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Re: Re: Debian on Zaurus status?

On Sun, Dec 21, 2003 at 01:58:44PM -0800, Steve   wrote:
> According to another post
> (http://lists.debian.org/debian-handheld/2003/debian-handheld-200303/msg00007.html), 
> .ipk is compatible with .deb, but if that's true, does the feed exist
> because the .ipk's are optimized and/or customized for the Zaurus?

It's not directly compatible, meaning that you must use the 'ipkg' tool
to install .ipk packages, and 'dpkg' for real Debian packages. The OZ
build does not support dpkg/.deb, and even if you were to install the
dpkg system on top of OZ you'd have a lot of trouble because the two
packaging systems would not know about each other, and you'd be likely to
get conflicts and/or confused dependencies. (That BTW is the reason why I
decided on a chroot approach - I initially installed dpkg on top of the
5500's SHARP ROM, and it was a huge mess.)

The two systems are compatible in the sense that it's fairly easy to
convert a .deb to a .ipk. That reminds me, does a tool similar to 'alien'
exist to install a .deb on OZ? It would probably only work though if you
ignore the specified dependencies and hope for the best.


http://openzaurus.org/official/testing/old/feed/ipkg/ipkg-utils/
There there is ipkg-deb-unbuild and ipkg-build (among other files) that can supposedly be used to convert .debs to their original files then to a .ipk. Unfortunately this is apparently primarily claimed by old Familiar message boards (http://handhelds.org/pipermail/familiar/2001-December/003785.html http://handhelds.org/pipermail/handhelds/2001-May/001850.html), although some other sites (http://www.intrinsyc.com/support/I-Linux/405-cube/packages/debianpackages.htm http://download.intrinsyc.com/supported/os/linux/distribution/i-linux-4.1/i-packages-1.1/src/hello-world/HOWTO-ipkg (at step 6 at the bottom)) claim that a simple 
     ar x <package name>
tar czvf <packagename>.ipk ./control.tar.gz ./data.tar.gz ./debian-binary will do the trick. ("The postinstall and preinstall scripts may need to be modified.") But once again these sites are talking about converting ARM .debs so that Familiar can use them, not OZ or anything Zaurus-related. This is probably what you were referring to anyways when you said "it's fairly easy to convert a .deb to a .ipk" and that a tool that actually checks dependencies would be nice to have, but in case I found something you aren't aware of, the links are above.
> I'll have a 5600 in a couple days and OZ looks like an awesome option but > having full-blown Debian would be ideal, or both! I know that's basically > what pocketworkstation talks about (having both and chrooting to debian), > but all the actual Debian-for-Zaurus-type ROMs I've seen require/recommend 
> the CROW ROM, which is not for the 5600.

I don't own a 5600 so I can't comment on it directly. The CROW ROM is
only a recommendation (not a requirement) for the 5500. On the SL-C7x0
you can use the default Sharp ROM.

I'm running Debian fully natively on the C760, using pivot_root to switch
over entirely to the SD card on boot. You could presumably do something
similar on the 5600.

Unfortunately I've had zero time to work on the pocketworkstation project
recently...

-Klaus
Okay thanks I'll see what I can get working on the 5600 and hopefully report back with some good news if anyone is interested. Any idea how many people use pocketworkstation or OZ, or how many people work on them?
And out of curiosity, you need to know C to work on the OZ and pocketworkstation projects right? I'd love to contribute to Zaurus-related projects and I'll learn C some day (for now it's homework and a little perl). 

Steve

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