dpkg and apt into believing that some package is installed even though it is only an empty shell. This allows satisfying dependencies on a package when the corresponding software was installed outside the scope of the packaging system. Such a method works, but it should still be avoided whenever possible, since there is no guarantee that the manually installed software behaves exactly like the corresponding package would and other packages depending on it would not work properly.
equivs-control and equivs-build commands in the equivs package. The equivs-control file command creates a Debian package header file that should be edited to contain the name of the expected package, its version number, the name of the maintainer, its dependencies, and its description. Other fields without a default value are optional and can be deleted. The Copyright, Changelog, Readme and Extra-Files fields are not standard fields in Debian packages; they only make sense within the scope of equivs-build, and they will not be kept in the headers of the generated package.
Exemple 15.2. Fichier d'en-têtes d'un faux paquet libxml-libxml-perl
Section: perl Priority: optional Standards-Version: 4.6.2 Package: libxml-libxml-perl Version: 2.0207-1 Maintainer: Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org> Depends: libxml2 (>= 2.9.10) Architecture: all Description: Fake package - module manually installed in site_perl This is a fake package to let the packaging system believe that this Debian package is installed. . In fact, the package is not installed since a newer version of the module has been manually compiled & installed in the site_perl directory.
equivs-build fichier. Le tour est joué : le paquet est disponible dans le répertoire courant et vous pouvez désormais le manipuler comme tous les autres paquets Debian.
$equivs-build filedpkg-buildpackage: info: source package libxml-libxml-perl dpkg-buildpackage: info: source version 2.0207-1 dpkg-buildpackage: info: source distribution unstable dpkg-buildpackage: info: source changed by Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org> dpkg-buildpackage: info: host architecture amd64 dpkg-source --before-build . debian/rules clean dh clean dh_clean debian/rules binary dh binary dh_update_autotools_config dh_autoreconf create-stamp debian/debhelper-build-stamp dh_prep dh_auto_install --destdir=debian/libxml-libxml-perl/ dh_install dh_installdocs dh_installchangelogs dh_perl dh_link dh_strip_nondeterminism dh_compress dh_fixperms dh_missing dh_installdeb dh_gencontrol dh_md5sums dh_builddeb dpkg-deb: building package 'libxml-libxml-perl' in '../libxml-libxml-perl_2.0207-1_all.deb'. dpkg-genbuildinfo --build=binary -O../libxml-libxml-perl_2.0207-1_amd64.buildinfo dpkg-genchanges --build=binary -O../libxml-libxml-perl_2.0207-1_amd64.changes dpkg-genchanges: info: binary-only upload (no source code included) dpkg-source --after-build . dpkg-buildpackage: info: binary-only upload (no source included) The package has been created. Attention, the package has been created in the current directory, not in ".." as indicated by the message above!
falcot-data-1.0 directory to contain the target source package. The package will, logically, be named falcot-data and bear the 1.0 version number. The administrator then places the document files in a data subdirectory. Then they invoke the dh_make command (from the dh-make package) to add files required by the package generation process, which will all be stored in a debian subdirectory:
$cd falcot-data-1.0$dh_make --nativeType of package: (single, indep, library, python) [s/i/l/p]?iMaintainer Name : Raphael Hertzog Email-Address : hertzog@debian.org Date : Sun, 26 May 2024 21:48:41 +0100 Package Name : falcot-data Version : 1.0 License : gpl3 Package Type : indep Are the details correct? [Y/n/q] Currently there is not top level Makefile. This may require additional tuning Done. Please edit the files in the debian/ subdirectory now. $
Architecture: all in debian/control). single acts as a counterpart, and leads to a single binary package that is dependent on the target architecture (Architecture: any). In this case, the former choice is more relevant since the package only contains documents and no binary programs, so it can be used similarly on computers of all architectures.
dh_make command created a debian subdirectory with many files. Some are required, in particular rules, control, changelog and copyright. Files with the .ex extension are example files that can be used by modifying them (and removing the extension) when appropriate. When they are not needed, removing them is recommended. The compat file is not used nor created anymore. Instead of defining the debhelper compatibility level as a number in this file, it is now defined as a build-dependency on the debhelper-compat virtual package in the Build-Depends field in debian/control.
copyright file must contain information about the authors of the documents included in the package, and the related copyright and license. In our case, these are internal documents and their use is restricted to within the Falcot Corp company. The default format used for this file is defined in the Format field.
changelog file is generally appropriate; replacing the “Initial release” with a more verbose explanation and changing the distribution from UNRELEASED or unstable to the target release name is enough.
control file must also be updated: the Section field can be changed to misc and the Homepage, Vcs-Git and Vcs-Browser fields were removed. The Depends fields was completed with firefox-esr | www-browser so as to ensure the availability of a web browser able to display the documents in the package. If the package does not require to run any commands as root (see OUTIL fakeroot), the Rules-Requires-Root field can be left as is.
Exemple 15.3. Le fichier control
Source: falcot-data
Section: misc
Priority: optional
Maintainer: Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org>
Build-Depends: debhelper-compat (= 13)
Standards-Version: 4.6.2
Rules-Requires-Root: no
Package: falcot-data
Architecture: all
Depends: firefox-esr | www-browser, ${misc:Depends}
Description: Internal Falcot Corp Documentation
This package provides several documents describing the internal
structure at Falcot Corp. This includes:
- organization diagram
- contacts for each department.
.
These documents MUST NOT leave the company.
Their use is INTERNAL ONLY.
Exemple 15.4. Le fichier changelog
falcot-data (1.0) bookworm; urgency=low
* Initial Release.
* Let's start with few documents:
- internal company structure;
- contacts for each department.
-- Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org> Sun, 26 May 2024 21:48:41 +0100
Exemple 15.5. Le fichier copyright
Format: https://www.debian.org/doc/packaging-manuals/copyright-format/1.0/ Upstream-Name: falcot-data Files: * Copyright: 2004-2024 Falcot Corp License: All rights reserved.
rules contient normalement un ensemble de règles employées pour configurer, compiler et installer le logiciel dans un sous-répertoire dédié (portant le nom du paquet binaire généré). Le contenu de ce sous-répertoire est ensuite intégré au paquet Debian comme s'il était la racine du système de fichiers. Dans le cas qui nous concerne, les fichiers seront installés dans le répertoire debian/falcot-data/usr/share/falcot-data/ pour que les documents ainsi diffusés soient disponibles sous /usr/share/falcot-data/ dans le paquet généré. Le fichier rules est de type Makefile avec quelques cibles standardisées (notamment clean et binary, respectivement pour nettoyer et produire le binaire).
debhelper. C'est le cas dans le fichier préparé par dh_make. Pour installer nos fichiers, nous allons simplement modifier le comportement de la commande dh_install en créant le fichier debian/falcot-data.install :
data/* usr/share/falcot-data/
falcot-data.desktop file and get it installed in /usr/share/applications by adding a second line to debian/falcot-data.install.
Exemple 15.6. Le fichier falcot-data.desktop
[Desktop Entry] Name=Internal Falcot Corp Documentation Comment=Starts a browser to read the documentation Name[fr]=Documentation interne Falcot SA Comment[fr]=Lance un navigateur pour lire la documentation Exec=x-www-browser /usr/share/falcot-data/index.html Terminal=false Type=Application Categories=Documentation;
debian/falcot-data.install mis à jour ressemble donc à ceci :
data/* usr/share/falcot-data/ falcot-data.desktop usr/share/applications/
dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc command from within the falcot-data-1.0 directory.