Someone throw that together and let's get it done by Friday at closing
time, mmmkay?

I'm tired using this outdated version of Pan with Mint.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Le 30/04/2026 … 11:00, CtrlAltDel a ‚critÿ:

Someone throw that together and let's get it done by Friday at closing
time, mmmkay?

I'm tired using this outdated version of Pan with Mint.

hum...

--
Amicalement,

Frenchy Friendly, & French touch !

german

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

rbowman wrote:

Current is .165 from 2026-01-14.

Mint is perfectly adequate for most people but if you want cutting edge,
Mint ain't it.

LM's basis is Ub; other than compiling, it uses Ub repo/s and flatpaks,
and while Ub likes snap, default LM does not.

The Pan dev/s don't 'bother w/' releasing anything but source. The only
major distro that 'likes' Pan enough to provide an up-to-date Pan is Arch.

Ub's latest LTS release 'just happened' so LM isn't there yet, so LM is
using Ub 24.04 repo/s, which is .155. Sometimes compilers will build
.deb/s to put into .ppa repo/s, but the Pan .ppa is very old.

The 'alternate' packagers are snap, flathub and appimage; but I don't
*think* there is anything useful in there.

I would say that Pan is 'one of those things' that if you aren't happy
w/ the available old versions, then you have to compile or use a distro
w/ it in the repo/s.

Not being a compiling fan, if I wanted to 'see' Pan's 165 w/o too much trouble, I would boot a distro based on Deb testing, such as Sparky,
which I like anyway. Both Deb testing and unstable repo/s have the Pan 165.

--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 30 Apr 2026 17:56:48 GMT, rbowman wrote:

On Thu, 30 Apr 2026 09:00:48 -0000 (UTC), CtrlAltDel wrote:

Someone throw that together and let's get it done by Friday at closing
time, mmmkay?

I'm tired using this outdated version of Pan with Mint.

It is a little elderly, isn't it? I don't use Pan on the Mint laptop but
it's .155 from 2023-11-01. The one I use on Ubuntu is .162 from
2025-02-15. Current is .165 from 2026-01-14.

Mint is perfectly adequate for most people but if you want cutting edge,
Mint ain't it.

Truer words never spoken. There are very few, only 2 programs really, that
I would like to have more updated than Mint provides. The older versions
of everything else is fine for me.

One is Gimp, which I broke down and used a flatpak for, after a long time
of resisting flatpaks. The other is Pan Newsreader, which is woefully
outdated on the current Mint release.


--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Thu, 30 Apr 2026 12:13:18 -0700, Mike Easter wrote:

rbowman wrote:

Current is .165 from 2026-01-14.

Mint is perfectly adequate for most people but if you want cutting
edge,
Mint ain't it.

LM's basis is Ub; other than compiling, it uses Ub repo/s and flatpaks,
and while Ub likes snap, default LM does not.

The Pan dev/s don't 'bother w/' releasing anything but source. The only
major distro that 'likes' Pan enough to provide an up-to-date Pan is
Arch.

Ub's latest LTS release 'just happened' so LM isn't there yet, so LM is
using Ub 24.04 repo/s, which is .155. Sometimes compilers will build
.deb/s to put into .ppa repo/s, but the Pan .ppa is very old.

The 'alternate' packagers are snap, flathub and appimage; but I don't
*think* there is anything useful in there.

I would say that Pan is 'one of those things' that if you aren't happy
w/ the available old versions, then you have to compile or use a distro
w/ it in the repo/s.

Not being a compiling fan, if I wanted to 'see' Pan's 165 w/o too much trouble, I would boot a distro based on Deb testing, such as Sparky,
which I like anyway. Both Deb testing and unstable repo/s have the Pan
165.

Right, Mike, those are the issues I'm encountering exactly.

I can't seem to find a reasonable way to update Pan. There are no .deb packages available for the newer versions of Pan that don't throw up dependency errors from here:

https://pkgs.org/download/pan

No PPA's that are maintained and up to date. No Mint flatpak option is available. And I'm not sure that enabling Snap on Mint would give me the version of Pan that the latest version of Ubuntu is currently providing.

I'm fairly certain no AppImage of Pan has ever been created, at all. I realize I can use another distro or even just boot from a USB that has
more up to date distro's on them to be able to use the newer Pan but, that defeats the purpose, really.

