switching from apt-get to aptitude

[Rick Reynolds <rick@rickandviv.net>]

I've googled this quite a bit and found various web pages praising 
aptitude as a "better apt-get".   But I've also seen cautions about 
mixing the two.

I'm running a testing installation that has been in place for nearly two 
years -- all the while maintained via apt-get.  I've even written a 
shell wrapper around apt-get to log what gets installed.  But the above 
mentioned sites make switching over to aptitude sound good.

I can't seem to find a definitive answer on whether or not this is a 
good idea.  And I haven't found any kind of howto for doing the switch 
well.  I have seen some sites that indicate aptitude may attempt to 
remove lots of packages on the first run after such a switch-over.  If 
it's just a start-up kind of problem, can this be worked around?  (i.e. 
marking packages in some way that means "no, really!  I've installed 
that and want to keep it!")

Any advice, or perhaps pointers to better articles than what I've found?

Thanks,
Rick Reynolds
--
If you don't know the truth, you will believe anything. -- Eric Simmons