How do I remove debian packages using python apt API

Question

I'm was trying this on Linux mint. I have been researching on how to remove packages using the python-apt API. The piece of code below was all I could come up with but nothing happens when I run it. I am trying to remove a single package right now but later I would like to remove a list of packages from a text file. I tried to use the answer found in this post and re-engineered it for removing but my logic does not work. Please give me some input.

#!/usr/bin/env python
# aptuninnstall.py

import apt
import sys


def remove():
    pkg_name = "chromium-browser"
    cache = apt.cache.Cache()
    cache.update()
    pkg = cache[pkg_name]
    pkg.marked_delete
    resolver = apt.cache.ProblemResolver(cache)
    for pkg in cache.get_changes():
        if pkg.is_installed:
            resolver.remove(pkg)
        else:
            print (pkg_name + " not installed so not removed")
    try:
        cache.commit()
    except Exception, arg:
        print >> sys.stderr, "Sorry, package removal failed [{err}]".format(err=str(arg))

remove()

answerSeeker · Accepted Answer · 2016-12-15 18:29:47Z

After reading the docs and trying different things, I more or less fixed my problem by coming up with the code below. If someone has a better way, please post. I still want to learn a lot

#!/usr/bin/env python
# aptremove.py

import apt
import apt_pkg
import sys


def remove():
    pkg_name = "chromium-browser"
    cache = apt.cache.Cache()
    cache.open(None)
    pkg = cache[pkg_name]
    cache.update()
    pkg.mark_delete(True, purge=True)
    resolver = apt.cache.ProblemResolver(cache)

    if pkg.is_installed is False:
        print (pkg_name + " not installed so not removed")
    else:
        for pkg in cache.get_changes():
            if pkg.mark_delete:
                print pkg_name + " is installed and will be removed"
                print " %d package(s) will be removed" % cache.delete_count
                resolver.remove(pkg)
    try:
        cache.commit()
        cache.close()
    except Exception, arg:
        print >> sys.stderr, "Sorry, package removal failed [{err}]".format(err=str(arg))

remove()

In order to get the package list from a file, I took this approach for now.

#!/usr/bin/env python
# aptremove.py

import apt
import apt_pkg
import sys


def remove():
    cache = apt.cache.Cache()
    cache.open(None)
    resolver = apt.cache.ProblemResolver(cache)

    with open("apps-to-remove") as input:
        for pkg_name in input:
            pkg = cache[pkg_name.strip()]
            pkg.mark_delete(True, purge=True)
        input.close()
        cache.update()

    if pkg.is_installed is False:
        print (pkg_name + " not installed so not removed")
    else:
        for pkg in cache.get_changes():
            if pkg.mark_delete:
                print pkg_name + " is installed and will be removed"
                print " %d package(s) will be removed" % cache.delete_count
                resolver.remove(pkg)
    try:
        cache.commit()
        cache.close()
        print "starting"
    except Exception, arg:
        print >> sys.stderr, "Sorry, package removal failed [{err}]".format(err=str(arg))

remove()

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