I don't want to use anything but Mint, like I've been doing since Elyssa.
Now Mint is telling everyone, on their blog, that Mint 23 based on Ubuntu 26.04 LTS won't be available until December of '26 or January of '27 as
they have changed their strategy to longer development cycles.

So, you know, Pan 0.155 will be over 3 years old by then. Pimp Ass
Newsreader is getting a little long in the tooth for me and I was looking
for a reasonable way to get an updated version while still using Mint.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

CtrlAltDel wrote:

I was looking
for a reasonable way to get an updated version while still using Mint.

Sometimes compiling goes just fine; Pan gives plenty of instructions for it.

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience;
since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

In the past, when I tried and had some trouble, I was in a ng that
helped me.

--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience;
since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

I booted a live LM 22.3, used some instructions at gitlab, when that
wasn't working out smoothly enough, turned to the gglAIov LLM process
for more instructions and compiled pan and installed it; it wasn't in
the menu, but I booted it from the commandline and it was 165 seemingly running fine.

I can make a summary of the process I used:

I booted live LM 22.3 & went to the Pan gitlab & installed synaptic to
use to check what I needed, but it wasn't really helpful. Following instructions at gitlab, in order to get build-dep I needed to add the
repo/s for source, which was a pretty extensive operation.

$ sudo apt-get build-dep pan
Reading package lists... Done
E: You must put some 'deb-src' URIs in your sources.list

I did that w/ software manager.
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install build-essential
build-essential is already the newest version (12.10ubuntu1).
$ mkdir -p std-build
$ cmake -B std-build
Command 'cmake' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake
$ sudo apt install cmake
$ cmake-gui -B std-build
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
$ sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Error: could not load cache
$ sudo apt install build-essential cmake git intltool \
ÿ ÿ libgtk-3-dev libgmime-3.0-dev libgspell-1-dev \
ÿ ÿ libgnutls28-dev libsecret-1-dev libnotify-dev
$ git clone https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan
Cloning into 'pan'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan.git/
$ cd pan
~/pan$ mkdir build && cd build
$ cmake ..
$ make -j$(nproc)
(very extensive operation)

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.



--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 1 May 2026 01:38:54 GMT, rbowman wrote:

On Thu, 30 Apr 2026 23:23:13 -0000 (UTC), CtrlAltDel wrote:

One is Gimp, which I broke down and used a flatpak for, after a long
time of resisting flatpaks. The other is Pan Newsreader, which is
woefully outdated on the current Mint release.

https://github.com/GNOME/pan/blob/master/NEWS

Do you see anything in the newer revisions that is going to affect your quality of life? A lot of it seems to be moving to CMake and fixing
problems that caused.

No, not really. It's just the idea of it being so old, I suppose. The
2005 release of VLC would still probably be just fine for my purposes,
just watching a movie every now and then, but it's nice to have an updated version just to feel like it matters for some reason.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Thu, 30 Apr 2026 18:51:21 -0700, Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience;
since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

I booted a live LM 22.3, used some instructions at gitlab, when that
wasn't working out smoothly enough, turned to the gglAIov LLM process
for more instructions and compiled pan and installed it; it wasn't in
the menu, but I booted it from the commandline and it was 165 seemingly running fine.

I can make a summary of the process I used:

I booted live LM 22.3 & went to the Pan gitlab & installed synaptic to
use to check what I needed, but it wasn't really helpful. Following instructions at gitlab, in order to get build-dep I needed to add the
repo/s for source, which was a pretty extensive operation.

$ sudo apt-get build-dep pan Reading package lists... Done E: You must
put some 'deb-src' URIs in your sources.list

I did that w/ software manager.
$ sudo apt update $ sudo apt install build-essential build-essential is already the newest version (12.10ubuntu1).
$ mkdir -p std-build $ cmake -B std-build Command 'cmake' not found, but
can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake $ sudo apt install cmake $ cmake-gui -B std-build Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
$ sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui Error: could not load cache $ sudo apt install build-essential cmake git intltool \
ÿ ÿ libgtk-3-dev libgmime-3.0-dev libgspell-1-dev \
ÿ ÿ libgnutls28-dev libsecret-1-dev libnotify-dev
$ git clone https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan Cloning into 'pan'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan.git/
$ cd pan ~/pan$ mkdir build && cd build $ cmake ..
$ make -j$(nproc)
(very extensive operation)

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.

