Quick hack to get a more comfortable search tool on APT-based distros. Inspired by gentoo's wonderful `eix'.

aix

#!/usr/bin/python

class AnsiColor:
        default = '\033[00;30m'
        bold = '\033[01;30m'
        green = '\033[00;32m'
        boldgreen = '\033[01;32m'
        boldred = '\033[01;31m'
        pass

def human_readable_size(size):
        from math import log
        size = float(size)
        exp = max(int(log(size, 1024)), 0)
        mant = int(.5 + size / float(1024**exp))
        return '{0} {1}'.format(mant, ('Byte', 'KB', 'MB', 'GB', 'TB', 'PB')[exp])

def more_info(pkg):
        ret = []
        if pkg.is_installed:
                ret.append('{0.boldgreen}(installed)'.format(AnsiColor))
        if pkg.essential:
                ret.append('{0.boldred}(essential)'.format(AnsiColor))
        return AnsiColor.default+' '.join(ret)

def main():
        import apt, re, sys

        if len(sys.argv) < 2:
                print """Usage: aix [query]
[query] is a (python) regex that the package name must match"""
                return 1

        query = re.compile(sys.argv[1])
        cache = apt.Cache()
        for k in filter(lambda x: query.search(x), cache.keys()):
                p = cache[k]

                print '{1.boldgreen}*{1.default} {0.section}/{1.bold}{0.name}{1.default}'.format(p, AnsiColor),more_info(p)
                print '\t{1.green}Size:{1.default}            {0}'.format(human_readable_size(p.candidate.size), AnsiColor)
                if p.candidate.homepage != '':
                        print '\t{1.green}Homepage:{1.default}        {0.homepage}'.format(p.candidate, AnsiColor)
                print '\t{1.green}Description:{1.default}     {0.summary}'.format(p.candidate, AnsiColor)
                print

if __name__ == "__main__":
        main()