Re: [aclug-L] Debian package management

[John Goerzen <jgoerzen@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

"Greg House" <ghouse@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> >The easiest way to do this is to snag the tgz for your particular
> >server from www.xfree86.org, place it in /usr/local/bin, and update
> >/etc/X11/Xserver to use it.
> 
> Yeah, looking back, I should have just done that.

:-)

> >libc6 == glibc2 (aka glibc)
> 
> DOH!  Man do I feel like a dope now.

That's ok, I've had instances where I've spent lots of time
troubleshooting an intermittent null-modem PPP connection, only to
find out that the cable was loose and wasn't communicating half the
time :-)

> Yeah, I figured that one out.  But it has a bunch more options and the man
> page for it has this big warning at the start of it saying it's totally out
> of date and probably inaccurate and that you should really be using dselect
> anyway.  That kind of scared me off.

Hmm, mine doesn't say that.  Maybe it's been updated :-)

> >dpkg -i *.deb
> >
> >wiill do it :-)
> 
> What about dependancies & older versions?  Will it do an upgrade of an
> existing package with -i or do you have to go remove the older package
> before installing the newer one?

Yes, it will do an upgrade for you.  It will also refuse to install if 
the package depends on certain others.

Actually, that's a bit of a lie.  (Skip this paragraph if it's
confusing..)  Technically, it will copy the files on to the disk but
not configure the package; after you've met all the dependencies, you
can run "dpkg --pending --configure".

If you try to install a package and it depends on things that you
don't have, fetch them, use dpkg -i on them, and then try dpkg -i
again.

Better yet, use apt; it will automatically resolve dependencies and
install things in the correct order for you.

> Now...figuring all that out still didn't really help me a whole lot.  It
> seems Vincent's debs had a whole rash of dependancies.  I started fetchinig

Well, the trouble is, that they are based on a distribution two
versions greater than yours.  (Ie, potato, I believe, which is the
development tree for 3.0, due out this fall.)  It should work pretty
well on a Slink system though (prerelease of 2.1, due out on March
9).

> the debs from the unstable tree for the things it complained about until I
> finally got stuck in a dependancy deadlock.  When I tried to put one of them

Which packages are involved here?  You may be better off using things
from "slink" -- it's really close to release.  unstable stuff can be,
well, unstable :-)

If you let me know which specific packages are involved, or better
yet, the exact error messages, and I can find out what's going on.
Out of about 2500 packages in potato, it's a bit hard to guess :-)

> in, something else complained that it depended on the OLD version of the
> package and I couldn't find an updated version of that out there.  So I
> threw up my hands in frustration and reverted back to the stuff on the
> original distribution and swapped video cards
> 
> (I later found a mail message from a very kind ACLUG member offering to
> trade me a card better suited to this system for the Diamond card!  This
> list is great!)

Glad to hear it!

-- John
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