I really appreciate the information and the time you took to provide it,
Mike, but that seems like an awful lot to do. And then, even if I could miraculously make it operational, it would probably interfere the next
time I updated Mint.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Thu, 4/30/2026 9:51 PM, Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience; since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

I booted a live LM 22.3, used some instructions at gitlab, when that wasn't working out smoothly enough, turned to the gglAIov LLM process for more instructions and compiled pan and installed it; it wasn't in the menu, but I booted it from the commandline and it was 165 seemingly running fine.

I can make a summary of the process I used:

I booted live LM 22.3 & went to the Pan gitlab & installed synaptic to use to check what I needed, but it wasn't really helpful. Following instructions at gitlab, in order to get build-dep I needed to add the repo/s for source, which was a pretty extensive operation.

$ sudo apt-get build-dep pan
Reading package lists... Done
E: You must put some 'deb-src' URIs in your sources.list

I did that w/ software manager.
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install build-essential
build-essential is already the newest version (12.10ubuntu1).
$ mkdir -p std-build
$ cmake -B std-build
Command 'cmake' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake
$ sudo apt install cmake
$ cmake-gui -B std-build
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
$ sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Error: could not load cache
$ sudo apt install build-essential cmake git intltool \
ÿ ÿ libgtk-3-dev libgmime-3.0-dev libgspell-1-dev \
ÿ ÿ libgnutls28-dev libsecret-1-dev libnotify-dev
$ git clone https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan
Cloning into 'pan'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan.git/
$ cd pan
~/pan$ mkdir build && cd build
$ cmake ..
$ make -j$(nproc)
(very extensive operation)

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.

You'd look to see if it had a desktop file, for menu purposes.
Depending on whether you "install" it or not, the launch path and $CWD may
need to be modified a bit.

*******

This is as far as I got so far.

1) Install UBU2604 in a VM.
2) Need to spruce up the thing.

cd ~/Downloads

sudo apt update
sudo apt install synaptic # May need it, to look around at lib-dev tick boxes maybe.
sudo apt install software-properties-gtk
software-properties-gtk # tick the "sources" box
sudo apt install dpkg-dev # 205 MB (build-essential might already be in Ubuntu...)
mkdir pan
cd pan

sudo apt build-dep pan # Pulls in -dev packages into tree (failure likely, if done in LM223... but maybe)
apt source pan # ~/Downloads/pan/pan-0.165 created cd pan-0.165
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc # Takes a few minutes.

./debian/pan # Example path and materials ./debian/pan/usr/share/doc/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/bug/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/help/sv/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/help/C/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/help/es/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/help/cs/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/help/de/pan
./debian/pan/usr/share/pan
./debian/pan/usr/bin/pan <=== Executable doesn't seem to have a lot of explicit deps in this tree. Icons, though.
Always with the icons.

[Picture] pan-ubu2604.png (run the pan in that bin)

https://postimg.cc/vgqfJxZt

-rw-r--r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 2762450 Jan 24 12:33 pan_0.165.orig.tar.gz \
-rw-r--r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 26224 Jan 24 12:33 pan_0.165-1.debian.tar.xz \___ Source materials before unpack
-rw-r--r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 1928 Jan 24 12:33 pan_0.165-1.dsc /

drwxrwxr-x 10 bullwinkle bullwinkle 4096 May 1 06:46 pan-0.165
-rw-r--r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 10115786 May 1 06:47 pan-dbgsym_0.165-1_amd64.ddeb <=== it made a debug deb
-rw-rw-r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 18137 May 1 06:47 pan_0.165-1_amd64.buildinfo
-rw-rw-r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 1498 May 1 06:47 pan_0.165-1_amd64.changes
-rw-r--r-- 1 bullwinkle bullwinkle 1347142 May 1 06:47 pan_0.165-1_amd64.deb <=== aha, but maybe not quite there

*******
Brought the pan directory over to LM223 and put it in ~/Downloads .
This was back when it had three files and the pan-0.165 directory.
We're going to take Ubuntu folder for build 0.165 into LM223.

sudo apt build-dep pan # Use whatever pan dependencies are in LM223, close enough.
cd Downloads
cd pan
ls
cd pan-0.165
ls
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc # Nope
apt search libgspell-1-dev # A missing dependency.
sudo apt install libgspell-1-dev # Fixed.
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc
sudo apt install cmake # Tool missing, fixed.
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc # Runs to completion.

cd debian/pan/usr/share/ # Not installed, but we'll try anyway. CD to this path "for the icons".
../bin/pan # Using hack-path to icons as we are not installed.

