Whenever I'm writing a software package related question or answer, I ask myself how to call those .deb files, since everybody keeps calling them what he wants. Options I came up with are:
What would be a good way to call them? / Is there any "official" name?
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Debian package
Vote for this answer if you think it should be:
.deb package
Debian seems to call them Debian package or ".deb" file as evidenced in their FAQ question:
[OT FYI: "The Linux Filesystem Standard" says you can put "foreign" packages in /usr/local/ and manage them individually yourself]
Debian packages and .deb packages, perhaps?
Debian Package, but being such a detail oriented Q I thought this was different enough from ".deb package", and there was no ".deb file" yet (some people may never call them "files"?). And the perspective from "the horses's mouth" (Debian.org) together seemed like enough for it's own answer...
Debian package has the major downside that it looks like it means “package from the Debian distribution” and not “package in the Debian format”. So I recommend to avoid it on this site (unless you do mean a package from Debian as opposed to Ubuntu, but then you should make that explicit).
Debian package also doesn't distinguish between a binary package (.deb) and a source package (.dsc and the files it lists).
In an Ubuntu context, “binary package” is often fine. This needs to be avoided only when discussing Ubuntu packages vs downloading a generic Linux binary (or a package to convert with alien).
Otherwise you can call it a deb package or deb file. Regardless of whether authorities use that wording, it is good because it is both transparent and unambiguous.
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Ubuntu package
(I added this in :)
This is actually kind of a complicated question, depending on why you're asking, and more specifically, the behavior you expect.
All .deb files are "Debian packages", and that is technically correct, regardless of the distro or version of distro you're referring to. The same is true of "RPM", as all are "Red Hat packages". Specific files refer to the utilities to manage them, namely dpkg (The Debian Package Manager) and RPM (The Red Hat Package Manager).
The confusion stems from the fact that in addition to "installing packages", most users are used to "installing software", which is a complex process of "finding the software, installing it's dependencies, unpacking it, and configuring it for use on a user's system."
For instance... as of today (1 Jan, 2015), downloading and installing the sudo package from Ubuntu Trusty on an x86_64 system doesn't matter if you do:
wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/ubuntu/pool/main/s/sudo/sudo_1.8.9p5-1ubuntu1_amd64.deb; sudo dpkg -i sudo_1.8.9p5-1ubuntu1_amd64.deb
or:
sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install sudo -y
Deviations from that cause problems even with timing.
The dpkg file in question here has some specific things going for it.
Attempts to install this Debian package via dpkg will (almost) always fail on say, Raspbian, which is built with Debian dependencies and a different architecture.
However, using:
apt-get install sudo
Will almost always work. The difference lies in how the package manager, and the dependency resolver, are configured.
If you want a user to install "sudo", you should refer them to their dependency resolve, like aptitude, yum, or apt-get.
If you want them to work with a specific package, suck as "convert this Debian package to an RPM via alien", you deal with specific packages.
package
Citation: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/InstallingSoftware
Debian Binary would be, mostly the best choice for standing installs and non install working packages. Then having Debian Source for the obvious Source lists.
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debian software package
or
Debian software package
Debian package or dpkg package
.debfiles.man 5 deb