Ubuntu

What is the difference between “MAIN” & “SOURCE CODE” options?

Asked by Navin Talati

Respected Friends,

In 'Software & Updates', there will be a list of Canonical Partners, Independent, and some PPAs etc. In the window of 'Other Software'. There are check box beside each line. Almost every item are listed by TWO lines, one as MAIN and the second as MAIN (SOURCE CODE).
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e.g.
Canonical Partners
Software packaged by Canonical for their partners

Canonical Partners (Source Code)
Software packaged by Canonical for their partners

Independent
Provided by third-party software developers

Independent (Source Code)
Provided by third-party software developers

http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu trusty main
http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu trusty main (Source Code)

.... and so on........
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As I am technically very poor, I am not able to understand the meanings of these boxes to be Ticked or Un-Ticked.
Here, in my computer, the status is like under:

1.
Both “Canonical Partners” & “Canonical Partners (Source Code)” boxes are unticked.
What happens if I DO or UNDO each of them?

2
Both “Independent” & “Independent (Source Code)” boxes are ticked. Why? Can I untick them?

3.
In http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu trusty main, the box is ticked, while
in http://ppa.launchpad.net/libreoffice/ppa/ubuntu trusty main (Source Code), the box is unticked.
Why so? What happens if both are ticked, unticked, or reversely ticked?

Sirs, this might be a very basic matter for you all technically learned people, but it is an issue for me essential to understand and learn.
Hope your estyeemed-self shell help me in this self-learning motivaqtive efforts of mine !

Thank yo all in anticipation.,
Navin Talati / 06-07-2014

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Solved by:
Manfred Hampl
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Revision history for this message
Thomas Krüger (thkrueger) said : 		#1

For most of the software repositories there is an additional "source" repository. The main repository usually contains the software as it is or will be installed in Ubuntu. The source repository contains the source code of the software, including the script and metadata needed for packaging. It is not required if you are not planing to do code level changes to the packaged software. Most endusers don't.

To retrieve the source you can use "apt-get source" as described in "man apt-get".

Revision history for this message
Navin Talati (n-m-talati) said : 		#2

Thanks sir for explaining the core basic of the theory.
In my questions 1, 2, and 3 what is the

(a)..........effect of presently ticked or unticked boxes in each case with a specific software:
(b)..........effect if I reverse the presently ticked/unticked boxes in that softwares.
step to step guidance is requested.
Thanks

Revision history for this message
Best Manfred Hampl (m-hampl) said : 		#3

Suggested reading:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Repositories
and
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Repositories/Ubuntu

For any repository: for installing and/or updating the binary package, you need the binary repository (the entry without "source code") enabled. The "source code" repository has an effect only if you want to download the program source for compiling yourself, or for changing something in the software source. This is something that normal users normally will not do. Having the source code repositories enabled will not do any harm anyhow, the only effect will be that during package update a few MiB of additional data have to be downloaded, but I think this can be neglected.

For any repository: If you enable a repository, install some software package from that repository, and then disable that repository from your sources.list, you will not get updates from that repository for your packages any more, but the installed package will continue to function.

Revision history for this message
Navin Talati (n-m-talati) said : 		#4

Thanks Manfred Hampl, that solved my question.