<!entity % commondata SYSTEM "common.ent" > %commondata;
<!-- CVS revision of this document -->
- <!entity cvs-rev "$Revision: 1.142 $">
+ <!entity cvs-rev "$Revision: 1.149 $">
<!-- if you are translating this document, please notate the CVS
revision of the developers reference here -->
<!--
<item>
Orphan all your packages, as described in <ref id="orphaning">.
<item>
-Send an email about how you are leaving the project to
+Send an email about why you are leaving the project to
&email-debian-private;.
<item>
Notify the Debian key ring maintainers that you are leaving by
The Package Tracking System (PTS) is basically a tool to track by mail
the activity of a source package. You just have to subscribe
to a source package to start getting the mails related to it.
-You get the same mails than the maintainer. Each mail
+You get the same mails as the maintainer. Each mail
sent through the PTS is classified and associated to one of
the keyword listed below. This will let you select the mails that
you want to receive.
(see <ref id="collaborative-maint">).
- <sect id="porting">Porting and Being Ported
+ <sect id="porting">Porting and being ported
<p>
Debian supports an ever-increasing number of architectures. Even if
you are not a porter, and you don't use any architecture but one, it
</sect>
<sect id="archive-manip">
- <heading>Moving, Removing, Renaming, Adopting, and Orphaning
- Packages</heading>
+ <heading>Moving, removing, renaming, adopting, and orphaning
+ packages</heading>
<p>
Some archive manipulation operations are not automated in the Debian
upload process. These procedures should be manually followed by
<chapt id="best-pkging-practices">
<heading>Best Packaging Practices</heading>
<p>
-Debian's quality is largely due to its Policy that all packages
-follow. But it's also because we accumulated years of experience
-in packaging; very talented people created great tools to make
-good packages without much troubles.
+Debian's quality is largely due to the <url id="&url-debian-policy;"
+name="Debian Policy">, which defines explicit baseline requirements
+which all Debian packages must fulfill. Yet there is also a shared
+history of experience which goes beyond the Debian Policy, an
+accumulatation of years of experience in packaging. Many very
+talented people have created great tools, tools which help you, the
+Debian maintainer, create and maintain excellent packages.
<p>
-This chapter provides the best known solutions to common problems
-faced during packaging. It also lists various advice collected on
-several mailing lists. By following them, you will make Debian's quality
-even better.
-
- <sect id="packaging-tools">
- <heading>Packaging tools and common cases</heading>
+This chapter provides some best practices for Debian developers. All
+recommendations are merely that, and are not requirements or policy.
+These are just some subjective hints, advice and pointers collected
+from Debian developers. Feel free to pick and choose whatever works
+best for you.
+
+ <sect id="bpp-debian-rules">
+ <heading>Best practices for <file>debian/rules</file></heading>
+ <p>
+The following recommendations apply to the <file>debian/rules</file>
+file. Since <file>debian/rules</file> controls the build process and
+selects the files which go into the package (directly or indirectly),
+it's usually the file maintainers spend the most time on.
<sect1 id="helper-scripts">Helper scripts
<p>
-To help you in your packaging effort, you can use helper scripts.
-The best scripts available are provided by <package>debhelper</package>.
-With <prgn>dh_make</prgn> (see <ref id="dh-make">), you can
-generate in a few seconds a package that is mostly ready. However that
-apparent simplicity is hiding many things done by the helper scripts.
-You have to know what is done by them, that's why you are strongly
-encouraged to read the corresponding manual pages, starting with
-<tt>debhelper(1)</tt>. That's required because you'll have to
-understand what is going on to be able to use them wisely and to
-fix bugs in a pretty way.
- <p>
-debhelper is very useful because it lets you follow the latest Debian policy
-without doing many modifications since the changes that can be automated are
-almost always automatically done by a debhelper script. Furthermore it
-offers enough flexibility to be able to use it in conjunction with
-some hand crafted shell invocations within the <file>rules</file> file.
