Basic Debian Packaging

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Revision as of 16:20, 24 March 2006 by Vagrant (talk | contribs) (→‎lintian: example to use lintian with more info)
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overview

this class should give a basic understanding of how to build a debian package from some common types of source tarballs or repositories, with the assistance of several helper utilities.

background

prerequisites

suggested background

  • rudimentary understanding of building and compiling software
  • basic understanding of cvs or subversion

topics covered

finding software

  • is it already packaged:
    • packages.debian.org
  • other sources of software:
    • freshmeat.net
    • sourceforge.net
    • google.com

environment variables

  • DEBEMAIL
export DEBEMAIL=yourname@example.com
  • DEBFULLNAME
export DEBFULLNAME="Your Name Here"
  • EDITOR
export EDITOR=nano

creating debian directory

  • using dh_make (package dh-make)
  • dh-make-perl

contents of a debian directory

  • copyright
  • changelog
    • dch
    • version
    • release
  • control
  • rules
  • other files
    • *.install
    • *.manpages
    • *.examples
    • *.init
    • *.postinst
  • other examples: *.ex and *.EX files

cdbs basics:

  • magic snippet for a complete debian/rules file:
#!/usr/bin/make -f
# uncomment the next line if using a makefile-based source
#include /usr/share/cdbs/1/class/makefile.mk
# uncomment the next line if using a autotools-based source
include /usr/share/cdbs/1/class/autotools.mk
include /usr/share/cdbs/1/rules/debhelper.mk
  • add cdbs to build-depends or build-depends-indep debian/control

debuild

  • commandline arguments: -uc -us

basic troubleshooting

  • lesspipe
lesspipe ../hello_2.1.1_i386.deb | less
  • build dependencies
  • package dependencies
    • install in a clean debian base-install
    • pbuilder/sbuild

lintian

  • debian policy checker
lintian -i ../hello_2.1.1_i386.deb

additional and related topics