Binary incompatibility of Linux distributions

[Steven Susbauer]

On Sat, 16 May 2009 14:58:15 -0500, anthony baldwin  
<photodharma at gmail.com> wrote:

> Liam Proven wrote:
>>
>> Lots of apps don't /have/ a homepage. A basic Linux distro consists of
>> tens of thousands of binaries. Not every one has its own distinct web
>> presence. Is there much point in a homepage for the ls command? It's a
>> program in its own right.
>
>
> Clearly, I don't expect to see a website for glibc, ls, date,
> cdrdao...blah blah blah.
> But for "major" desktop appliances, like amarok, firefox, etc., which DO
> have webpages, I would expect a link.
> That would even go for less known/used apps, too, like medit, irssi,
> mutt, moc...whatever, that do have homepages...
> Even if it's a freshmeat, wiki.tcl.tk, or SF page, etc...
>
> /tony
>

In experimenting with Synaptic I see it doesn't appear to parse the  
Homepage field. Am I mistaken? I see some packages that do not have a  
homepage shown in Synaptic (even in the properties menu), but do when  
running "aptitude show PKG" (irssi). Most packages do have a Homepage  
field specified.

An example is irssi, in Synaptic it only shows the description, in  
aptitude you see:

Package: irssi
<snip>
Description: terminal based IRC client
  Irssi is a terminal based IRC client for UNIX systems. It also supports  
SILC
  and ICB protocols via plugins.

  Features include:
  * Autologging
  * Formats and themes
  * Configurable keybindings
  * Paste detection
  * Perl scripting
  * Irssi-proxy
  * Transparent upgrading
  * Recode support
Homepage: http://irssi.org/