Because I used a little more care in my hack-launch, I got icons in this picture :-)
The other picture lacks the icons because I neglected to provide a path to the icons.
That was explained here a bit...

https://github.com/GNOME/pan/blob/master/README.org

[Picture] pan-LM223.png

https://postimg.cc/WFbKM4bM

It wasn't as neat and tidy as I had hoped.

Paul


--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

CtrlAltDel wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience;
since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.

I really appreciate the information and the time you took to provide it, Mike, but that seems like an awful lot to do. And then, even if I could miraculously make it operational, it would probably interfere the next
time I updated Mint.

Well; I didn't really do it for /you/, per se, but for my experience of
doing it. I have very very little compiling.

I /was/ going to make something packaged out of what I had, such as a
.deb or other packaging, but my first attempt of that didn't want to go anywhere.

I left that setup alive and may work on it some more today.


--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Thu, 4/30/2026 11:45 PM, CtrlAltDel wrote:

On Thu, 30 Apr 2026 18:51:21 -0700, Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience;
since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

I booted a live LM 22.3, used some instructions at gitlab, when that
wasn't working out smoothly enough, turned to the gglAIov LLM process
for more instructions and compiled pan and installed it; it wasn't in
the menu, but I booted it from the commandline and it was 165 seemingly
running fine.

I can make a summary of the process I used:

I booted live LM 22.3 & went to the Pan gitlab & installed synaptic to
use to check what I needed, but it wasn't really helpful. Following
instructions at gitlab, in order to get build-dep I needed to add the
repo/s for source, which was a pretty extensive operation.

$ sudo apt-get build-dep pan Reading package lists... Done E: You must
put some 'deb-src' URIs in your sources.list

I did that w/ software manager.
$ sudo apt update $ sudo apt install build-essential build-essential is
already the newest version (12.10ubuntu1).
$ mkdir -p std-build $ cmake -B std-build Command 'cmake' not found, but
can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake $ sudo apt install cmake $ cmake-gui -B std-build
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be
installed with:
$ sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui Error: could not load cache $ sudo apt
install build-essential cmake git intltool \
ÿ ÿ libgtk-3-dev libgmime-3.0-dev libgspell-1-dev \
ÿ ÿ libgnutls28-dev libsecret-1-dev libnotify-dev
$ git clone https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan Cloning into 'pan'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan.git/
$ cd pan ~/pan$ mkdir build && cd build $ cmake ..
$ make -j$(nproc)
(very extensive operation)

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.

I really appreciate the information and the time you took to provide it, Mike, but that seems like an awful lot to do. And then, even if I could miraculously make it operational, it would probably interfere the next
time I updated Mint.

Not necessarily.

You can run it right from the build directory.

The amount of error messages will tell you how close you are getting :-)

Paul

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Mike Easter wrote:

I /was/ going to make something packaged out of what I had, such as
a .deb or other packaging, but my first attempt of that didn't want
to go anywhere.

I left that setup alive and may work on it some more today.

I'm learning about Open Build Service; originating w/ OpenSUSE, but more generic now.

an open and complete distribution development platform designed to
encourage developers to compile packages for multiple Linux
distributions including SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, openSUSE, Red
Hat Enterprise Linux, Mandriva, Ubuntu, Fedora, Debian, and Arch
Linux.[2] It typically simplifies the packaging process, so
developers can more easily package a single program for many
distributions

According to the OBS docs, one can choose which package format they want
as the result; rpm, deb, or arch.

--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 1 May 2026 01:29:19 GMT, rbowman wrote:

On Thu, 30 Apr 2026 23:37:46 -0000 (UTC), CtrlAltDel wrote:

No PPA's that are maintained and up to date. No Mint flatpak option is
available. And I'm not sure that enabling Snap on Mint would give me
the version of Pan that the latest version of Ubuntu is currently
providing.

pan/questing,now 0.162-1 amd64 [installed]

Pan isn't a snap on Ubuntu 25.10.

Okay, so that isn't an option either for Mint even with Snap enabled.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Mike Easter wrote:

I'm learning about Open Build Service; originating w/ OpenSUSE, but more generic now.

