In this article all deformations of the general linear group, subject
to certain restrictions which in particular ensure a smooth passage to
the Lie group limit, are obtained. Representations are given in terms
of certains sets of creation and annihilation operators. These creati
on and annihilation operators may belong to a generalization of the q-
quark type or q-hadronic type with q-boson or q-fermion behavior. This
leads to a natural definition of q-direct sums of q-algebras.