pkgutil(1) General Commands Manual pkgutil(1)

pkgutilQuery and manipulate macOS Installer packages and receipts.

pkgutil [options] [commands]

pkgutil reads and manipulates macOS Installer flat packages, and provides access to the “receipt” database used by the Installer. Options are processed first, and affect the operation of all commands. Multiple commands are performed sequentially in the given order.

A brief summary of commands and usage.
Don't ask for confirmation before performing a potentially destructive or ambiguous operation.
Output in a "human-readable" format with extra headers, footers, indentation, and other contextual information.
path
Perform all operations on the specified volume or home directory. The root volume '/' will be used if unspecified.
package-id
Specifies an existing receipt to be modified in-place by --learn.
List only files (not directories) in --files listing.
List only directories (not files) in --files listing.
Try to match package-id arguments as a regular expression if an exact match isn't found. See egrep(1) and re_format(7) for syntax.

List all installed package IDs on the specified --volume.
List all installed package IDs on the specified --volume in Mac OS X plist(5) format.
List all installed package IDs matching REGEXP on the specified --volume. The equal sign (=) is required or the search string will be ignored and all package IDs will be returned. Be mindful of escaping characters in both your shell and the regular expression. (Eg, 'pkgutil --pkgs=\\.D' searches for package IDs matching the literal '.D' after escaping the backslash from your shell and then the dot from the regex to make it literal.) Regular expressions are more complex than simple shell globbing. A dot (.) matches any character, while '*' matches zero or more of the previous character. See re_format(7) for a complete description of the syntax.
package-id
List all of the files installed under the package-id.
package-id
Print all receipt information about the specified package-id in the standard Mac OS X plist(5) format.
package-id
Print extended information about the specified package-id.
package-id
Print extended information about the specified package-id in Mac OS X plist(5) format.
package-id
Discard all receipt data about package-id, but do not touch the installed files. DO NOT use this command from an installer package script to fix broken package design.
path
Update the ACLs of the given path in the receipt identified by --edit-pkg. This affects subsequent repair operations on the package. This command be used from package postinstall scripts, but if a postinstall script changes the ACLs on the installed files, the receipt is automatically be updated to reflect those changes. This command will update the filesystem permissions in the receipt.
package-id
List all of the package groups this package-id is a member of.
List all of the package groups on the specified --volume.
List all of the package groups on the specified --volume in Mac OS X plist(5) format.
group-id
List all of the packages that are members of this group-id.
path
Show the metadata known about path.
path
Show the metadata known about path in Mac OS X plist(5) format.

pkg-path dir-path
Expand the flat package at pkg-path into a new directory specified by dir-path.
dir-path pkg-path
Flatten the dir-path into a new flat package created at pkg-path. The directory to be flattened must have the proper contents and layout for a flat package. This is not intended as a substitute for pkgbuild(1).
path
Extract any BOM files from the flat pkg at path into /tmp and return the filename(s). Suggested use is as an argument to lsbom(8). Eg, "lsbom `pkgutil --bom path`". Note that some flat package archives may contain no BOM, one BOM, or several BOMs.
path
List the files archived within the payload of the uninstalled flat package(s) contained at path. This should be equivalent to "lsbom -s `pkgutil --bom path`". Note that flat package archives may contain more than one package, and the destination location for the uninstalled package(s) is unknown to this command.
pkg-path
Check the validity and trust of the signature on the package at pkg-path. In addition to the status of the signature, the associated certificate chain will be shown.

March 2, 2011 Mac OS X