How can I know the dependencies of a certain package?

Question

Is it possible to list out the dependencies of a software/package in Ubuntu?

Answer 1

apt-cache depends package

apt-cache depends shows a listing of each dependency a package has and all the possible other packages that can fulfill that dependency. (see: man apt-cache)

Answer 2

Install apt-rdepends in Ubuntu

sudo aptitude install apt-rdepends

This will install all the required packages.

Using apt-rdepends

apt-rdepends Syntax

sudo apt-rdepends [options] [pkgs ...]

apt-rdepends Examples

sudo apt-rdepends bash

Output looks like below

Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree… Done
bash
Depends: base-files (>= 2.1.12)
Depends: debianutils (>= 2.15)
PreDepends: libc6 (>= 2.3.6-6)
PreDepends: libncurses5 (>= 5.4-5)
base-files
Depends: awk
Depends: base-passwd (>= 2.0.3.4)

Answer 3

Type dpkg-deb -I file in a terminal. Note "file" represents the package whose dependencies you want to see.