How to find what 'new' packages have been installed?

[NoOp]

On 11/12/2008 12:48 PM, Chris G wrote:
> On Wed, Nov 12, 2008 at 11:49:36AM -0800, NoOp wrote:
>> On 11/12/2008 09:30 AM, Chris G wrote:
>> > Is there a way to find out what packages have been installed by the
>> > user (i.e. me) after the inital installation of an Ubuntu system?
>> > 
>> > I like to record what I have added (and why) in the way of
>> > customisation so that the next time I build a system I have some hints
>> > available. 
>> > 
>> 
>> Open Synaptic and use File|History.
>> 
>> You can then copy & paste to a gedit file and add notes & save for your
>> records.
>> 
>> I'm sure that Synaptic gets the logs from somewhere, so perhaps someone
>> can adivse & you can then access directly.
>> 
> Synaptic's history is only its own history, I tend to do most things
> from the command line using apt-get so they don't appear in synaptic.
> 

OK, then try this:

$ gedit /var/log/dpkg.log

In my log I can see, for example, that I installed nvidia-settings (I
used sudo apt-get install nvidia settings to install) on the 10th of Nov:

2008-11-10 11:28:39 install nvidia-settings <none> 1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:39 status half-installed nvidia-settings
1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:39 status unpacked nvidia-settings 1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:39 status unpacked nvidia-settings 1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:41 startup packages configure
2008-11-10 11:28:41 configure nvidia-settings 1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:41 status unpacked nvidia-settings 1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:42 status half-configured nvidia-settings
1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1
2008-11-10 11:28:42 status installed nvidia-settings 1.0+20080304-0ubuntu1.1

Note that the install doen't show in the Synaptic File|History, but it
does show in the dpkg log.

You'll find previous dpkg logs in the same location.