using dgit. This git history is stored in a canonical location known
as
.B dgit-repos
-which lives outside the Debian archive (currently, on Alioth).
+which lives on a dedicated git server.
.SH MODEL
You may use any suitable git workflow with dgit, provided you
satisfy dgit's requirements:
normally the dgit-repos repo for the package will be accessible via
the remote name `origin'.
-dgit push will also (by default) make signed tags called
-.BI debian/ version
-and push them to dgit-repos, but nothing depends on these tags
-existing.
+dgit push will also make signed tags called
+.BI archive/debian/ version
+(with version encoded a la DEP-14)
+and push them to dgit-repos. These are used at the
+server to authenticate pushes.
dgit push can operate on any commit which is a descendant of the
current dgit/suite tip in dgit-repos.
Uploads not made by dgit are represented in git by commits which are
synthesised by dgit. The tree of each such commit corresponds to the
unpacked source; there is an origin commit with the contents, and a
-psuedo-merge from last known upload - that is, from the contents of
+pseudo-merge from last known upload - that is, from the contents of
the dgit/suite branch.
dgit expects repos that it works with to have a
.B dgit
-remote. This refers to the well-known dgit-repos location
-(currently, the dgit-repos project on Alioth). dgit fetch updates
-the remote tracking branch for dgit/suite.
+remote. This refers to the well-known dgit-repos location (on a
+dedicated Debian VM). dgit fetch updates the remote tracking branch
+for dgit/suite.
dgit does not (currently) represent the orig tarball(s) in git. The
orig tarballs are downloaded (by dgit clone) into the parent
build and dgit push.
dgit repositories could be cloned with standard (git) methods. The
-only exception is that for sourcefull builds / uploads the orig
+only exception is that for sourceful builds / uploads the orig
tarball(s) need to be present in the parent directory.
To a user looking at the archive, changes pushed using dgit look like
directory (which is used by quilt to record which patches are
applied). If you want to manipulate the patch stack you probably want
to be looking at tools like git-dpm.
-.SH FILES IN THE SOURCE PACKAGE BUT NOT IN GIT
+.SH FILES IN THE SOURCE PACKAGE BUT NOT IN GIT - AUTOTOOLS ETC.
This section is mainly of interest to maintainers who want to use dgit
with their existing git history for the Debian package.
bugs, which cause unintended files to end up in the source package.
dgit will notice this and complain. You may have to fix these bugs
before you can unify your existing git history with dgit's.
+.LP
+.SH FILES IN THE SOURCE PACKAGE BUT NOT IN GIT - DOCS, BINARIES ETC.
+Some upstream tarballs contain build artifacts which upstream expects
+some users not to want to rebuild (or indeed to find hard to rebuild),
+but which in Debian we always rebuild.
+.LP
+Examples sometimes include crossbuild firmware binaries and
+documentation.
+To avoid problems when building updated source
+packages
+(in particular, to avoid trying to represent as changes in
+the source package uninteresting or perhaps unrepresentable changes
+to such files)
+many maintainers arrange for the package clean target
+to delete these files.
+.LP
+dpkg-source does not
+(with any of the commonly used source formats)
+represent deletion of files (outside debian/) present in upstream.
+Thus deleting such files in a dpkg-source working tree does not
+actually result in them being deleted from the source package.
+Thus
+deleting the files in rules clean sweeps this problem under the rug.
+.LP
+However, git does always properly record file deletion.
+Since dgit's
+principle is that the dgit git tree is the same of dpkg-source -x,
+that means that a dgit-compatible git tree always contains these
+files.
+.LP
+For the non-maintainer,
+this can be observed in the following suboptimal occurrences:
+.TP
+\(bu
+The package clean target often deletes these files, making the git
+tree dirty trying to build the source package, etc.
+This can be fixed
+by using
+.BR "dgit -wg" " aka " "--clean=git" ,
+so that the package clean target is never run.
+.TP
+\(bu
+The package build modifies these files, so that builds make the git
+tree dirty.
+This can be worked around by using `git reset --hard'
+after each build
+(or at least before each commit or push).
+.LP
+From the maintainer's point of view,
+the main consequence is that to make a dgit-compatible git branch
+it is necessary to commit these files to git.
+The maintainer has a few additional options for mitigation:
+for example,
+it may be possible for the rules file to arrange to do the
+build in a temporary area, which avoids updating the troublesome
+files;
+they can then be left in the git tree without seeing trouble.
+.SH PROBLEMS WITH PACKAGE CLEAN TARGETS ETC.
+A related problem is other unexpected behaviour by a package's
+.B clean
+target.
+If a package's rules
+modify files which are distributed in the package,
+or simply forget to remove certain files,
+dgit will complain that the tree is dirty.
+.LP
+Again, the solution is to use
+.BR "dgit -wg" " aka " "--clean=git" ,
+which instructs dgit to use git clean instead of the package's
+build target,
+along with perhaps
+.B git reset --hard
+before each build.
+.LP
+This is 100% reliable, but has the downside
+that if you forget to git add or to commit, and then use
+.BR "dgit -wg" " or " "git reset --hard" ,
+your changes may be lost.
.SH SEE ALSO
\fBdgit\fP(1).
~ianmdlvl / dgit.git / blobdiff