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Re: Unidentified subject!

On Fri, 21 Feb 1997, Christoph wrote:

> 
> .deb packages are simpler than .rpm packages by their very nature. Some
> of the dependency things went the wrong way though.
> 
> .deb packages can easily be unpacked on any system. That universality has
> never been really pushed and clarified. RPM packages have a complex binary
> structure and still have problems with configuration files.

So true for .deb not for source package. An how-to Build local binary package
can be done easily. May be can you put it in a FAQ?

This is a proposition, please, coorect me if I make mistake:
Q. X.Y.Z) I have some binaries on my system that I want dselect to know 
about it. How can I build a .deb file for installation?

This could be easy if your binaries is not complicate.
1) create a temporary directory with a name based on the package you want 
to build. Example:
 mkdir MyPackage_1.4-0 will build the package MyPackage version 1.4 
debian revision 0
2) copy all the binary files you want your package to install in this 
directory. The directory must copy the root (/) structure. Example:
 /usr/bin/MyPackage will go MyPackage_1.4-0/usr/bin/MyPackage
3) create a MyPackage_1.4-0/DEBIAN directory. There it goes some file need
by Debian. The most important one is named DEBIAN/control this contains
fields that you see in dselect or when executing dpkg --info MyPackage.deb.
This is a good example of a control file:
 < put a good control file example here >
Refers too to question W.V for more informations about dependencies.
4) They're 4 scripts run by dpkg when installing the .deb files. None of 
them are mandatory:
	pre-rm		: run before removing or upgrading a package
	pre-install	: run before unpacking a package
	post-rm		: run after a package is removed/upgraded
	post-install	: run after unpacking a package
5) DEBIAN/conffiles : this file contains the list of files who could be 
changes by the administrator and you don't want to upgrade some time.
dpkg will treat them by asking you if you want to replaced them or not
when a file with that name already exist on the systems. Also, it's not 
mandatory.
6) You can find some utilities that can help you to install some files.
Please, refers to the man pages about them:
	install-info : update your info file index
	update-rc.d  : manage your initilisation scripts (init.d)
	install-mime : update you're mime type entries.
	install-menu : update you're X menus entry.
	suidregister : help you to register suid files.
7) go back in the directory where you're create the first one 
(MyPackage_1.4-0) and the run 'dpkg --build MyPackage_1.4-0'. 
MyPackage_1.4-0.deb will now be create and you can install it with
dpkg -i MyPackage_1.4-0.deb.

I suggest you to look some packages examples for more complicated
packages. Execute for that dpkg --fsys-tarfile and dpkg --control on
a package you think it looks like you're one. You can looks too directly
in /var/lib/dpkg/info/ to looks for the scripts of packages currently
install in your Debian system. 

<end of proposition>

Sorry, I'm really not good in writing english and I don't have any reference
here to verify anything. If someone can correct it?

<And now, about development packages> 
> We could have
> 
> dpkg = base dpkg
> 
> dselect = Selection interface
> 
> dpkg-dev = Development package
> 
> debian-standards = Policy etc etc.

I would add:
  debmake = Tools to help building and releasing package

This will included alien, build, deblint, release. This tools should not
be allowed in a source package. To follow Mike proposition, I suggest that
all tools can be compiled from a core distribution plus everything need by
the upstream version and nothing more. 

I will kept dpkg-dev to the bare minimum utilities for building package. 
For myself, dpkg-deb might be enough, but I think we can support some 
other one such as dpkg-source, etc. ;)

just my 2 pennies.
fab (who can't sign from this stupid mac terminal... :( )


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