Re: [PLUG] new @ debian/apt maintenance

[sean finney <seanius@seanius.net>]

On Fri, Dec 03, 2004 at 06:58:08AM -0500, Art Alexion wrote:
> I think that you nailed my question, but please give more details (or 
> point me to something to read).  What are "equivs" packages?  Let me 

"equivs" is a package you can install on a debian system, which then
lets you create and install "dummy" packages to make your system
think that you have something installed.  i haven't used equivs
myself, but do know someone who's used it to install his xserver
from source and still satisfy everything that depends on x.

however, i don't know if that's at all relevant for what you describe
below, since it's chiefly designed to satisfy missing dependencies.
for example, say you have for some reason installed your own webserver
in /usr/local, and you want to install a web application that depends
on having a web server installed.  you could use equivs to convince your
system that you did, even if you didn't have one installed from a package.

> give you the example that prompted this question.  Warty comes with OOo 
> 1.1.2.  The 1.1.4 version fixes a ton of bugs 
> (http://download.openoffice.org/1.1.4rc/release_notes_1.1.4rc.html), so 
> I want to upgrade.  One of the maintainers on the Ubuntu users list 
> indicated that there are no plans to add the upgrade to the apt 
> repository, and warned against installing using the OOo install script.  
> I have installed many instances of OOo always using the install scripts, 
> and never had a problem -- on Red Hat distros.  My concern is that I 
> have a version of OOo installed via apt, and it may be a non-standard 
> installation as far as distro integration goes, so I want to make sure I 
> don't mess up the apt database. 

i don't know what would be so wrong with installing from the install
script, assuming that it gives you the option of installing in /home,
/opt, /usr/local, or something like that.  you might want to remove
the warty version of OOo just to avoid confusion, but otherwise i can't
think of a way it would even touch your apt repository data unless it
created its own deb and then installed it.  

basically, as long as it doesn't mess around with things in /usr,
installing from source might be the best way to go.  if you have
other packages that depend on OOo, you can use equivs do convince
them that it's there.


	sean

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