- <p>
-You can however decide to not use any helper script and still write
-excellent <file>rules</file> file. Many examples are available
-at <url id="&url-rules-files;">.
+The rationale for using helper scripts in <file>debian/rules</file> is
+that lets maintainers use and share common logic among many packages.
+Take for instance the question of installing menu entries: you need to
+put the file into <file>/usr/lib/menu</file>, and add commands to the
+maintainer scripts to register and unregister the menu entries. Since
+this is a very common thing for packages to do, why should each
+maintainer rewrite all this on their own, sometimes with bugs? Also,
+supposing the menu directory changed, every package would have to be
+changed.
+ <p>
+Helper scripts take care of these issues. Assuming you comply with
+the conventions expected by the helper script, the helper takes care
+of all the details. Changes in policy can be made in the helper
+script, then packages just need to be rebuilt with the new version of
+the helper and no other changes.
+ <p>
+<ref id="tools"> contains a couple of different helpers. The most
+common and best (in our opinion) helper system is
+<package>debhelper</package>. Previous helper systems, such as
+<package>debmake</package>, were "monolithic": you couldn't pick and
+choose which part of the helper you found useful, but had to use the
+helper to do everything. <package>debhelper</package>, however, is a
+number of seperate little <prgn>dh_*</prgn> programs. For instance,
+<prgn>dh_installman</prgn> installs and compresses manpages,
+<prgn>dh_installmenu</prgn> installs menu files, and so on. Thus, it
+offers enough flexibility to be able to use the little helper scripts,
+where useful, in conjunction with hand-crafted commands in
+<file>debian/rules</file>.
+ <p>
+You can get started with <package>debhelper</package> by reading
+<manref name="debhelper" section="1">, and looking at the examples
+that come with the package. <prgn>dh_make</prgn>, from the
+<package>dh-make</package> package (see <ref id="dh-make">), can be
+used to convert a "vanilla" source package to a
+<package>debhelper</package>ized package. This shortcut, though,
+should not convince you that you do not need to bother understanding
+the individual <prgn>dh_*</prgn> helpers. If you are going to use a
+helper, you do need to take the time to learn to use that helper, to
+learn its expectations and behavior.
+ <p>
+Some people feel that vanilla <file>debian/rules</file> files are
+better, since you don't have to learn the intricies of any helper
+system. This decision is completely up to you. Use what works for
+you. Many examples of vanilla <file>debian/rules</file> files are
+available at <url id="&url-rules-files;">.
+
+
+ <sect1 id="multiple-patches">
+ <heading>Patching source versus patching at build time</heading>
+ <p>
+Big, complex packages may have many bugs that you need to deal with.
+If you correct a number of bug directly in the source, if you're not
+careful, it can get hard to differentiate the various patches that you
+applied. It can get quite messy when you have to update the package
+to a new upstream version which integrates some of the fixes (but not
+all). You can't take the total set of diffs (e.g., from
+<file>.diff.gz</file>) and work out which patch sets to back out as a
+unit as bugs are fixed upstream.
+ <p>
+One good solution is to keep separate patches under the
+<file>debian</file> directory and apply the patches at build time. The
+<package>dbs</package> package provides an convenient means for
+applying patches at build time (and unapplying them at clean time).
+<package>dbs</package> also provides facilities for creating the
+patches and keeping track of what they are for. As always when using
+maintainer tools, you'll have to read the accompanying documentation.
+The package <package>hello-dbs</package> is a simple example that
+demonstrates how to use <package>dbs</package>.
+
+
+ <sect1 id="multiple-binary">Multiple binary packages
+ <p>
+A single source package will often build several binary packages,
+either to provide several flavors of the same software (examples are
+the <package>vim-*</package> packages) or to make several small
+packages instead of a big one (e.g., if the user can install only the
+subset she needs, and thus save some disk space).
+ <p>
+The second case can be easily managed in <file>debian/rules</file>.
