Sorry for snipping previous messages, but it seems to me your basic premise is wrong. If you are going to compile from source for local installs, try a couple of suggestions.
1. Use equivs: Package: equivs Priority: extra Section: admin Installed-Size: 50 Maintainer: Martin Bialasinski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Architecture: all Version: 2.0.2 Depends: perl | perl5, debhelper, dpkg-dev, devscripts, make, fakeroot Filename: pool/main/e/equivs/equivs_2.0.2_all.deb Size: 17394 MD5sum: 0c84d50f864ea181738fc1b496b6fb20 Description: Circumventing Debian package dependencies This is a dummy package which can be used to create Debian packages, which only contain dependency information. . This way, you can make the Debian package management system believe that equivalents to packages on which other packages do depend on are actually installed. . Another possibility is creation of a meta package. When this package contains a dependency as "Depends: a, b, c", then installing this package will also select packages a, b and c. Instead of "Depends", you can also use "Recommends:" or "Suggests:" for less demanding dependency. . Please note that this is a crude hack and if thoughtlessly used might possibly do damage to your packaging system. And please note as well that using it is not the recommended way of dealing with broken dependencies. Better file a bug report instead. 2. Probably the simpler solution for a package that exists in Debian but you wish to 'upgrade' to newer version: a. mkdir $package; cd $package; apt-get source $package cp $newer_source . cd $debian_version; uupdate -v$new_version-1 cd ../$new_debianized_version; debuild b. lynx/netscape/links packages.debian.org/$package download $package$ver.diff.gz mkdir $package; cd $package; mv $new_source $package$ver.diff.gz . tar zxvf $new_source tar zxvf debian $package$ver.diff.gz cp -a debian/ $new_source_dir/ cd $new_source_dir; dch -v$new_verison-1 debuild a. will attempt to apply debianized diffs if they exist, you may have to search for *rej afterwards. b. will just yield the debian dir with rules, changelogs, etc It's all up to you, but very flexible. If you insist on stow and /usr/local, afraid I don't think that integrates well with dpkg and/or apt. Equivs is probably your answer if you stick with /usr/local. Of course, you can try 2nd method and modify debian/rules to install/use whatever directories you want as well... Flexibility. Good Luck Gordon Sadler
