ismagulb
commented
3 years ago Hello Mihai,
this is actually a Debian packaging question, not an Isar one. One doesn't have to do anything special for Isar; one creates a general Debian source package, then feeds it to Isar. I think the right forum is something like debian-mentors.
If you don't have deb_debianize working, don't bother with it. As mentioned in #66, find a dh_make tutorial and follow it. Roughly,
- Get pkg-1.0.tar.gz
- Unpack it to pkg-1.0
- cd pkg-1.0
- dh_make # Generates a package template
- Edit and / or delete debian/* to taste
- Make it build with dpkg-buildpackage -uc -us
After you have this working, integrate it into Isar (e.g., similar to https://github.com/ilbers/isar/blob/master/meta-isar/recipes-app/hello-isar/hello-isar.bb).
Regarding the empty package, I guess debhelper tries to be smart and automatically detect the files that need to be copied. You may have to help it. debian/rules is a makefile with some magic behind the scenes that calls some hook targets. I also don't know them by heart (in the older days, the targets were pasted completely into debian/rules, and it was easier to understand), please check debhelper docs. You may also want to check other Debian source packages, maybe apt-get source coreutils. Please note that not all packages use debhelper, there are also other Debian packaging systems.
mihaiolteanu
jan-kiszka
Scope and Overview
I'm trying to understand how would one go about creating an isar recipe, step by step for a package that doesn't have the debian folder. Naturally, this would mean that we have to create our own debian files.
The official isar documentation, compilation of sources missing the debian directory, suggests that this is the case indeed and points one to the official debian documentation and to
deb_debianize. How any of that works, is left as a homework for the user.Packaging Intro (hithere example)
The first step that I took was to understand how debian packaging works in general, outside isar. So I followed the official debian packaging intro. I've installed a debian docker container so as not to mess things up and did all the steps in the intro:
Replicate the hithere example with isar
Once I understood the basic steps needed to build a basic package, I've tried to replicate that with an isar recipe. The advantage of this approach, in my mind, is that I already know what the debian files should contain, so I am left with only one problem and not two. That is, replicating the build with isar and not at the same time trying to figure out what the debian files should contain.
Minimal recipe using only deb_debianize
I've started with a minimalist recipe inspired by
samefile_2.14.bb, and namedhithere.bb,This leads to a clean build, but the generated .deb package only contains the changelog and not the manual pages and, most importantly, the binary,
Some points that I'm figuring out as I go (some of which might be wrong):
cleandirsis a way of telling isar to start with a clean debian folder.deb_debianizegenerates the minimum required files for packaging (rules, control, compat, etc)deb_debianize, we can create our own personalized debian files inside WORKDIR (with here-docs, for example) anddeb_debianizewill take those instead of creating its default ones.SRC_URI(which will get copied in theWORKDIR,according to the bitbake rules), anddeb_debianizewill install those; otherwise, it will install its default filesReplicate all the debian files from the intro using here-docs
Ok, since that didn't work, I've next tried to add all the debian files as seen in the official packages intro inside the
do_prepare_buildas here-docs and see what comes out of it.Some points:
Run the build,
The hithere official example runs the build with
debuild -us -uc. It is possible that isar runs a different build command, thus the above error, see hereI think isar builds deb packages with
dpkg-buildpackage,which is just one step in thedebuildtool (that is,debuildcontains thedepk-buildpackagecall as a step, besides lintian, fakeroot, etc). See the isarbuild.shscript file for details,${GBP_PREFIX}dpkg-buildpackage -a$target_arch -d --source-option=-IBut these are just assumptions on my side, which, even if they were right, they don't help me much in figuring out what the solution is to actually building this recipe.Manually remove every reference to
hithere, except the recipe, and retry the build (sometimes I do get errors due to old, temp or cache files not being deleted).This time I get,
Remove this line, for now,
No error this time, but the .deb package still does not contain any binaries. For comparison, this is what the deb package contains on the docker container after a successful packaging,
This is what we want after isar completes the build, as well.
The rules and source/format files are there, for example,
But I think they are in the wrong place, as hithere-1.0 also contains debian files,
But I also get this warning,
Comparing the debian file contents reveals that they are the same, or contain the same info. But there are actually three different debian folders where debian files are present in the same
hitherelocation. Most likely this is fine, and it's the way isar builds its stuff internally. But it's a bit tricky to understand how should one write a recipe by checking the implementation.Simplify and only keep one here-doc
Simplify the initial recipe, only add a compat file, for example, and do not call deb_debianize for the moment,
I do not expect this recipe to work, but only to understand how isar works. Clean every mention of hithere (except the recipe itself) and rebuild,
Perfect! Debian files are missing, so we get an error.
compat contains the 12345 string, as expected, hithere-1.0 contains an empty debian folder (presumably the compat was not copied here due to the error) and an error file,
Full recipe with here-docs but without deb_debianize
Try again the full recipe, but without the deb_debianize at the end of the
do_prepare_buildtask.No debian/control file. Why? There is a debian/control file given in the task, as a here-doc. deb_debianize should only add one if it doesn't find one in the WORKDIR.
Full recipe but with override_dh_auto_install
Add back the
override_dh_auto_install,But then I get other errors
Specify all the debian files in the files folder of the hithere recipe,
For a different approach, I've remove the here-docs and added all the debian files in the file folder of the hithere recipe,
All the debian files contain what the packaging intro contain and what I also used in the docker image to successfully build the debian package.
Rebuild,
That does not work either. debian/control is still missing.
Conclusion
I've tried all the combinations that I could think of to replicate the build steps from the packaging intro. At each step I get different errors. The big question is what is the correct approach to debianizing packages in isar? I am open and willing to write a detailed isar wiki article on how to debianize the hithere package once I'm clear with the process and the pitfalls. I'm choosing the hithere package since this is the official "packaging for beginners" suggestion for debian users who have no clue what packaging is. It might also be a good starting point for "isar for beginners" in the future. (feel free to adjust the formatting or grammar for the above issue)