[gentoo-dev] writing ebuild scripts

[gentoo-dev] writing ebuild scripts

[Erik Grinaker]

Hi

First I'd like to extend my respect to the Gentoo developers, I
installed Gentoo Linux on one of my workstations yesterday, and I am
very impressed so far. If no bad things happen I may even start using it
as my primary distro.

I am making some ebuild-scripts for a few pieces of software I need to
install, and will submit these to the Bugzilla for inclusion in the
distro. I am a bit uncertain about how, and under what policies, these
scripts should be written.

Some of the following questions may be answered in the documentation,
but in order to avoid any misunderstandings (and as the documentation
seems a bit dated) it's probably better to just ask.

- What is the best way to determine dependencies for a file, and how
important is it to have minimum version info for dependencies? Unless I
find any info in the docs, would common sense and a quick peek at
configure-scripts/makefiles ot the source suffice?

- What is the best way to install built files? Using make install or
using the dobin/doman/whatever scripts? ...which brings me on to the
next question ;

- Is there any database over what files belong to what package?

- Do you have any policies for testing? Is it enough that I test the
package on my own system, or should I have a clean installation (via
chroot, usermode linux, dualboot or whatever) I can use for testing?

- Should I work against cvs or the Bugzilla?


-- 

Erik Grinaker
Freelance UNIX/Linux systems consultant

"Perfection is acheived not when there is nothing more to add, but
rather when there is nothing more to take away"
- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Re: [gentoo-dev] writing ebuild scripts

[Karl Trygve Kalleberg]

On 08 Mar 2002 03:43:13 +0100
Erik Grinaker <erikg@wired-networks.net> wrote:

> - What is the best way to determine dependencies for a file, and how
> important is it to have minimum version info for dependencies? Unless I
> find any info in the docs, would common sense and a quick peek at
> configure-scripts/makefiles ot the source suffice?

Yes. If all else fails, you could just default to the version you're
actually building it against. It is very unlikely that we'll add older
versions to the tree anyway.

> - What is the best way to install built files? Using make install or
> using the dobin/doman/whatever scripts? ...which brings me on to the
> next question ;

make install is preferrable. Make certain that it actually installs into
${D} at this stage, by either adding DESTDIR=${D} or prefix=${D}/usr,
depending on which alternative the make files support. 
> - Is there any database over what files belong to what package?

Yes, /var/db/pkg contains a lot of neat info. Look at each packages
CONTENTS file. The qpkg tool in gentoolkit is a nice, quick frontend to
much of the info in /var/db/pkg.

> - Do you have any policies for testing? Is it enough that I test the
> package on my own system, or should I have a clean installation (via
> chroot, usermode linux, dualboot or whatever) I can use for testing?

It is sufficient that it works on your installation. If you know you have
done something horribly weird to your install, let another Gentoo user
test it too.

In time, all ebuilds will be tested on our Tinderbox before being put into
the stable tree.

> - Should I work against cvs or the Bugzilla?

Not quite certain what you mean by this. Submit ebuilds through bugzilla,
preferrably as plain-text attachments to the enhancement request you're
filing. emerge rsync gives you exactly what's in CVS now (albeit with a
time-delay of a few minutes).

Kind regards,

Karl T

Re: [gentoo-dev] writing ebuild scripts

[Grant Goodyear]

> - What is the best way to determine dependencies for a file, and how
> important is it to have minimum version info for dependencies? Unless I
> find any info in the docs, would common sense and a quick peek at
> configure-scripts/makefiles ot the source suffice?

Minimum version info is nice, whenever you can find it.  As for finding
dependencies, ldd is your friend.

> - What is the best way to install built files? Using make install or
> using the dobin/doman/whatever scripts? ...which brings me on to the
> next question ;

By all means, if "make install" can be hacked to install into our 
temporary installation directory, then use it.  Please do your checking
with our "sandbox" turned on (in /etc/make.conf).  The sandbox feature
ensures that attempts to write outside ${D} are automatically caught.
 
> - Is there any database over what files belong to what package?

As karltk mentioned, /var/db/pkg has lots of info.

> - Do you have any policies for testing? Is it enough that I test the
> package on my own system, or should I have a clean installation (via
> chroot, usermode linux, dualboot or whatever) I can use for testing?

It it's working on your system (sandboxed), then please post it on
bugzilla.  It may be a while before we get to it (we're in a new-ebuild
freeze until 1.0), but at least then it will be available to others to
test.


Best,
g2boojum
-- 
___________________________________________________________________
|     Grant Goodyear                  |  The Secrets of Physics:   |
|     Dept. of Chemistry - Clemson U  |1. Add zero.                |
|     Clemson, SC  29634              |2. Multiply by one.         |
|-------------------------------------|3. Expand in a Taylor series|
|e-mail: goodyea@clemson.edu          |4. Integrate by parts.      |
|www:http://g2.ces.clemson.edu/~grant |5. Fourier transform.       |
|                                     |6. Add auxiliary variables  |
|_____________________________________|____________________________|