+You just need to move the appropriate files from the build directory
+into the package's temporary trees. You can do this using
+<prgn>install</prgn> (vanilla approach) or <prgn>dh_install</prgn>
+(from <package>debhelper</package>). Be sure to check the different
+permutations of the various packages, ensuring that you have the
+inter-package dependancies set right in <file>debian/control</file>.
+ <p>
+The first case is a bit more difficult since it involves multiple
+recompiles of the same software but with different configure
+options. The <package>vim</package> is an example of how to manage
+this using an hand-crafted <file>debian/rules</file> file.
+
+<!-- &FIXME; Find a good debhelper example with multile configure/make
+ cycles -->
+ </sect1>
+ </sect>
+
+ <sect id="bpp-debian-maint-scripts">
+ <heading>Best practices for maintainer scripts</heading>
+ <p>
+Maintainer scripts include the files <file>debian/postinst</file>,
+<file>debian/preinst</file>, <file>debian/prerm</file> and
+<file>debian/postrm</file>. These scripts take care of any package
+installation or deinstallation setup which isn't handled merely by the
+creation or removal of files and directories. The following
+instructions supplement the <url id="&url-debian-policy;" name="Debian
+Policy">.
+ <p>
+Maintainer scripts must be idempotent. That means that you need to
+make sure nothing bad will happen if the script is called twice where
+it would usually be called once.
+ <p>
+Standard input and output may be redirected (e.g. into pipes) for
+logging purposes, so don't rely on them being a tty.
+ <p>
+All prompting or interactive configuration should be kept to a
+minimum. When it is necessary, you should use the
+<package>debconf</package> package for the interface. Remember that
+prompting in any case can only be in the <tt>configure</tt> stage of
+the <file>postinst</file> script.
+ <p>
+Keep the maintainer scripts as simple as possible. We suggest you use
+pure POSIX shell scripts. Remember, if you do need any bash features,
+the maintainer script must have a bash shbang line. Posix shell or
+Bash are preferred to Perl, since they enable
+<package>debhelper</package> to easily add bits to the scripts.
+ <p>
+If you change your maintainer scripts, be sure to test package
+removal, double installation, and purging. Be sure that a purged
+package is completely gone, that is, it must remove any files created,
+directly or indirectly, in any maintainer script.
+ <p>
+If you need to check for the existance of a command, you should use
+something like
+<example>if [ -x /usr/sbin/install-docs ]; then ...</example>
+
+If you don't wish to hardcode the path of the command in your
+maintainer script, the following POSIX-compliant shell function may
+help:
+
+&example-pathfind;
+
+You can use this function to search <tt>$PATH</tt> for a command name,
+passed as an argument. It returns true (zero) if the command was
+found, and false if not. This is really the most portable way, since
+<tt>command -v</tt>, <prgn>type</prgn>, and <prgn>which</prgn> are not
+POSIX. While <prgn>which</prgn> is an acceptable alternative, since
+it is from the required <package>debianutils</package> package, it's
+not on the root partition, although that is probably not something
+that will cause a problem.
+
+
<!--
<sect1 id="pkg-mgmt-cvs">Managing a package with CVS
via CVS (debian/rules refresh).
-->
- <sect1 id="multiple-patches">Package with multiple patches
- <p>
-Big packages tend to have many upstream bugs that you want to fix within
-the Debian package. If you just correct the bug in the source, all the
-fixes are directly integrated in the <file>.diff.gz</file> file and you
-can't easily differentiate the various patches that you applied. It gets
-very messy when you have to update the package to a new upstream version
-which integrates some of the fixes (but not all).
+ <sect id="bpp-config-mgmt">
+ <heading>Configuration management with <package>debconf</package></heading>
+
<p>
-The good solution is to keep separate patches within the
-<file>debian/patches</file> directory and to apply them on the fly at
-build time. The package <package>dbs</package> provides an
-implementation of such a system, you just have to build-depend on dbs to
-be able to use its functionalities. The package
-<package>hello-dbs</package> is a simple example that demonstrates how to
-use <package>dbs</package>.
