New packager guide

[kjpetrie]

mkdir p should be mkdir -p in the manual rpm build system guide.

Also, there's a lot of emphasis on task-packaging-kde, but KDE is a fairly bloated build environment. I build in LXDE in order to get the kind of lean system needed. People ought to be encouraged to build on a dedicated lean machine (probably an old computer or a virtual machine) rather than in their main install. I don't think that's emphasised enough.

[travisN000]

mkdir p should be mkdir -p in the manual rpm build system guide.

..this is now fixed;  thanks for second set of eyes!

Also, there's a lot of emphasis on task-packaging-kde, but KDE is a fairly bloated build environment. I build in LXDE in order to get the kind of lean system needed. People ought to be encouraged to build on a dedicated lean machine (probably an old computer or a virtual machine) rather than in their main install. I don't think that's emphasised enough.

..I think the bloat issue is a common misconception;  if you look at the download specs for the LXDE-Mini and KDE-mini releases I think you will see that they are not that much different in size:

KDE-minime:        Size: 445 MB

LXDE Mini:           Size: 410 MB

..however, It is still probably a good idea to have more info on setup of different build environments.  I plan on revising that section eventually, as pkgutils needs to be updated to use the mkrepo that I posted in another thread; this will also be a good opportunity to set up a SINGLE spec/srpm to build all of the pkgutils / task-packaging packages and do so with a more consistent structure (..currently I think it is set up with a task-packaging-kde and pkgutils-thunar packages).

IIRC, the naming / organization of these is inconsistent across DE... this makes writing clear documentation more difficult.  What I would like to see is something like the following (I'm not at a PCLOS machine now, so I'm not exactly sure as to what the current setup is..  I'm going from memory ):

task-packaging-kde4:    metapackage with .desktop service menu entries for KDE4;  also req's bottom two packages
task-packaging-thunar/gtk (?):  similar to kde version; not sure if one package can serve gnome, lxde, xfce service menus
<unknown name>:        metapackage containing min. required rpm-build libs, spec-helper, gcc, automake, etc..,
pkgutils:                    contains only pkgutils script; mkrepo will install / update <unknown> package above.

..by removing the service menu entries from pkgutils and moving them all to appropriate task-packaging-<desktop environment> packages, pushing updates to pkgutils scripts becomes easier, and documentation for all DE's also becomes easier.

If anyone else wants to jump on this, this is fine; otherwise, I will probably get to it sometime in the next week or so.

[Neal ManBear]

<unknown name>:        metapackage containing min. required rpm-build libs, spec-helper, gcc, automake, etc..,

That would be a-task-packager-minimal.

[clarms]

I searched and guess I'm not finding the information. What do you do with a finished package? I've got obscure src rpms or spec files that someone "may" be interested in. 

[SpeedVin]

I searched and guess I'm not finding the information. What do you do with a finished package? I've got obscure src rpms or spec files that someone "may" be interested in. 

I normally install finished package and test it...

[clarms]

What I meant was how do you submit a finished package or a spec file for ideas or testing, to others here or to pclos for possible use? In other words, for new src rpms for rpms that are not in the repository that are hand made.

[Neal ManBear]

clarms,
We use dropbox.

See reply number 3 here -->
http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,73610.0.html

[clarms]

Thanks! i must have overlooked that somewhere.

[MBantz]

mkdir p should be mkdir -p in the manual rpm build system guide.

..this is now fixed;  thanks for second set of eyes!

Also, there's a lot of emphasis on task-packaging-kde, but KDE is a fairly bloated build environment. I build in LXDE in order to get the kind of lean system needed. People ought to be encouraged to build on a dedicated lean machine (probably an old computer or a virtual machine) rather than in their main install. I don't think that's emphasised enough.

