R SIG Debian - Feb 2010 - packages in cran2deb and Debian

Some packages are available in cran2deb and Debian.  After adding
cran2deb to my sources.list it seems the cran2deb ones are favored
because X.Y-ZcranN is "more recent" than X.Y-Z.

In the case of r-cran-rmpi the effect of this was to cause aptitude to
want to uninstall all my mpi stuff.  Apparently the automatically
generated package doesn't have mpi as a dependency.

I just put a hold on the existing version, and I suppose I could fiddle
with apt preferences.

Do people have any general advice about how to handle this situation?

There probably is no one rule for what to do.  The official packages are
more carefully done, but the automatic packages may be more recent.  At
least if they are the same version, I  presume the official ones are
preferable.  But I don't know of a good way of making such a rule
automatic.

Actually, I'm a bit surprised that official Debian packages are also in
cran2deb.

Thanks.
Ross Boylan

On Fri, Feb 12, 2010 at 12:07 AM, Ross Boylan <ross at biostat.ucsf.edu>
wrote:
> Some packages are available in cran2deb and Debian. ?After adding
> cran2deb to my sources.list it seems the cran2deb ones are favored
> because X.Y-ZcranN is "more recent" than X.Y-Z.
>
Hmm, my experience has been different: Debian packages were preferred
over cran2deb. Can you give a specific example that bugs you?

> In the case of r-cran-rmpi the effect of this was to cause aptitude to
> want to uninstall all my mpi stuff. ?Apparently the automatically
> generated package doesn't have mpi as a dependency.
>
Wouldn't it be sufficient to set mpi as "manually installed", as
opposed to automatically, as a dependency?

> Do people have any general advice about how to handle this situation?
>
You might want to try an approach similar to this [1].
[1] https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-sig-debian/2009-December/000970.html

> There probably is no one rule for what to do. ?The official packages are
> more carefully done, but the automatic packages may be more recent. ?At
>
I am curious, what makes you think so?
Regards
Liviu