+<package>Debconf</package> is a configuration management system which
+can be used by all the various packaging scripts
+(<file>postinst</file> mainly) to request feedback from the user
+concerning how to configure the package. Direct user interactions must
+now be avoided in favor of <package>debconf</package>
+interaction. This will enable non-interactive installations in the
+future.
<p>
-Additionally, dbs provides facilities to create the patches and to keep
-track of what they are for.
+Debconf is a great tool but it is often poorly used. Many common mistakes
+are listed in the <manref name="debconf-devel" section="8"> man page.
+It is something that you must read if you decide to use debconf.
+ </sect>
- <sect1 id="multiple-binary">Multiple binary packages
- <p>
-A single source package will often build several binary packages, either
-to provide several flavors of the same software (examples are the
-vim-* packages) or to make several small packages instead of a big one
-(it's interesting if the user doesn't need all the packages and can thus
-save some disk space).
- <p>
-The second case can be easily managed by <prgn>dh_install</prgn> (from
-<package>debhelper</package>) to move files from the build directory to
-the package's temporary trees.
- <p>
-The first case is a bit more difficult since it involves multiple recompiles
-of the same software but with different configure options. The
-<package>vim</package> is an example of how to manage this with an
-hand crafted rules file.
-<!-- &FIXME; Find a good debhelper example with multile configure/make
- cycles -->
- <sect1 id="handling-debconf-translations">Handling debconf translations
- <p>
+ <sect id="bpp-i18n">
+ <heading>Internationalization</heading>
+
+ <sect1 id="bpp-i18n-debconf">
+ <heading>Handling debconf translations</heading>
+ <p>
Like porters, translators have a difficult task. They work on many
packages and must collaborate with many different
maintainers. Moreover, most of the time, they are not native English
-speaker, so you may need to be particularly patient with them.
+speakers, so you may need to be particularly patient with them.
<p>
The goal of <package>debconf</package> was to make packages
configuration easier for maintainers and for users. Originally,
translation of debconf templates was handled with
-<prgn>debconf-mergetemplate</prgn> from the
-<package>debconf-utils</package> package. Since
-<package>debconf</package> version 1.2.9,
-<prgn>debconf-mergetemplate</prgn> has been deprecated and a new
-system called <package>po-debconf</package> is strongly
-encouraged. This new method is much easier both for the maintainer and
-the translators, and you should upgrade your packages to use it.
-Transition scripts are provided.
+<prgn>debconf-mergetemplate</prgn>. However, that technique is now
+deprecated; the best way to accomplish <package>debconf</package>
+internationalization is by using the <package>po-debconf</package>
+package. This method is easier both for maintainer and translators;
+transition scripts are provided.
<p>
Using <package>po-debconf</package>, the translation is stored in
<file>po</file> files (drawing from <prgn>gettext</prgn> translation
techniques). Special template files contain the original messages and
-mark which fields should be translated. When you change the original,
-calling the <prgn>debconf-updatepo</prgn> script with no argument is
-enough to mark the translation as needing attention from the
-translators. Then, at build time, use the
-<prgn>dh_installdebconf</prgn> program take care of all the needed
-magic to add the template along with the up-to-date translations into
-the binary packages. Refer to the <manref name="po-debconf"
-section="7"> manual page for details.
-
- <sect id="specific-practices">
- <heading>Specific packaging practices</heading>
+mark which fields are translatable. When you change the value of a
+translatable field, by calling <prgn>debconf-updatepo</prgn>, the
+translation is marked as needing attention from the translators. Then,
+at build time, the <prgn>dh_installdebconf</prgn> program takes care
+of all the needed magic to add the template along with the up-to-date
+translations into the binary packages. Refer to the <manref
+name="po-debconf" section="7"> manual page for details.
