unknown
The unknown
part comes from the entry for Suite
key in Release
file for a debian repository. I think you've generated a local repository without properly setting the required keys for the Release (or InRelease
)file and that's why apt
shows unknown
.
For example, a typical standard Release file may have these entries (taken from Ubuntu's official repository's InRelease
file)
Origin: Ubuntu
Label: Ubuntu
Suite: zesty
Version: 17.04
Codename: zesty
Date: Wed, 12 Apr 2017 2:53:23 UTC
Architectures: amd64 arm64 armhf i386 ppc64el s390x
Check this section of debian wiki for more information about Release file format.
And check this slightly old but my favorite guide to create a proper Ubuntu local repository.
now
now
refers to the version of the package currently installed (and thus considered available). The info is maintained in /var/lib/dpkg/status
file. I have these entries in apt list --installed
zlib1g/zesty,now 1:1.2.11.dfsg-0ubuntu1 amd64 [installed]
zlib1g-dev/ubuntu-local,zesty,now 1:1.2.11.dfsg-0ubuntu1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
zsync/zesty,now 0.6.2-2ubuntu1 amd64 [installed]
As you can see zsync
has a now
entry which means it's installed and available as such. If you see no other entries except now
it would mean you have a package installed which isn't available to reinstall from any known repository.
Here is the output of apt policy zsync
again from the same system.
zsync:
Installed: 0.6.2-2ubuntu1
Candidate: 0.6.2-2ubuntu1
Version table:
*** 0.6.2-2ubuntu1 500
500 http://bd.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu zesty/universe amd64 Packages
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
0.6.2-1ubuntu1 500
500 file:/mnt/Data/Software/Linux/Debian_Packages/xenial_debs2 Packages
As you can see /var/lib/dpkg/status
was listed as a repo for zsync
which means it's currently installed.