Debian – In synaptic, is there a way to always expand “Details” when installing a package

aptdebiansynaptic

While using synaptic and update-manager in Debian (I'm using unstable), I always like to see what it is doing while installing and always manually expand the "Show installing files" and "Details" tabs. Is there a way to make this a permanent setting?

Best Answer

On the General tab of preferences, there is an option labelled "Apply changes in a terminal window".

While this is likely a bit MORE detail than you'd like, I haven't found a way to automatically enable the 'mid-level' detail that the 'Details' selectors show.

But you can see what's going on, at least. Give it a try.

Found a way!

If you look in /usr/share/synaptic/gtkbuilder, you'll find a bunch of 'ui' files, containing the information to build/display the various windows shown.

As an example, to default enable the 'Show Details' button, look in the file windows_summary.ui:

Near line 392:

<object class="GtkToggleButton" id="togglebutton_details">
    <property name="visible">True</property>
    <property name="can_focus">True</property>
    <property name="label" translatable="yes">_Show Details</property>
    <property name="use_underline">True</property>
    <property name="relief">GTK_RELIEF_NORMAL</property>
    <property name="focus_on_click">True</property>
    <property name="active">False</property>
    <property name="inconsistent">False</property>
</object>

If you look in there, you'll find a property named "active", set as False.

If you change that to True, the window will be displayed with that button enabled, thus giving you the default Details shown like you want.

Of course, if synaptic gets upgraded, it'll get 'fixed', but it doesn't get upgraded THAT often, so this would be a decent fix for your desires.

Search the rest of the 'ui' files for the (English) text of the menus you're looking to change defaults for, and you can make them all show details as you wish.

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