+ </sect1>
+
+ <sect1 id="bpp-i18n-docs">
+ <heading>Internationalized documentation</heading>
+ <p>
+Internationalizing documentation is crucial for users, but a lot of
+labor. There's no way to eliminate all that work, but you can make things
+easier for translators.
+ <p>
+If you maintain documentation of any size, its easier for translators
+if they have access to a source control system. That lets translators
+see the differences between two versions of the documentation, so, for
+instance, they can see what needs to be retranslated. It is
+recommended that the translated documentation maintain a note about
+what source control revision the translation is based on. An
+interesting system is provided by <url id="&url-i18n-doc-check;"
+name="doc-check"> in the <package>boot-floppies</package> package,
+which shows an overview of the translation status for any given
+language, using structured comments for the current revision of the
+file to be translated and, for a translated file, the revision of the
+original file the translation is based on. You might wish to adapt
+and provide that in your CVS area.
+ <p>
+If you maintain XML or SGML documentation, we suggest that you isolate
+any language-independant information and define those as entities in a
+separate file which is included by all the different
+translations. This makes it much easier, for instance, to keep URLs
+up-to-date across multiple files.
+ </sect1>
+ </sect>
+
+ <sect id="bpp-common-situations">
+ <heading>Common packaging situations</heading>
<!--
<sect1 id="bpp-kernel">Kernel modules/patches
<sect1 id="bpp-autotools">
<heading>Packages using
<prgn>autoconf</prgn>/<prgn>automake</prgn></heading>
- <p>
-Some very good packaging practices for packages using
-<prgn>autoconf</prgn> and/or <prgn>automake</prgn> have been
-synthesized in &file-bpp-autotools;. You're strongly encouraged to
-read this file and to follow the given recommendations.
+ <p>
+Keeping <prgn>autoconf</prgn>'s <file>config.sub</file> and
+<file>config.guess</file> files up-to-date is critical for porters,
+especially on more volatile architectures. Some very good packaging
+practices for any package using <prgn>autoconf</prgn> and/or
+<prgn>automake</prgn> have been synthesized in
+&file-bpp-autotools;. You're strongly encouraged to read this file and
+to follow the given recommendations.
<sect1 id="bpp-libraries">Libraries
Good practices for library packaging have been grouped in
<url id="&url-libpkg-guide;" name="the library packaging guide">.
- <sect1 id="bpp-other-specific-practices">Other specific packages
+ <sect1 id="bpp-other">Specific types of packages
<p>
-Several subsets of packages have special sub-policies and corresponding
-packaging rules and practices:
+Several specific types of packages have special sub-policies and
+corresponding packaging rules and practices:
<list>
<item>
-Perl related packages have a <url name="Perl policy" id="&url-perl-policy;">,
-some examples of packages following that policy are
-<package>libdbd-pg-perl</package> (binary perl module) or
+Perl related packages have a <url name="Perl policy"
+id="&url-perl-policy;">, some examples of packages following that
+policy are <package>libdbd-pg-perl</package> (binary perl module) or
<package>libmldbm-perl</package> (arch independent perl module).
<item>
-Python related packages have their python policy:
-&file-python-policy; (in the python package).
+Python related packages have their python policy; see
+&file-python-policy; in the <package>python</package> package.
<item>
Emacs related packages have the <url id="&url-emacs-policy;"
name="emacs policy">.
Java related packages have their <url id="&url-java-policy;"
name="java policy">.
<item>
-Ocaml related packages have their Ocaml policy: &file-ocaml-policy; (in
-the <package>ocaml</package> package). A good example is the <package>camlzip</package>
-source package.
+Ocaml related packages have their own policy, found in
+&file-ocaml-policy; from the <package>ocaml</package> package. A good
+example is the <package>camlzip</package> source package.
+ <item>
+Packages providing XML or SGML DTDs should conform to the
+recommendations found in the <package>sgml-base-doc</package>
+package.
