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I'm trying to create a list of all packages currently installed in my system with apt list --installed for backup / migration purposes.

I noticed that I get somehow unexpected output:

....

chromium-browser/now 53.0.2785.143-0ubuntu0.16.04.1.1257 arm64 [installed,upgradable to: 62.0.3202.94-0ubuntu0.16.04.1317]
chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra/now 53.0.2785.143-0ubuntu0.16.04.1.1257 arm64 [installed,upgradable to: 62.0.3202.94-0ubuntu0.16.04.1317]
cmake/xenial-updates,**now** 3.5.1-1ubuntu3 arm64 [installed]
cmake-data/xenial-updates,**now** 3.5.1-1ubuntu3 all [installed,automatic]
colord/xenial,**now** 1.2.12-1ubuntu1 arm64 [installed,automatic]

....

It's almost clear what the output means with the exception of the now term.

e.g. xenial since I'm using 16.04, next the "version", architecture and installation type.

I tried skimming through the apt man page but I wasn't able to find any reference to the list option except that it is experimental.

Could anyone point me to the correct documentation or explain what does this mean?

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now refers to the currently installed version, that’s all. When you see it on its own, it means that the installed package isn’t in the configured repositories (usually because an upgrade is available, as is the case above). Otherwise it’s listed alongside the repositories containing the package.

It’s equivalent to /var/lib/dpkg/status in apt-cache policy’s output.

See What is the format of the "apt search" output on debian / ubuntu? for more details.

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  • Thank you for the answer. I still don't understand why I would need to see this 'now' marker. I already know that this version is installed since I generated the output with list --installed and it wouldn't make sense to show another version. Does anyone know a real usecase? Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 14:59
  • The use case is all the cases where you don’t specify --installed, with the idea that the output format should stay the same whether or not --installed is specified. A similar output format is used for apt search too. Commented Dec 6, 2017 at 15:36

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