Debian 6.0.6 apt-get "unable to locate package" - how do I find the package?

Question

I'm running Debian 6.0.6 and trying to install libeigen3-dev using:

sudo apt-get install libeigen3-dev

But I get the following output:

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E:Unable to locate package libeigen3-dev

So I looked up libeigen3-dev and I got the following page: http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=libeigen3-dev

It appears libeigen3 is available, but I need to get it in apt-get for installation on multiple systems using a shell script.

Here's the content of sources.list:

# 

# deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.6 _Squeeze_ - Official i386 CD Binary-1 20120929-15:56]/ squeeze main

# deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.6 _Squeeze_ - Official i386 CD Binary-1 20120929-15:56]/ squeeze main

deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ squeeze main
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ squeeze main

deb http://security.debian.org/ squeeze/updates main
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ squeeze/updates main

# squeeze-updates, previously known as 'volatile'
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ squeeze-updates main
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ squeeze-updates main

How do I figure out what to add to sources.list in order to make it work with apt-get?

Solution

wget http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/pool/main/e/eigen3/libeigen3-dev_3.1.0-1_i386.deb

dpkg -i libeigen3-dev_3.1.0-1_i386.deb

rm libeigen3-dev_3.1.0-1_i386.deb

these 3 commands do in order:

1. download and store the package to current path
2. Installation of the same package
3. (Skippable) removal of the installation package

Hope it helps you.

note: replace the url for the package for any version you need.
note2: dpkg needs root user login or sudo.

note3: there is a repo for wheezy - deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian wheezy main , but i would recommend installing only the package, not a repo add.

Comments

[Victor Rocheron]

Thanks, that's what I needed. I took your advice and set up the script to install it using the wget method, that's just as good as apt-get for our purposes. Unfortunately there was another error, but that's in another part of the process and not related to this issue. :)