Ubuntu – Where do I look for the reason for the removal of a package from the Ubuntu repositories

official-repositoriespackage-managementrepository

I have seen that when a new Ubuntu version is released, sometimes a particular application that I had used till the previous Ubuntu versions would have been removed from the Ubuntu repositories for the latest release.
Who can makes such decisions( a particular Launchpad team/individual,etc..), and which mailing-list(or other resource) should I look to find the exact reason for removal of the package from the latest Ubuntu release.

e.g: Kompozer has been removed from the repository for Quantal

Best Answer

Most packages that are removed from Universe inherit that state from Debian. In order to find out the status of a package you can use the Debian Package Tracking System (PTS) to look it up:

http://packages.qa.debian.org/k/kompozer.html

Has the answer:

------------------- Reason -------------------
ROM; dead upstream
----------------------------------------------

This means the author(s) of the program have abandoned it.

Related Solutions

Ubuntu – How to Find Out If an Updated Program Lands in Official Ubuntu Repositories

There is no list that covers all yet, especially for possible future updates/upgrades. Maybe somebody can work on this ...

That is what I could find out so far: If a program is updated/upgraded, it will be automatically added to the software centre (and will be updated by the system), viewable also with Synaptic (needs install) and apt-cache (command line). The page packages.ubuntu.com shows past updates, but do not inform what the future will hold.

Stable Release Update/Backport
Every SRU (Stable Release Update) and Backport is manually requested. SRUs are done only to fix an important bug. Backports are done upon request, if volunteers and resources are available. Requests for packaging and/or backports are generally tracked as bugs. They are not really bugs, of course. But bug trackers usually track more than just bugs, see backports list. If you poke around in Launchpad, you should quickly find the similar tracking lists for the Packaging Team, the Security Team, and the SRU Team. There is doubt that tentative release dates are realistic for most packages, since many backporters seem to work more-or-less at random from the list. If some backporter has specific interests, then they could certainly post ETA dates in the comments and assign the package to themself.

PPAs and alternative repositories
As there are not many significant updates/upgrades that are added in the official repositories of a Ubuntu release (although this might change with future LTS releases), PPAs and alternative repositories are chosen by a lot of people, but it takes time to find them:
I would also promote a list of PPAs and alternative repositories, but this is not supported by Canonical as many PPAs and alternative repositories can cause problems to a system. But a list with the possibility of rating and comments (problem, success) would be better as the scattered information without or little feedback from the community. Unfortunately the Ubuntu brainstorm page will be closed, so I add this idea to this answer, perhaps somebody knowledgeable reads it and can work on it. There is a related brainstorm idea regarding this topic as long as Ubuntu Brainstorm exists.

Ubuntu – How to get a list of all packages installed from PPAs even for PPA repositories that may have been removed

You may search for installed obsolete packages, either locally installed or their source repository is disabled)

aptitude search '?narrow(?installed, ~o)'

Also if you want both obsolete + ppa ones:

aptitude search '?narrow(?installed, ~Oppa | ~o)'

Reference: aptitude - Search term reference

Best Answer

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Ubuntu – How to Find Out If an Updated Program Lands in Official Ubuntu Repositories

Ubuntu – How to get a list of all packages installed from PPAs even for PPA repositories that may have been removed

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