Now I'm off in a different direction due to some nice instructions from gglAIov (google AI overview LLM):

https://share.google/aimode/4SisXu7fJILfhemYY

I also found a 'conventional' .tar.gz package for 165 at gitlab:

https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan/-/archive/v0.165/pan-v0.165.tar.gz

That seems more familiar to me than my earlier 'sensation' at gitlab.

Now I'll do it w/ the live LM 22.3 I used before by starting w/ those instructions (which can also be found in the LM forum). The fact that I
was successful before encourages me to do it again in a different way.

I still want to make a full circle and create a Pan 165 .deb for LM 22.3.

--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Sat, 5/2/2026 2:21 PM, Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

I'm learning about Open Build Service; originating w/ OpenSUSE, but more
generic now.

Now I'm off in a different direction due to some nice instructions from gglAIov (google AI overview LLM):

https://share.google/aimode/4SisXu7fJILfhemYY

I also found a 'conventional' .tar.gz package for 165 at gitlab:

https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan/-/archive/v0.165/pan-v0.165.tar.gz

That seems more familiar to me than my earlier 'sensation' at gitlab.

Now I'll do it w/ the live LM 22.3 I used before by starting w/ those instructions (which can also be found in the LM forum). The fact that I was successful before encourages me to do it again in a different way.

I still want to make a full circle and create a Pan 165 .deb for LM 22.3.

This is the stanza I used yesterday. I got the source directory by using
Ubuntu 26.04 to capture a 0.165 folder. I used a dependency calculation
on LM223, to "pull in" the -dev packages from a slightly earlier version of Pan. Only one dependency was missing at build time.

sudo apt build-dep pan # Use whatever pan dependencies are in LM223, close enough.
cd Downloads
cd pan
ls
cd pan-0.165

dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc # Nope
apt search libgspell-1-dev # A missing dependency.
sudo apt install libgspell-1-dev # Fixed.
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc
sudo apt install cmake # Tool missing, fixed.
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc -nc # Runs to completion.

cd debian/pan/usr/share/ # Not installed, but we'll try anyway. CD to this path "for the icons".
../bin/pan # Using hack-path to icons as we are not installed.
# I am running it right out of the build directory.

Since I put that VM away yesterday, I can use 7ZIP on Windows to inspect the other outputs.
Windows has VirtualBox as a host for my collection of Linux VM guests.

This is what I have open in 7ZIP. I don't use a conventional structure for keeping VMs in VirtualBox. The control info isn't in a virtualbox directory, everything of note is in the .7z I "put away" after a run. This is so I get
to choose whether to "keep" a run or "chuck it", without using snapshots.

P:\LM223.7z\LM223\LM223\LM223.vhd\home\bullwinkle\Downloads\pan\

Name: pan_0.165-1_amd64.deb Size: 1,323,398

If I open inside, I see inside that .deb

control.tar.zst
data.tar.zst

7ZIP would not open that (Z-Standard compressor). My WSL2 archive manager would not open that either.
But *Windows* in File Explorer on W11 could open those o.O (because it has libarchive in *Windows*).
Of all the absurd things to have in Windows, access to Z-Standard.

The data has exactly what you would expect, /usr/bin and /usr/share .
Just like the "debian" tree in the build directory.

The control file, has this in it (copied from Notepad).

Package: pan
Version: 0.165-1
Architecture: amd64
Maintainer: Dominique Dumont <dod@debian.org>
Installed-Size: 4353
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.38), libcairo2 (>= 1.6.0), libenchant-2-2 (>= 2.2.3), libgcc-s1 (>= 3.3.1),
libgcr-base-3-1 (>= 3.8.0), libgdk-pixbuf-2.0-0 (>= 2.22.0), libglib2.0-0t64 (>= 2.36.0),
libgmime-3.0-0t64 (>= 3.0.0), libgnutls30t64 (>= 3.8.1), libgspell-1-2 (>= 1.8.2),
libgtk-3-0t64 (>= 3.21.5), libnotify4 (>= 0.7.0), libpango-1.0-0 (>= 1.14.0),
libsecret-1-0 (>= 0.7), libstdc++6 (>= 13.1), zlib1g (>= 1:1.1.4), gnome-keyring, gnupg
Section: news
Priority: optional
Homepage: https://pan.rebelbase.com/
Description: newsreader based on GTK3, which looks like Forte Agent
Pan is a newsreader, loosely based on Agent and Gravity, which attempts to be
pleasant to use for new and advanced users alike. It has all the typical
features found in newsreaders and also supports offline newsreading,
sophisticated filtering, multiple connections, and a number of extra features
for power users and alt.binaries fans.

