As webmaster, one should test their work in as many browsers as they can. As Kubuntu doesn’t have Firefox installed by default, I decided I probably should install it (Konqueror rocks by the way… :D ). However, when one goes to install firefox, here’s what happens:

ryan@iota> sudo aptitude install firefox                                    ~
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information

Initializing package states... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:

  apturl{a} docbook-xml{a} firefox firefox-3.0{a} firefox-3.0-branding{a}
  gksu{a} gnome-app-install{a} gnome-icon-theme{a} libcairo-perl{a} libgksu2-0{a}
  libglib-perl{a} libgnome2-canvas-perl{a} libgnome2-perl{a}
  libgnome2-vfs-perl{a} libgtk2-perl{a} libgtkhtml2-0{a} libgtop2-7{a}
  libgtop2-common{a} liblaunchpad-integration1{a} librsvg2-common{a}
  libscrollkeeper0{a} libvte-common{a} libvte9{a} python-cairo{a} python-gconf{a}
  python-glade2{a} python-gst0.10{a} python-gtk2{a} python-gtkhtml2{a}
  python-launchpad-integration{a} python-numeric{a} python-pyorbit{a}
  python-sexy{a} python-vte{a} scrollkeeper{a} sgml-data{a}
  software-properties-gtk{a} synaptic{a} ubufox{a} xulrunner-1.9{a} 

0 packages upgraded, 40 newly installed, 0 to remove and 17 not upgraded.
Need to get 20.9MB of archives. After unpacking 87.8MB will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n/?]

Notice, there’s a pile of GNOME cruft, namely synaptic, gksu, that we Kubuntu users don’t necessarily need nor want. Since aptitude does not have super cow powers, we can do the following:

sudo aptitude install firefox-3.0 ubufox= gksu=

Lets take a closer look at what is going on here. We are installing firefox-3.0, but we are asking aptitude not to install ubufox nor gksu and to keep it that way on any future upgrades. To learn more about aptitude’s install options, look at aptitude’s manpage, from line 38 onwards.

This command reduced what we had to install to

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information
Initializing package states... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  firefox-3.0 firefox-3.0-branding{a}
The following packages are RECOMMENDED but will NOT be installed:

  ubufox
0 packages upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 17 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B/1086kB of archives. After unpacking 3854kB will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n/?]

Much better, don’t you think? Two packages to install instead of 40, 1086kB vs 20.9MB to download and 3854kB vs 87.8MB unpacked.

Enjoy,
Ryan