Re: Can rpm packages from other linux distribution be used on Debian?

From: dircha (dircha_at_dircha.com)
Date: 05/15/04

  • Next message: david: "Weird Scroll on Emacs Bug" 
    Date: Sat, 15 May 2004 02:10:44 -0500
To: debian-user@lists.debian.org

    On Wed, May 12, 2004 at 05:40:51PM +0800, Rick wrote:
    >
    > Hello People:
    > Our product is base on redhat,I will porting it to Debian,but in this
    > system,many procedure depend redhat rpms,for example:
    > glibc-2.3.2-11.9.i386.rpm, perl-5.8.0-88.i386.rpm,etc..
    > At the start,I wanted to try install these rpm packages(from redhat) On
    > debian,but I found that thers is a lot work to do,some rpm packages even can't
    > be installed on it.(perhaps these rpms packages from redhat can't be used on
    > debian at all).I think 2 ways to settle this problem,But I am not sure these
    > ways is doable,and I wish to get some advices about it.these problem are:
    >
    > 1. Use a certain tool to translate these packages(glibc*.rpm..) from redhat
    > to rpm packages that can be used on debian.Is there such tools exist on
    > debian?
    > 2. On Debian,after I install rpm,rpm DB and deb DB exist,Can I make some
    > mapping bettwen betwwen rpm DB and deb DB? when I run rpm command,the OS will
    > invoke debian DB.for example:
    > # rpm -qv gcc
    > package gcc is not installed
    > #dpkg -l |grep gcc
    > ii gcc-3.0 3.0.4-7 The GNU C compiler.
    > #
    > this means gcc*rpm isn't installed but gcc*deb is installed on debian. after I
    > make this mapping,I can use rpm to access deb DB.
    > # rpm -qv gcc
    > gcc-3.0
    > #
    > if this way is feasible,How to do it?
    >
    > I am a new debian user,not too familiar with this OS, If above ways are
    > impossible,is thers other ways to attain my purpose?

    As someone else mentioned, look at the "alien" Debian package for
    conversion from .rpm .deb. But that is hardly adequate for reliable,
    professional software.

    You should consider a more realistic option:

    3. Genuinely *port* your software to the Debian platform. While glibc
    2.3.2 and perl 5.8 are not available in the current Debian stable
    release (Woody), it's rather unlikely that your software *needs* those
    components in those versions - i.e. whether it is more or less a matter
    of recompiling. But then you know that.

    Or even if not this, somehow you're going to need to provide security
    updates for these libraries your software needs. These packages aren't
    going to reliably install with alien or rpm unmodified. So if you're
    going to officially support the port of your software to Debian (which
    seems to be part of the definition of "port"), you are going to need to
    distribute these packages to your users yourselves, and distribute
    security updates of these non-official packages yourselves.

    Since you will be doing this anyhow, why not simply maintain these
    packages as .deb packages in the versions your users will need, in the
    form of backports [1] for Debian stable (Woody)?

    [1] http://www.backports.org

    dircha 

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