Ubuntu – Which Programs Are Included In The LiveCD That Are Removed Upon Installation

13.10aptlive-cdpreinstallation

I've noticed when booting up Ubuntu 13.10 – Desktop X86-64 disc in "Try Without Installing" mode that Gparted is pre-installed, however if you install Ubuntu to your hard drive the package is removed (or purged? not sure which) during the installation process.

I know for a fact that Gparted is pre-installed in the LiveCD rather than installed by script during LiveCD boot, because I've examined the filesystem.squashfs file. This makes me wonder what other programs are pre-installed but removed during installation. Is there a full listing available somewhere?

Best Answer

https://askubuntu.com/a/436700/248158 is a great answer but if you no longer have the file iso/casper/filesystem.manifest-remove to look at the list or just want another way you may be able to get the information (in more ugly form) from /var/log/apt.

  • Assuming you have the oldest compressed history.log file available (which you normally should have if you did a clean install of 13.10 (and don't use things like Bleachbit)), you should see something close to this:

    $ ls -l /var/log/apt
    total 120
    -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 5024 Mar 19 07:40 history.log
    -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1252 Feb 27 07:29 history.log.1.gz
    -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2156 Jan 31 06:03 history.log.2.gz
    -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1288 Dec 31 11:14 history.log.3.gz
    -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 3232 Nov 27 07:22 history.log.4.gz
    -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 18813 Oct 31 07:11 history.log.5.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 root adm 28064 Mar 19 07:40 term.log
    -rw-r----- 1 root adm 3331 Feb 27 07:29 term.log.1.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 root adm 4862 Jan 31 06:03 term.log.2.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 root adm 3685 Dec 31 11:14 term.log.3.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 root adm 9058 Nov 27 07:22 term.log.4.gz
    -rw-r----- 1 root adm 12452 Oct 31 07:11 term.log.5.gz
    $

  • In here, history.log.5.gz is of interest. So, to get the uncompressed version, run:

    zcat /var/log/apt/history.log.5.gz > ~/Desktop/output.txt

  • Look at that file with the text editor you like. Looking from the top, you'll see a lot of "installs" (very long lines) but if you go down carefully a few lines, you'll come to a line beginning with Purge:. That is also a very long line and will list the packages, including gparted, removed as part of the setting up of your OS.

  • If you like the terminal, you can extract only that line with:

    grep -m 1 "Purge:" ~/Desktop/output.txt

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