DeveloperWiki:HOWTO Be A Packager
Contents
Follow Package Guidelines
Package guidelines can be found in the Arch Linux documentation. Please follow them closely.
How To Use SVN
Non-recursive checkout
For core, extra, testing and staging repos:
svn checkout -N svn+ssh://svn-packages@nymeria.archlinux.org/srv/repos/svn-packages/svn svn-packages
For community, community-testing, community-staging, multilib, multilib-testing, multilib-staging:
svn checkout -N svn+ssh://svn-community@nymeria.archlinux.org/srv/repos/svn-community/svn svn-community
This creates a directory named "svn-packages" which contains nothing. It does, however, know that it is an svn checkout.
Checkout a package
cd svn-packages svn update package-name
This will pull the package you requested into your checkout. From now on, any time you `svn update` at the top level, this will be updated as well.
Updating all packages
cd svn-packages svn update
Adding a package
cd svn-packages mkdir -p new-package/{repos,trunk} $EDITOR new-package/trunk/PKGBUILD svn add new-package svn propset svn:keywords "Id" new-package/trunk/PKGBUILD svn commit
Removing a package
ssh nymeria.archlinux.org /packages/db-remove repo-name arch packagename i.e. /packages/db-remove core i686 opensshAnd if you want to really kill the package, you will need to
svn rmthe entire package directory after the above steps and commit the deletion.
Moving a package between repos
ssh nymeria.archlinux.org /packages/db-move fromrepo torepo packagename i.e. /packages/db-move testing core openssh
Alternatively, the move from testing is so common we have helper scripts:
/packages/testing2x openssh bzip2 coreutils /packages/testing2x64 openssh bzip2 coreutils
These scripts only work if the packages on the commandline are either in core or extra. If a package is only in testing, you have to use testing2core, testing2core64, testing2extra or testing2extra64.
"Tagging" releases
cd svn-packages/package-name/trunk archrelease extra-i686
This makes an svn copy of the trunk entries in a directory named "extra-i686" indicating that this package is in the extra repository for the i686 architecture. This will be done automatically when using tools such as extrapkg (see below)
Cleaning up your checkout
Since you are now maintaining a non-recursive checkout, you may want to get rid of packages that you are no longer tracking:
svn update package1 package2 --set-depth exclude
Or if you want an empty toplevel again:
svn update --set-depth empty
The Process
Checkout/update your local repository
cd svn-packages svn update
Update the needed package
svn update some-package
Traverse to the package's trunk directory
cd some-package/trunk/
Change and build
$EDITOR PKGBUILD makepkg
It is highly recommended to build your package using a clean chroot
Run namcap on both PKGBUILD and package
namcap PKGBUILD namcap some-package-1.0-1-i686.pkg.tar.gz
Use devtools to upload and commit
This is repo dependent. For 'extra', you use 'extrapkg'. 'testingpkg' for 'testing', etc
extrapkg "A commit message"
Update the repository
Use 'db-update'. It will find new packages for any repository and it manages both i686 and x86_64 architectures at once, if present. For example:
ssh gerolde.archlinux.org /arch/db-update
Staging Directories
Staging directories are needed on gerolde.archlinux.org for uploading of packages. The following structure is NOT automatically created. You must do it yourself:
~/staging/ |-- core/ |-- extra/ `-- testing/
These directories are searched by the db scripts to find new packages and those slated for removal.
Miscellaneous Stuff
SVN $Id$ tags
$Id$ tags are a nice helper for PKGBUILDs and should be added to the top of all PKGBUILDs in a comment. However, svn needs an additional push to know that it should modify this line on checkout.
svn propset svn:keywords "Id" my-package/trunk/PKGBUILD
Package checking tools
namcap
Run on both your PKGBUILD and package to check for common packaging problems.
checkpkg
Run (as root) in the directory with your freshly built package to get a file list diff compared with the package version currently in the repos.
Commit messages
Please try to write concise commit messages. If the package is simply an upstream change, that is fine, but if anything more complex changes, please inform us by writing an appropriate commit message.
Avoid having to enter your password all the time
When working with extrapkg and the other devtools, quite a few ssh connections are established, even when using ssh keys and the ssh agent. You can work around that.
Add this to your $HOME/.ssh/config:
ControlPath /home/<your username>/.ssh/master-%h-%p-%r Host gerolde.archlinux.org
Now, before you start working, open a ssh session with
ssh -M gerolde.archlinux.org
Enter your password and leave that session open until you are finished. All ssh sessions (including scp and svn+ssh) will now be tunneled through this connection.