So you can build the deb, with relative ease, by using the "source" archive
and the provided (in-tree) various tools. And that is only going to work if I give
it to another person, if the Depends can be satisfied by the tree. I could download
the Deb from pkgs.org instead, and just try jamming it in, but "that's gambling".

Paul

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience;
since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

I booted a live LM 22.3, used some instructions at gitlab, when that
wasn't working out smoothly enough, turned to the gglAIov LLM process
for more instructions and compiled pan and installed it; it wasn't in
the menu, but I booted it from the commandline and it was 165
seemingly running fine.

I can make a summary of the process I used:

I booted live LM 22.3 & went to the Pan gitlab & installed synaptic to
use to check what I needed, but it wasn't really helpful. Following instructions at gitlab, in order to get build-dep I needed to add the
repo/s for source, which was a pretty extensive operation.

$ sudo apt-get build-dep pan
Reading package lists... Done
E: You must put some 'deb-src' URIs in your sources.list

I did that w/ software manager.
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install build-essential
build-essential is already the newest version (12.10ubuntu1).
$ mkdir -p std-build
$ cmake -B std-build
Command 'cmake' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake
$ sudo apt install cmake
$ cmake-gui -B std-build
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
$ sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Error: could not load cache
$ sudo apt install build-essential cmake git intltool \
ÿ ÿ libgtk-3-dev libgmime-3.0-dev libgspell-1-dev \
ÿ ÿ libgnutls28-dev libsecret-1-dev libnotify-dev
$ git clone https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan
Cloning into 'pan'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan.git/
$ cd pan
~/pan$ mkdir build && cd build
$ cmake ..
$ make -j$(nproc)
(very extensive operation)

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.

could you host the appimage somewhere so we can download it?

--
Linux Mint 22.3


--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Paul and Mike,

It seems like the two of you may be on the precipice of a breakthrough. Please keep the group informed and thanks a million to both of you for the tremendous effort.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Sun, 5/3/2026 1:18 AM, CtrlAltDel wrote:

Paul and Mike,

It seems like the two of you may be on the precipice of a breakthrough. Please keep the group informed and thanks a million to both of you for the tremendous effort.

What we're doing, is measuring the "distance" from 0.162 to 0.165,
and it may be within one dependency of working, just with the
available .deb and no build work on your part. Ubuntu 26.04
has the 0.165 deb .

You would be checking to see if you have something to cover this.

libgspell-1-2 (>= 1.8.2)

By using the deb file, you can pick it apart and make your own
folder structure. The only tricky part, is the pan developers
hack for gaining access to the icons. You can run a private copy
of icons, but the executable launch has to be "just so">

cd debian/pan/usr/share/ # to pick up ./pan/icons
../bin/pan # from a private tree

Paul


--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Sat, 5/2/2026 10:48 PM, Axel wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

Sometimes I'm in the mood for something like that for the experience; since I don't use Pan, if it didn't work out I could just bail.

I did it.

I booted a live LM 22.3, used some instructions at gitlab, when that wasn't working out smoothly enough, turned to the gglAIov LLM process for more instructions and compiled pan and installed it; it wasn't in the menu, but I booted it from the commandline and it was 165 seemingly running fine.

I can make a summary of the process I used:

I booted live LM 22.3 & went to the Pan gitlab & installed synaptic to use to check what I needed, but it wasn't really helpful. Following instructions at gitlab, in order to get build-dep I needed to add the repo/s for source, which was a pretty extensive operation.

$ sudo apt-get build-dep pan
Reading package lists... Done
E: You must put some 'deb-src' URIs in your sources.list

I did that w/ software manager.
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install build-essential
build-essential is already the newest version (12.10ubuntu1).
$ mkdir -p std-build
$ cmake -B std-build
Command 'cmake' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake
$ sudo apt install cmake
$ cmake-gui -B std-build
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Command 'cmake-gui' not found, but can be installed with:
$ sudo apt install cmake-qt-gui
Error: could not load cache
$ sudo apt install build-essential cmake git intltool \
ÿ ÿ libgtk-3-dev libgmime-3.0-dev libgspell-1-dev \
ÿ ÿ libgnutls28-dev libsecret-1-dev libnotify-dev
$ git clone https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan
Cloning into 'pan'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/pan.git/
$ cd pan
~/pan$ mkdir build && cd build
$ cmake ..
$ make -j$(nproc)
(very extensive operation)

Then because Pan wasn't in menu/s, ran command pan.

could you host the appimage somewhere so we can download it?

