[conspire] (forw) Re: [svlug] New question.. not really :) (was: svlug Digest, Vol 299, Issue 24)

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Daniel Gimpelevich (daniel at gimpelevich.san-francisco.ca.us):

> I recently took a close look at apt-get.org, and got the distinct
> impression that nearly everything there is too ancient to bother with,
> going all the way back to Potato.

Yes, one of the biggest problems of lists like Mike Markley's (owner of
apt-get.org) and of its predecessor maintained by Stephane Bortzmeyer 
(formerly at http://www.internatif.org/bortzmeyer/debian/apt-sources/)
is that of maintenance:  Everyone's in a hurry to add new unofficial 
sources, but nobody's charged with weeding out the obsolete or
no-longer-functional ones.

But, even at that, either browsing the apt-get.org list or filtering it
on words like sid, sarge, unstable, testing..., is very useful.

Appreciately your posting your sources.list.  Now, of course, you get to
maintain it.  ;->

(Warning to newcomers:  You can seriously screw up your
Debian/Ubuntu/whatever system by using unofficial packages.  As
Bortzmeyer's site used to warn, and Markley's really _should_ warn,
unofficial packages may not meet Debian (or your branch's) quality
standards, may not have crypto signatures in the developer keyring, etc.

Be careful, and be aware that you're going "outside the system" and
assuming all risks thereof.


> I've been pondering a one-size-fits-all sources.list file, and I am
> including what I came up with. Notice that Christian Marillat's
> repository is commented out. This is to empasize that it should only
> be used until it can be fully rolled into the "official" Unofficial
> repository.

Given that Marillat's repository includes packages with patent
encumbrances and also ones with licence conflicts, it seems safe to bet
that it or something like it will persist and not ever be (fully) rolled
in.