it seems that i didn't have it installed... aptitude install reportbug fixed the problem.At this prompt you should be able to type in the specific bug number and the bug should be displayed. Maybe you are putting a '#' in front of it? Like it says above this uses the querybts program. Does this program work on its own, so without starting aptitude? I chose a random bug number: $ querybts 313313 Retrieving report #313313 from Debian bug tracking system...
thanks for the hint! regards, -- Lubos _@_"