(Sorry about the long lines but they illustrate the output I'm talking about.)
``dpkg -l'' on its own in a terminal produces wide output, e.g.: $ dpkg -l perl* Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold | Status=Not/Installed/Config-files/Unpacked/Failed-config/Half-installed |/ Err?=(none)/Hold/Reinst-required/X=both-problems (Status,Err: uppercase=bad) ||/ Name Version Description +++-===================================-===================================-====================================================================================== ii perl 5.8.3-3 Larry Wall's Practical Extraction and Report Language. .... but when I send its output to a pipe or a file, I get narrow output: $ dpkg -l perl* |head Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold | Status=Not/Installed/Config-files/Unpacked/Failed-config/Half-installed |/ Err?=(none)/Hold/Reinst-required/X=both-problems (Status,Err: uppercase=bad) ||/ Name Version Description +++-==============-==============-============================================ ii perl 5.8.3-3 Larry Wall's Practical Extraction and Report .... I want to dump a complete list of installed packages to a file as part of my backup procedure. man dpkg-query suggests using --showformat=format, in particular: "Package information can be included by inserting variable references to package fields using the ${var[;width]} syntax." But it doesn't say what the variable names are. Suggestions? Thanks, Adam -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]