How To Install gpg-agent on Ubuntu 18.04
Introduction
In this tutorial we learn how to install gpg-agent on Ubuntu 18.04.
What is gpg-agent
gpg-agent is:
GnuPG is GNU’s tool for secure communication and data storage. It can be used to encrypt data and to create digital signatures. It includes an advanced key management facility and is compliant with the proposed OpenPGP Internet standard as described in RFC4880.
This package contains the agent program gpg-agent which handles all secret key material for OpenPGP and S/MIME use. The agent also provides a passphrase cache, which is used by pre-2.1 versions of GnuPG for OpenPGP operations. Without this package, trying to do secret-key operations with any part of the modern GnuPG suite will fail.
There are three methods to install gpg-agent on Ubuntu 18.04. We can use apt-get, apt and aptitude. In the following sections we will describe each method. You can choose one of them.
Install gpg-agent Using apt-get
Update apt database with apt-get using the following command.
sudo apt-get update
After updating apt database, We can install gpg-agent using apt-get by running the following command:
sudo apt-get -y install gpg-agent
Install gpg-agent Using apt
Update apt database with apt using the following command.
sudo apt update
After updating apt database, We can install gpg-agent using apt by running the following command:
sudo apt -y install gpg-agent
Install gpg-agent Using aptitude
If you want to follow this method, you might need to install aptitude first since aptitude is usually not installed by default on Ubuntu. Update apt database with aptitude using the following command.
sudo aptitude update
After updating apt database, We can install gpg-agent using aptitude by running the following command:
sudo aptitude -y install gpg-agent
How To Uninstall gpg-agent on Ubuntu 18.04
To uninstall only the gpg-agent package we can use the following command:
sudo apt-get remove gpg-agent
Uninstall gpg-agent And Its Dependencies
To uninstall gpg-agent and its dependencies that are no longer needed by Ubuntu 18.04, we can use the command below:
sudo apt-get -y autoremove gpg-agent
Remove gpg-agent Configurations and Data
To remove gpg-agent configuration and data from Ubuntu 18.04 we can use the following command:
sudo apt-get -y purge gpg-agent
Remove gpg-agent configuration, data, and all of its dependencies
We can use the following command to remove gpg-agent configurations, data and all of its dependencies, we can use the following command:
sudo apt-get -y autoremove --purge gpg-agent
References
Summary
In this tutorial we learn how to install gpg-agent package on Ubuntu 18.04 using different package management tools: apt, apt-get and aptitude.
