Subject: Re: bug#29777: Newer .deb files can't be opened

From: 積丹尼 Dan Jacobson <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 20 Dec 2017 13:41:27 +0800

>>>>> "EZ" == Eli Zaretskii <[email-masked]> writes:
EZ> Examples of such files or URLs to get them would be helpful.

GOOD http://free.nchc.org.tw/debian/pool/main/g/getmail4/getmail4_4.46.0-1+deb8u1_all.deb
BAD  http://free.nchc.org.tw/debian/pool/main/g/getmail4/getmail4_4.53.0-1+deb9u1_all.deb

I think it has to do with a change from .gz to .xz:
$ w3m -dump http://free.nchc.org.tw/debian/pool/main/g/getmail4 | grep -P \\d.debian.tar
[ ]         getmail4_4.46.0-1+deb8u1.debian.tar.xz  2015-09-03 7.5K
[ ]         getmail4_4.46.0-1.debian.tar.xz         2014-04-22 7.0K
[ ]         getmail4_4.46.0-1~deb7u1.debian.tar.gz  2014-12-08 8.0K
[ ]         getmail4_4.53.0-1+deb9u1.debian.tar.xz  2017-11-03 7.5K
[ ]         getmail4_4.53.0-2.debian.tar.xz         2017-10-07 7.5K

In the minibuffer: "File mode specification error: (error Malformed Tar header)"

By the way, even trying to view ( v runs the command dired-view-file )
causes the BAD file buffers to get altered in memory:
When trying to exit emacs, one will be asked
Buffer getmail4_4.53.0-1+deb9u1_all.deb-INFO modified; kill anyway? (yes or no)