+ <item>
+Lisp packages should register themselves with
+<package>common-lisp-controller</package>, about which see
+&file-lisp-controller;.
</list>
-
- <sect id="config-mgmt">
- <heading>Configuration management</heading>
-
- <sect1 id="config-wise-debconf">
- <heading>Proper use of <package>debconf</package></heading>
- <p>
-<package>Debconf</package> is a configuration management system which
-can be used by all the various packaging scripts
-(<file>postinst</file> mainly) to request feedback from the user
-concerning how to configure the package. Direct user interactions must
-now be avoided in favor of <package>debconf</package>
-interaction. This will enable non-interactive installations in the
-future.
- <p>
-Debconf is a great tool but it is often poorly used. Many common mistakes
-are listed in the <manref name="debconf-devel" section="8"> man page.
-It is something that you must read if you decide to use debconf.
+ </sect1>
+ </sect>
<!--
<sect1 id="custom-config-files">Custom configuration files
<heading>Writing useful descriptions</heading>
<p>
The description of the package (as defined by the corresponding field
-in the <file>control</file> file) is usually the first information
-available to the user before they install it. As such, it should
-provide all the required information to let him decide whether
-to install the package.
+in the <file>control</file> file) is the primary information available
+to the user about a package before they install it. It should provide
+all the required information to let the user decide whether to install
+the package.
<p>
-For example, apart from the usual description that you adapt from the
-upstream <file>README</file>, you should include the URL of the
-web site if there's any. If the package is not yet considered stable
-by the author, you may also want to warn the user that the
+For example, apart from the usual description that you might adapt
+from the upstream <file>README</file>, you should include the URL of
+the web site if there's any. If the package is not yet considered
+stable by the author, you may also want to warn the user that the
package is not ready for production use.
<p>
-For consistency and for an aesthetic concern, you should capitalize the
-first letter of the description.
+For consistency and aesthetics, you should capitalize the first letter
+of the description. Don't put a full stop (period) at the end.
<p>
-Last but not least, since the first user impression is based on
-that description, you should be careful to avoid English
-mistakes. Ensure that you spell check it.
-<prgn>ispell</prgn> has a special option (<tt>-g</tt>) for that:
-<example>ispell -d american -g debian/control</example>.
+Since the first user impression is based on the description, be
+careful to avoid spelling and grammar mistakes. Ensure that you
+spell-check it. <prgn>ispell</prgn> has a special <tt>-g</tt> option
+for <file>debian/control</file> files:
+
+<example>ispell -d american -g debian/control</example>
+
If you want someone to proofread the description that you
intend to use you may ask on &email-debian-l10n-english;.
the most critical thing to spend their time on.
<sect id="submit-bug">
- <heading>Bug Reporting</heading>
+ <heading>Bug reporting</heading>
<p>
We encourage you to file bugs as you find them in Debian packages. In
fact, Debian developers are often the first line testers. Finding and
for help on &email-debian-qa; or &email-debian-devel;). At the same
time, you can look for co-maintainers (see <ref id="collaborative-maint">).
- <sect1 id="qa-bsp">Bug Squashing Parties
+ <sect1 id="qa-bsp">Bug squashing parties
<p>
From time to time the QA group organizes bug squashing parties to get rid of
as many problems as possible. They are announced on &email-debian-devel-announce;
finalizing a version and listing the package's current bugs.
- <sect id="debget">
- <heading><package>debget</package>
- <p>
-<package>debget</package> is a package containing a convenient script
-which can be helpful in downloading files from the Debian archive.
-You can use it to download source packages, for instance (although
-<tt>apt-get source <package-name></tt> does pretty much the same
-thing).
-
<!-- FIXME: add the following
- dpkg-awk
alien
dpkg-repack
+ debsums
+ debiandoc-sgml, debiandoc-sgml-doc
+ debian-keyring
+
+questionable:
+ ucf
+ dpkg-awk
grep-dctrl
+ debview
-->
~ianmdlvl / developers-reference.git / blobdiff