remove residual config packages/files from the command line

[pythonscript]

In synaptic, there's an option in the package manager to mark residual config files/packages for complete removal, and I'm wondering how to do this from the command line. I ran

sudo deborphan | xargs sudo apt-get purge -y
sudo apt-get autoremove -y
sudo apt-get clean

but some packages still show up in synaptic, so clearly, these commands aren't removing everything. My main laptop runs a command line ubuntu interface with icewm on top, so I primarily use the command line, and I'd like to know how to remove residual config packages from the command line. Maybe something using dpkg -l to search for packages labeled "rc?" Thanks!

[sahabcse]

Hi

For complete removal

sudo apt-get purge packagename


more info

[pythonscript]

I know about apt-get purge, but what if I don't remember what the packages are? When I looked in synaptic in gnome, there were packages from a while back that still had config files left all over my system, so is there a way from the command line to run purge for all packages that have already been installed? Thanks!

[sahabcse]

this may be help

http://www.debian-administration.org...ebian_packages.

[pythonscript]

Let me rephrase my question... How can I use "dpkg -l" or "dpkg-query" so it will only show the output of packages labeled as "rc?" (As opposed to those labeled "ii" etc). Thanks!

[unutbu]

Maybe this will do?

dpkg-query -W -f='${Package}\t${Status}\n' | awk '/deinstall/{print $1}'