packages with binaries

[Julian Bradfield]

I'm trying to update the VM package, and as this is my first ever
interaction with the package system, it's a bit daunting.

First question: what am I supposed to do with auxiliary programs
(qp-decode, base64-decode etc) that VM likes to have?
Since XEmacs has built-in base64 functions, I guess the base64
programs are superfluous anyway; and perhaps qp-*code are superfluous
because any qp-encoded message part is likely to be small anyway.
But if I did want them, what would I do with them?

Secondly, is there a way to check out the package infrastructure
without getting the whole of the package sources?
(This is also my first interaction with Mercurial, since these days
every project uses a different VCS...)