aptitude vs apt-get vs apt

aptitude update, apt-get update, apt update do the same job. Then what is the difference between them? We explained the basic of Advanced Packaging Tool (apt) and aptitude in the linked old article. Let us first discuss aptitude and apt-get.

aptitude, apt-get and apt are front ends to dpkg. aptitude provides a terminal menu interface whereas apt-get does not. Using aptitude TUI as a normal user is a good idea to avoid messing up your system. aptitude lets you undo changes. As it’s running as a normal user mode, at certain which point it will prompt to get the root password. Aptitude’s GTK GUI was considered experimental (aptitude-gtk). aptitude uses the ncurses library, which provides the character-based user interface. APT is a big project and apt-get was developed within it as first sub-project. apt is newer CLI. There is some unofficial project which does the job of aptitude, apt-get and apt.

aptitude is a user-level program but apt-get is for use by higher-level programs. aptitude has an additional layer stored in the packet states (package states). There, the registered software packages and dependencies are written. Furthermore, aptitude maintains a full log of the entire installation history and dependencies. It is humans who find apt-get easy instead of aptitude, definitely to avoid a typographical error. aptitude user-friendly while dpkg is the least user-friendly. aptitude and apt-get use the same repositories. So, if a command works with aptitude, apt-get and apt, then there is no actual difference in most use-cases. There is no single “apt” program. apt is a collection of tools. The apt command is meant to be pleasant. A significant part of apt is a C++ library of function.

The apt update command is like the apt-get update with colour output and the number of upgradeable packages.
apt install is like an apt-get update command with progress output.
apt upgrade is like apt-get upgrade –with-new-pkgs.*
The apt list command is similar to the dpkg list command.
apt edit-sources is for editing the sources.list file using a default text editor.

We can disable/enable the progress bar of apt :

aptitude will automatically remove eligible packages but apt-get requires a separate command. aptitude has the scripts to tell you which installed packages are preventing action. So, from all aspect, aptitude is powerful and apt is shorter and easy to type.

aptitude in TUI

So, aptitude is a heavy program suitable for anyone.

You can use aptitude on Windows Ubuntu Bash too. Just install it by running apt-get install aptitude. Just run the command aptitude to launch the TUI. The eater egg of aptitude starts with aptitude install moo. You may have to add some -v flag to see the graphics. I got an odd outline running aptitude moo -vvvvv. Running aptitude moo -vvvvvv I got the answer “”What is it? It’s an elephant being eaten by a snake, of course.

I do not know more about aptitude till you search another question.