To extract a Debian package and view it’s contents first make a temporary directory to work in, move the .deb file to that location, and extract it:
# mkdir /tmp/rssh
# mv rssh_2.3.2-13squeeze3_i386.deb /tmp/rssh
# cd /tmp/rssh
# ar vx rssh_2.3.2-13squeeze3_i386.deb
# ls -l
total 128
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 5094 Jun 5 09:13 control.tar.gz
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 54142 Jun 5 09:13 data.tar.gz
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4 Jun 5 09:13 debian-binary
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 59428 Nov 27 2012 rssh_2.3.2-13squeeze3_i386.debAs you can see, the contents have been extracted, and we see the typical 3 files, that are needed for a proper Debian package. The debian-binary file contains information about the version of the package. The control.tar.gz file contains configuration scripts, and tells dpkg about how to install and configure the package. data.tar.gz is the one we are interested in. It contains the actual files that will be set in place at time of installation. The contents of data.tar.gz mirror the typical Linux filesystem tree. Make a directory for the contents of data.tar.gz and extract the tarball into it.
# mkdir debroot
# tar -C debroot -xzf data.tar.gz
# find debroot/ -ls
950 4 drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/
956 4 drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/etc
960 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1867 Nov 22 2012 debroot/etc/rssh.conf
957 4 drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/etc/logcheck
958 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/etc/logcheck/ignore.d.server
959 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 455 Nov 22 2012 debroot/etc/logcheck/ignore.d.server/rssh
961 4 drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr
965 4 drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share
971 4 drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc
972 4 drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh
977 8 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4162 Nov 27 2005 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/SECURITY.gz
975 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2207 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/README.Debian
981 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 46 Jul 21 2003 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/TODO
976 8 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 6297 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/changelog.Debian.gz
983 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 680 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/NEWS.Debian.gz
973 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2575 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/copyright
979 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/examples
980 8 -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 6479 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/examples/mkchroot.sh
974 8 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4409 Nov 27 2005 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/CHROOT.gz
982 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1488 Jan 3 2006 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/changelog.gz
978 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1636 Dec 29 2004 debroot/usr/share/doc/rssh/README
984 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/rssh
985 4 -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 1321 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/rssh/conf_convert
966 4 drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/man
969 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/man/man1
970 8 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 5771 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/man/man1/rssh.1.gz
967 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/man/man5
968 4 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2277 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/share/man/man5/rssh.conf.5.gz
986 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/bin
987 24 -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 22288 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/bin/rssh
962 4 drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/lib
963 4 drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/lib/rssh
964 24 -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 21184 Nov 22 2012 debroot/usr/lib/rssh/rssh_chroot_helper
Now we can browse, and take a look at the contents of the files.