A lot of the software ported by people in the community is poorly maintained and implemented. There are a few things you need to do to get a program integrated into the tablet and a lot of porters don't do them. Unless the program is properly ported it doesn't stand much chance of making it into the official repositories, so people just host them on their website.

Probably the most useful thing you can do as a newbie if some program doesn't work is to write an email to the author or porter explaining the problem. They frequently will appreciate the feedback and fix the problem.