Bug#1109196: apt: provide a way to automatically mark 'auto' all packages that don't need to stay manual

On 13/07/25 at 11:49 +0200, Lucas Nussbaum wrote:
> Package: apt
> Version: 3.0.3
> Severity: wishlist
> Tags: patch
> 
> Hi,
> 
> When cleaning up cruft in a system, I used to use debfoster, which is
> nice because it allows me to get a short list of packages that are
> really the ones I want to keep, excluding all packages that are
> dependencies (or installed for other reasons).
> 
> I understand apt-mark manual/auto is the new way to solve this, but I'm
> missing a tool that analyzes my system and provides a list of packages
> that can safely be marked 'auto'.
> 
> 'apt-mark minimize-manual' doesn't really do that, because it only looks at
> dependencies of meta packages.
> 
> I wrote a POC (using AI) to demonstrate what I mean:
> https://salsa.debian.org/lucas/apt-suggest-auto
> 
> But I wonder if you would consider adding similar functionality in apt
> directly (typically by replacing the current implementation in apt-mark
> minimize-manual, or adding another subcommand).

Hi,

A merge request to integrate this into apt-mark:
https://salsa.debian.org/apt-team/apt/-/merge_requests/502

Lucas