Revision history [back]

I suggest you read the ROS Packages page describing the concept of packages. It provides detailed explanations of what a package is, what may be included in a package, how packages define dependencies on other packages, how command line tools and ROS introspection tools operate within the package construct, and more. The distinction of a "binary" package (a package installed with apt-get... a debian package) and a source package (a package that is most likely in a catkin workspace that was compiled on your machine with catkin_make) has very little to do with what a package itself is. If you find yourself confused by the descriptions on the linked page, please edit your original question to provide more detailed questions.