anyway, ftp://ftp.nerim.net/debian-marillat/index.html

which starts out with

" Why Marillat's repository doesn't work ? Because now the repository is here debian-multimedia.org"

ok, so after some cursory reading, i find i need sources.list to have

deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org stable main
deb-src http://www.debian-multimedia.org sid mai

and i see a avi tool that will fit the bill (wasn't i after centelerra when i started though?)

anyway, avidemux is now available to me, so i'll try it out

but alas

avidemux: Depends: libartsc0 (>= 1.5.0-1) but 1.4.3-0ubuntu1 is to be installed
Depends: libasound2 (> 1.0.10) but 1.0.9-2 is to be installed
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.3.6-6) but 2.3.5-1ubuntu12.5.10.1 is to be installed
Depends: libcairo2 (>= 1.0.2-2) but 1.0.2-0ubuntu1.1 is to be installed
Depends: libdirectfb-0.9-24 but it is not installable
Depends: libfaac0 (>= 1.24+cvs20060416) but it is not going to be installed
Depends: libfaad2-0 (>= 2.0.0+cvs20060416) but it is not going to be installed
Depends: libgcc1 (>= 1:4.1.0) but 1:4.0.1-4ubuntu9 is to be installed
Depends: libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.10.0) but 2.8.3-0ubuntu1 is to be installed
Depends: liblame0 (>= 3.96.1-1) but it is not going to be installed
Depends: libmozjs0d but it is not installable
Depends: libogg0 (>= 1.1.3) but 1.1.2-1 is to be installed
Depends: libpango1.0-0 (>= 1.12.1) but 1.10.1-0ubuntu1 is to be installed
Depends: libstdc++6 (>= 4.1.0) but 4.0.1-4ubuntu9 is to be installed
Depends: libvorbis0a (>= 1.1.2) but 1.1.0-1ubuntu1 is to be installed
Depends: libvorbisenc2 (>= 1.1.2) but 1.1.0-1ubuntu1 is to be installed
Depends: libxml2 (>= 2.6.23) but 2.6.21-0ubuntu1 is to be installed
Depends: libxvidcore4 (>= 1:1.0.0-0.0) but it is not going to be installed

why does it always have to be so hard?