..I think the bloat issue is a common misconception;  if you look at the download specs for the LXDE-Mini and KDE-mini releases I think you will see that they are not that much different in size:

KDE-minime:        Size: 445 MB

LXDE Mini:           Size: 410 MB

..however, It is still probably a good idea to have more info on setup of different build environments.  I plan on revising that section eventually, as pkgutils needs to be updated to use the mkrepo that I posted in another thread; this will also be a good opportunity to set up a SINGLE spec/srpm to build all of the pkgutils / task-packaging packages and do so with a more consistent structure (..currently I think it is set up with a task-packaging-kde and pkgutils-thunar packages).

IIRC, the naming / organization of these is inconsistent across DE... this makes writing clear documentation more difficult.  What I would like to see is something like the following (I'm not at a PCLOS machine now, so I'm not exactly sure as to what the current setup is..  I'm going from memory ):

task-packaging-kde4:    metapackage with .desktop service menu entries for KDE4;  also req's bottom two packages
task-packaging-thunar/gtk (?):  similar to kde version; not sure if one package can serve gnome, lxde, xfce service menus
<unknown name>:        metapackage containing min. required rpm-build libs, spec-helper, gcc, automake, etc..,
pkgutils:                    contains only pkgutils script; mkrepo will install / update <unknown> package above.

..by removing the service menu entries from pkgutils and moving them all to appropriate task-packaging-<desktop environment> packages, pushing updates to pkgutils scripts becomes easier, and documentation for all DE's also becomes easier.

If anyone else wants to jump on this, this is fine; otherwise, I will probably get to it sometime in the next week or so.

pkgutils-thunar is my little baby, created when I wanted to package in LXDE avoiding a bunch kde stuff. Thunar can be installed in all DE's along with this package. Currently I package in Zen using thunar (and have just added a bunch functionality to it). Having small thoughts on creating same service menu options to Nautilus (as it handles mimetypes perfectly), not sure anyone else is interested in this?

cheers
MBantz

[travisN000]

I re-wrote mkrepo today so that it will no longer overwrite the sources.list with arbitrary list of repos, and also added a bunch of zenity prompts to it so that it should be a little more user friendly for the new packager.

I also combined pkgutils and the various packaging metapackage specs into a single spec / SRPM to keep the organization / maintenance easier...

If Martin & Neal and any other interested parties could download the SRPM from my dropbox and test the new arrangement it would be appreciated; feel free to also add in any needed info for Gnome, etc (I don't know that it will be needed, as most of the mime-type stuff is in the pkgutils RPM)  

I think some of the KDE4 stuff is getting put into the pkgutils RPM instead of the pkgutils-kde4 package.. it should be moved, but I probably won't have any time in the upcomming week.  I'm pretty sure it is set up to obsolete the old packaging meta-packages properly, but its getting late and I have to be up in 4-5 hours...

Here is the SRPM download link:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2425248/pkgutils-0.1.5-1travisn0002010.src.rpm

For the mean time I'm leaving this up to anyone that wants to jump in!  


PS..  the new mkrepo script no longer denies access from root user; instead a root user gets prompted to select which regular user they would like to set up for packaging!  

[Neal ManBear]

I'll have a look, but I believe Martin is better with this. If he has the time to do it, I'll leave any tweaks to him.

[MBantz]

oki-doki,

I'll just got it and I give it a whirl :-)

[travisN000]

oki-doki,

I'll just got it and I give it a whirl :-)

..In my testing last night I was trying to get the mkrepo script to run from the %post section at install; I'm not sure but I think I may have left it in there.  I couldn't get mkrepo to run properly from the post section, but it seemed to do fine after install... maybe you'll have better luck; if not feel free to remove it from the spec.  


EDIT:
One other thought..  perhaps we should have the "build all" service menu also run gbd (or have this as another option)

[slax]

One other thought..  perhaps we should have the "build all" service menu also run gbd (or have this as another option)

I think it should be added, i would like that. It's annoying to run gbd everytime you build package

[MBantz]

I changed the post to posttrans for the mkrepo - and then it work fine when installing (here at least).

I think I have missed something about gbd, is this Gnu Debugger? What is it used for?

I'll gladly add it to the thunar - what is the commandline for build all in this case?

cheers,
MBantz