I am often interested in the installation triggers (postinst, postrm) or certain parts of packages (like `/usr/share` and `/etc`). Currently, I am running the next command to retrieve the source code:

```
apt-get source [package-name]

```

The downside is, this file is often much bigger than the binary package and does not reflect the installation tree.

Right now, I am downloading the packages through <http://packages.ubuntu.com/>:

1. [Search for `[package-name]`](http://packages.ubuntu.com/search?keywords=mysql&searchon=names&suite=maverick&section=all)
2. [Select the package](http://packages.ubuntu.com/maverick/mysql-server-5.1)
3. [Click on amd64/i386 for download](http://packages.ubuntu.com/maverick/amd64/mysql-server-5.1/download)
4. Download the actual file

This takes too long for me and as someone who really likes the shell, I would like to do something like the next (*imaginary*) command:

```
apt-get get-deb-file [package-name]

```

I could not find something like this in the [apt-get manual page](http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/maverick/en/man8/apt-get.8.html). The most close I found was the `--download-only` switch, but this puts the package in `/var/cache/apt/archives` (which requires root permissions) and not in the current directory.