How To Install afew on Debian 11

One-liner install command

For those in a hurry, here's a one-line installation command:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt -y install afew

But if you are interested in the detailed steps with descriptions, the following information is for you.

What is afew and what are the ways to install it?

Before beginning this tutorial, you will need access to a server or computer running Debian 11. This guide was written specifically with a server running Debian 11 in mind, although it should also work on older, supported versions of the operating system.

Also, make sure you are running a regular, non-root user with sudo privileges configured on your server. When you have an account available, log in as your non-root user to begin.

There are several ways to install afew on Debian 11. You can use (links are clickable):

In the following sections, we will describe each method in detail. You can choose one of them or refer to the recommended one.

Install afew using apt-get

First, update apt database with apt-get using the following command.

sudo apt-get update

After updating apt-get database, You can install afew using apt by running the following command:

sudo apt -y install afew

Install afew using apt

Because afew is available in Debian 11’s default repositories, it is possible to install it from these repositories using the apt packaging system.

To begin, update apt database with apt using the following command.

sudo apt update

After updating apt database, You can install afew using apt by running the following command:

sudo apt -y install afew

Install afew using aptitude

If you want to follow this method, you might need to install aptitude first since aptitude is usually not installed by default on Debian 11. Update apt database with aptitude using the following command.

sudo aptitude update

After updating aptitude database, You can install afew by running the following command:

sudo aptitude -y install afew

How to upgrade (update) a single package afew using apt-get?

First, you will need to update packages index. Run update command as usual:

sudo apt-get update

Next, to upgrade only the afew, e.g. single package, you should use the following format with the apt-get command/apt command:

sudo apt-get --only-upgrade install afew

Note that this command will not install any new packages! If you wish to install the package if it doesn't exist you may leave out --only-upgrade part.

sudo apt-get install afew

How To Uninstall afew from Debian 11

To uninstall only the afew package you can execute the following command:

sudo apt-get remove afew

Uninstall afew and all its dependencies

To uninstall afew and its dependencies that are no longer needed by Debian 11, you can use the command below:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove afew

Remove afew with all configurations and data

To remove afew configuration and data from your system you can run the following purge command:

sudo apt-get -y purge afew

Remove afew completely (configurations, data and all of its dependencies)

And lastly, you can run the next command to remove absolutely everything related to afew package, e.g.: configurations, data and all of its dependencies. Just use this command:

sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge afew

Extra info and code examples

The basic task of afew is to provide automatic tagging each time new mail is registered with notmuch. In a classic setup, you might call it after 'notmuch new' in an offlineimap post sync hook. In addition to more elementary features such as adding tags based on email headers or maildir folders, handling killed threads and spam, it can do some heavy magic in order to /learn/ how to initially tag your mails based on their content. In move mode, afew will move mails between maildir folders according to configurable rules that can contain arbitrary notmuch queries to match against any searchable attributes.

Conclusion

You now have a full guide on how to install afew using apt, apt-get and aptitude tools. Also, we showed how to update as a single package and different ways to uninstall the afew from Debian 11.

See also: