find and install the 'latest' package

[Craig White]

On Mon, 2011-12-26 at 21:22 -0800, Rajeev Prasad wrote:
> i can go to web and check the the packages for a ubuntu release, but
> how can i search and install the latest version of  a package without
> knowing what is the latest version: for example for mysql, php, perl,
> apache, openssl etc...
----
short answer, the latest version will automatically be installed.

longer answer, depends upon which tools you use to install software and
which version of Ubuntu you are using.

Assuming that you are using 11.11 (oneric), and apt/aptitude...

sudo apt-get update # updates package cache
sudo apt-get install $SOMETHING

will install the latest version.

Likewise, you can always ensure you have the latest versions of
everything by doing...

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

If you use GUI tools such as synaptic, I believe that they will perform
the 'update' on launch so they will install the latest version.

Then there's the possibility that a PPA exists that has newer versions
but those should probably be avoided by new users. Generally mainstream
packages such as the ones you mentioned are very close to current.

Lastly, LTS versions (ie, Lucid/10.04) don't necessarily have the
'latest' versions but tend to remain on the 'stable' versions that were
chosen at the outset and patched for security issues if any.

Lastly, 'latest' version of packages is often a relative concept since
many of the upstream projects have 'stable' and 'pre-release' versions.
Most users of the base server packages such as the ones you mentioned
would definitely prefer the stable versions (patched for security issues
of course) and the concept of 'latest' is not always desired.

Craig



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