Only in ipkg-utils: ipkg-py-sane-vercompare.patch
diff -ur ipkg-utils.org/ipkg.py ipkg-utils/ipkg.py
--- ipkg-utils.org/ipkg.py	2005-01-08 18:08:52.000000000 +0000
+++ ipkg-utils/ipkg.py	2007-04-04 11:52:46.000000000 +0000
@@ -48,9 +48,9 @@
         self.epoch = epoch
         self.version = version
 
-    def _versioncompare(self, ref):
-        selfversion = self.version
-        refversion = ref.version
+    def _versioncompare(self, selfversion, refversion):
+        if not selfversion: selfversion = ""
+        if not refversion: refversion = ""
         while 1:
             ## first look for non-numeric version component
             selfm = re.match('([^0-9]*)(.*)', selfversion)
@@ -89,7 +89,18 @@
         elif (self.epoch < ref.epoch):
             return -1
         else:
-            return self._versioncompare(ref)
+	    self_ver_comps = re.match(r"(.+?)(-r.+)?$", self.version)
+	    ref_ver_comps = re.match(r"(.+?)(-r.+)?$", ref.version)
+	    #print (self_ver_comps.group(1), self_ver_comps.group(2))
+	    #print (ref_ver_comps.group(1), ref_ver_comps.group(2))
+	    r = self._versioncompare(self_ver_comps.group(1), ref_ver_comps.group(1))
+	    if r == 0:
+		r = self._versioncompare(self_ver_comps.group(2), ref_ver_comps.group(2))
+	    #print "compare: %s vs %s = %d" % (self, ref, r)
+	    return r
+
+    def __str__(self):
+        return str(self.epoch) + ":" + self.version
 
 def parse_version(versionstr):
     epoch = 0
@@ -445,6 +456,13 @@
         return self.packages[key]
 
 if __name__ == "__main__":
+
+    assert Version(0, "1.2.2-r1").compare(Version(0, "1.2.3-r0")) == -1
+    assert Version(0, "1.2.2-r0").compare(Version(0, "1.2.2+cvs20070308-r0")) == -1
+    assert Version(0, "1.2.2+cvs20070308").compare(Version(0, "1.2.2-r0")) == 1
+    assert Version(0, "1.2.2-r0").compare(Version(0, "1.2.2-r0")) == 0
+    assert Version(0, "1.2.2-r5").compare(Version(0, "1.2.2-r0")) == 1
+
     package = Package()
 
     package.set_package("FooBar")