Is it safe to remove Ruby on 17.10?

Question

I wanted to remove Ruby from my system as I do not use it. However, after past experience (removed Python 2.7 ...) I have learnt not to do so without checking the dependencies.

The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
fonts-lato ruby-did-you-mean ruby-minitest ruby-net-telnet ruby-power-assert
  rubygems-integration

Are any of these packages important to the system? Does the Ubuntu system depend on Ruby in any way for that matter?

Although the question mentions 17.10 , I would like to know dependency of any other system as well. — Ankur S, Dec 14 '17 at 17:52
See https://askubuntu.com/q/13296/295286 You can find out what depends on specific package before removing — Sergiy Kolodyazhnyy, Dec 14 '17 at 20:41

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 14 '17 at 18:29

Yes, it's fairly safe.

First of all, what you list there is the autoremove-packages. apt-get lists two things, when removing:

Packages that were installed due to depencies by the package you're uninstalling
Packages that depends on the one you want to uninstall, that will also be uninstalled.

The first category is listed under The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required: and the second category as The following packages will be REMOVED:

Packages listed under autoremove section is packages that were installed due to the package you are trying to remove (or a previously installed package that was removed).

Packages listed under the will be removed is packages that depends on the package you are uninstalling. If nothing depends on it, it's generally safe to uninstall.

Is it safe to remove Ruby on 17.10?

1 Answers1