Re: Aptitude wants to remove OpenOffice.org

["Manon Metten" <manon.metten@gmail.com>]

Hi Bob,

Thank you for your very detailed and convincing explanation. I'll remove the .rpm OOo stuff and install the backports from now on.


Still two question remains in my mind. First: What good is Alien for?
The Debian Reference says: 

"6.4.12 Convert or install an alien binary package

Alien enables the conversion of binary packages provided in Red
Hat rpm, Stampede slp, Slackware tgz,
and Solaris pkg file formats into a Debian deb
package.  If you want to use a package from another Linux distribution than the
one you have installed on your system, you can use alien to
convert it to your preferred package format and install it, alien also supports LSB packages."

(http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/reference/ch-package.en.html
)
How could I have known the danger of using Alien?


Second: What to do if no debian package exists at all? Eg: suppose Adobe Acrobat would only be available as an .rpm package (and not as a tarball like now). What should I do in such a case?

Greetings, Manon.