Use dpkg to install and remove packages from your system.
You can also invoke dpkg-deb by calling dpkg with whatever options you want to pass to dpkg-deb. dpkg will spot that you wanted dpkg-deb and run it for you.
Unless you specify --no-check, dpkg-deb will read DEBIAN/control and parse it. It will check it for syntax errors and other problems, and display the name of the binary package being built. dpkg-deb will also check the permissions of the maintainer scripts and other files found in the DEBIAN control information directory.
If no archive is specified then dpkg-deb will write the package into the file directory.deb.
If the archive to be created already exists it will be overwritten.
If the second argument is a directory then dpkg-deb will write to the file package_version_arch.deb, or package_version.deb if no Architecture field is present in the package control file. When a target directory is specified, rather than a file, the --no-check option may not be used (since dpkg-deb needs to read and parse the package control file to determine which filename to use).
If no control-file-names are specified then it will print a summary of the contents of the package as well as its control file.
If any control-file-names are specified then dpkg-deb will print them in the order they were specified; if any of the components weren't present it will print an error message to stderr about each one and exit with status 2.
If no control-file-fields are specified then it will print the whole control file.
If any are specified then dpkg-deb will print their contents, in the order in which they appear in the control file. If more than one control-file-field is specified then dpkg-deb will precede each with its field name (and a colon and space).
No errors are reported for fields requested but not found.
--vextract (-X) prints a listing of the files extracted as it goes, while --extract (-x) is silent unless an error occurs.
Note that extracting a package to the root directory will not result in a correct installation ! Use dpkg to install packages.
directory (but not its parents) will be created if necessary.
If no directory is specified then a subdirectory DEBIAN in the current directory is used.
The target directory (but not its parents) will be created if necessary.
There is no authentication on .deb files; in fact, there isn't even a straightforward checksum.
Do not attempt to use just dpkg-deb to install software ! You must use dpkg proper to ensure that all the files are correctly placed and the package's scripts run and its status and contents recorded.