3.3. Distribution directory

If you want to check the full Debian distribution with Lintian, you have to set up the LINTIAN_DIST variable in the configuration file (or as environment variable). Then, you have to run lintian -S to set up the laboratory and to create lists of all binary and source packages in the distribution. (Note, that this might take some time…)

After that, you can either check single packages simply be running


  $ lintian foo
(without path or extension for the package foo) or check the whole distribution with

  $ lintian --all

Since Lintian needs an up-to-date list of packages in the distribution, you'll have to rerun the lintian -S command whenever the distribution directory has been changed. (But there is no need to remove the laboratory in this situation: Lintian is smart enough to only re-unpack packages that have been changed.)