 thousand software packages available for Debian – everything from the Linux kernel to games.
What is APT?
APT (for Advanced Package Tool) is a set of tools for managing Debian packages, and therefore the applications installed on your Debian system. APT makes it possible to:
- Install applications
- Remove applications
- Keep your applications up to date
- and much more...
How to use?
See DebianPackageManagement section.
APT resolves dependency problems and retrieves requested packages from designated package repositories. APT delegates the actual installation and removal of packages to dpkg. APT is primarily used by commandline tools, but
there are many GUI tools to let you use APT without having to touch the command line.
tools like aptitude can interact with APT via both command line and TUI interfaces.
Further Reading
tools
AptCLI - basics of using APT on the commandline
apt-get - probably the most widely-used APT commandline tool
aptitude - a tool that can (among other things) drive APT from commandline or TUI
Synaptic - a graphical APT package manager
AptTools - yet more APT tools
configuration
SourcesList - lists package repositories
AptPreferences - details where and when to retrieve packages
AptConf - even more detailed APT configuration
security
SecureApt - configure APT to retrieve packages from authenticated repositories