You must be new to the concept of "there is no cake" :-)

Install mechanisms

1) Traditional olde fart way:

./configure
make
sudo make install

This is an out-of-tree way of doing it.
The modern version of this, uses a variety of commands
to achieve what used to be rather simple and formulaic.
Not many packages kept a configure script, so that package
build was interactive. Think of this, as being how we did it
when there wasn't a .deb for it.

2) sudo apt install somedeb # gdebi somedeb

This fiddles the official tree, and could potentially
bugger up your next Upgrade install. Keep a notes file of
*every* thing you've done to your distro, in case you have
to undo the non-standard parts later. The same goes with
adding PPA. Only an official GoogleEarth PPA that a distro tree
herder added, might be tolerated, and if an Upgrade broke because
of that, then you have learned that practically no PPA is tolerated
on an Upgrade.

3) appImage, flatpak, snap

These are techniques that only work for certain kinds of package
designs. Not everything can be coerced to fit a package.
Even making .deb took work, and potentially, interaction
between Debian and the person submitting a package for use.

Without extra effort, "there can be no Cake". Cake does not
grow on trees.

And you can tell just from the package construct, the Pan dev
is NOT going to do days-of-work to suit the latest package-fad.
(Maybe repackaging using Qt for graphics is needed, to make an AppImage.
Which is a LOT of work for the Pan dev. It's basically a rewrite.)

Some day, an AI will do these for us (and screw it up).

Time was, the (1) method, some developers would #ifdef their source,
so that their package could be custom-built to run on *12* platforms.
I used to look at this, and conclude "are these poor people INSANE?",
because when you slash up your source and make a mess of it, it's
a maintenance headache. The people who went to that much trouble
to ensure their software "ran on S390", were some kind of heroes.
Well, nothing has changed in this regard, and bodging stuff so
it fits into a Flatpak is just "more of the same". Slave work,
for poor wages. While it took me only five minutes to write
printf("Hello World\n"), it might take me thousands of hours
to make it so that goes onto 12 platforms and 3 packaging schemes
plus .deb and .rpm and so on. Many a dev, has drawn a line in the
sand, regarding exactly how many platforms/mechanisms they will support.

*******

Time was, we could kinda tell what subsystems were available, by looking
at the PATH used in our profile. The "/usr/local/bin" is for method (1) installs
which are out of tree. On a distro Upgrade, the /usr/local/bin should be ignored,
and because the /usr/local/lib may not be complete enough, you might have to recompile and re-install a "local" program. This is why we don't "hack our tree to bits", it is Upgrade-time, when you would pay a price.

bullwinkle@SKYLARK :~ $ echo $PATH /usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/local/games:/snap/bin
<--------- private ----------> <--------------- distro ---------------> <--external packaging-->

That's from LM223, and it looks like even though snaps are not installed, the path necessary for a smooth snap transition is still present.

Many things today, are started execution by "nefarious means", like "launchers".
This make it harder, later on, for the user to look at what she is doing,
and figure out "exactly how is that AppImage getting started". By not doing things via the PATH mechanism, we lose the diagnostic capability later
of examining the PATH to see what "mechanisms" are present in this
particular install. At least now I know, this distro *might* have SNAPS,
so I will be on the look-out for a snap daemon or a systemd snap-thingy.

Paul


--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Axel wrote:

could you host the appimage somewhere so we can download it?

When I said 'I did it.' I only meant that I had successfully compiled
and installed the 165 Pan on LM 22.3; I hadn't made an appimage or any
other kind of installable package for LM.

I have an interest in making a .deb but I haven't done anything about
that since yesterday.

--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

rbowman wrote:

Mike Easter wrote:

When I said 'I did it.' I only meant that I had successfully compiled
and installed the 165 Pan on LM 22.3; I hadn't made an appimage or any
other kind of installable package for LM.

Was it an improvement than the current LM version? I doubt many will
notice the switch from gtkspell to gspell or the move to cmake, both of
which were speed bumps when you were building it.

I can't say; I didn't 'use' it; I just booted it and observed that it
seemed to be functioning OK.

--
Mike Easter

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.14
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)