Alien - Program that converts between rpm, dpkg, slp, and tgz file formats.
Updated by FastRunner on Wednesday, December 02nd 2009.
Alien is a program that converts between the rpm, dpkg, stampede slp, and slackware tgz file formats. If you want to use a package from another 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.
This one of the handiest programs for us non-compilers to use. It works all the time. The only real issues are caused by dependency problems. The interface, even as command line, is very simple and efficient. This has taken care of roughly 90% of the apps that I've wanted to install and that's good enough for me.
Thanks!!!
I use Debian, so sometimes I come across free software developer's programs who put their programs in RPM, but forget to put DEB's(You know who you are, you...).
When I can't wait, I just do alien package_name.rpm and it works flawlessly. The new package is even put in it's special category by dpkg, which helps keeping an eye on those alien packages.
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