NAME¶
debhelper - the debhelper tool suite
SYNOPSIS¶
dh_* [
-v] [
-a] [
-i] [
-s]
[
--no-act] [
-ppackage] [
-Npackage]
[
-P tmpdir]
DESCRIPTION¶
Debhelper is used to help you build a Debian package. The philosophy behind
debhelper is to provide a collection of small, simple, and easily understood
tools that are used in
debian/rules to automate various common aspects
of building a package. This means less work for you, the packager. It also, to
some degree means that these tools can be changed if Debian policy changes,
and packages that use them will require only a rebuild to comply with the new
policy.
A typical
debian/rules file that uses debhelper will call several
debhelper commands in sequence, or use
dh(1) to automate this process.
Examples of rules files that use debhelper are in
/usr/share/doc/debhelper/examples/
To create a new Debian package using debhelper, you can just copy one of the
sample rules files and edit it by hand. Or you can try the
dh-make
package, which contains a dh_make command that partially automates the
process. For a more gentle introduction, the
maint-guide Debian package
contains a tutorial about making your first package using debhelper.
DEBHELPER COMMANDS¶
Here is the list of debhelper commands you can use. See their man pages for
additional documentation.
- dh_auto_build(1)
- automatically builds a package
- dh_auto_clean(1)
- automatically cleans up after a build
- dh_auto_configure(1)
- automatically configure a package prior to building
- dh_auto_install(1)
- automatically runs make install or similar
- dh_auto_test(1)
- automatically runs a package's test suites
- dh_bugfiles(1)
- install bug reporting customization files into package
build directories
- dh_builddeb(1)
- build Debian binary packages
- dh_clean(1)
- clean up package build directories
- dh_compress(1)
- compress files and fix symlinks in package build
directories
- dh_fixperms(1)
- fix permissions of files in package build directories
- dh_gconf(1)
- install GConf defaults files and register schemas
- dh_gencontrol(1)
- generate and install control file
- dh_icons(1)
- Update Freedesktop icon caches
- dh_install(1)
- install files into package build directories
- dh_installcatalogs(1)
- install and register SGML Catalogs
- dh_installchangelogs(1)
- install changelogs into package build directories
- dh_installcron(1)
- install cron scripts into etc/cron.*
- dh_installdeb(1)
- install files into the DEBIAN directory
- dh_installdebconf(1)
- install files used by debconf in package build
directories
- dh_installdirs(1)
- create subdirectories in package build directories
- dh_installdocs(1)
- install documentation into package build directories
- dh_installemacsen(1)
- register an Emacs add on package
- dh_installexamples(1)
- install example files into package build directories
- dh_installgsettings(1)
- install GSettings overrides and set dependencies
- dh_installifupdown(1)
- install if-up and if-down hooks
- dh_installinfo(1)
- install info files
- dh_installinit(1)
- install init scripts and/or upstart jobs into package build
directories
- dh_installlogcheck(1)
- install logcheck rulefiles into etc/logcheck/
- dh_installlogrotate(1)
- install logrotate config files
- dh_installman(1)
- install man pages into package build directories
- dh_installmenu(1)
- install Debian menu files into package build
directories
- dh_installmime(1)
- install mime files into package build directories
- dh_installmodules(1)
- register modules with modutils
- dh_installpam(1)
- install pam support files
- dh_installppp(1)
- install ppp ip-up and ip-down files
- dh_installudev(1)
- install udev rules files
- dh_installwm(1)
- register a window manager
- dh_installxfonts(1)
- register X fonts
- dh_link(1)
- create symlinks in package build directories
- dh_lintian(1)
- install lintian override files into package build
directories
- dh_listpackages(1)
- list binary packages debhelper will act on
- dh_makeshlibs(1)
- automatically create shlibs file and call
dpkg-gensymbols
- dh_md5sums(1)
- generate DEBIAN/md5sums file
- dh_movefiles(1)
- move files out of debian/tmp into subpackages
- dh_perl(1)
- calculates Perl dependencies and cleans up after
MakeMaker
- dh_prep(1)
- perform cleanups in preparation for building a binary
package
- dh_shlibdeps(1)
- calculate shared library dependencies
- dh_strip(1)
- strip executables, shared libraries, and some static
libraries
- dh_testdir(1)
- test directory before building Debian package
- dh_testroot(1)
- ensure that a package is built as root
- dh_ucf(1)
- register configuration files with ucf
- dh_usrlocal(1)
- migrate usr/local directories to maintainer scripts
Deprecated Commands¶
A few debhelper commands are deprecated and should not be used.
- dh_desktop(1)
- deprecated no-op
- dh_installmanpages(1)
- old-style man page installer (deprecated)
- dh_python(1)
- calculates Python dependencies and adds postinst and prerm
Python scripts (deprecated)
- dh_scrollkeeper(1)
- deprecated no-op
- dh_suidregister(1)
- suid registration program (deprecated)
- dh_undocumented(1)
- undocumented.7 symlink program (deprecated no-op)
Other Commands¶
If a program's name starts with
dh_, and the program is not on the above
lists, then it is not part of the debhelper package, but it should still work
like the other programs described on this page.
DEBHELPER CONFIG FILES¶
Many debhelper commands make use of files in
debian/ to control what they
do. Besides the common
debian/changelog and
debian/control,
which are in all packages, not just those using debhelper, some additional
files can be used to configure the behavior of specific debhelper commands.
These files are typically named debian/
package.foo (where
package of course, is replaced with the package that is being acted
on).
For example,
dh_installdocs uses files named
debian/package.docs
to list the documentation files it will install. See the man pages of
individual commands for details about the names and formats of the files they
use. Generally, these files will list files to act on, one file per line. Some
programs in debhelper use pairs of files and destinations or slightly more
complicated formats.
Note for the first (or only) binary package listed in
debian/control,
debhelper will use
debian/foo when there's no
debian/package.foo
file.
In some rare cases, you may want to have different versions of these files for
different architectures or OSes. If files named debian/
package.foo.
ARCH or debian/
package.foo.
OS exist,
where
ARCH and
OS are the same as the output of "
dpkg-architecture -qDEB_HOST_ARCH" / "
dpkg-architecture
-qDEB_HOST_ARCH_OS", then they will be used in preference to other,
more general files.
Mostly, these config files are used to specify lists of various types of files.
Documentation or example files to install, files to move, and so on. When
appropriate, in cases like these, you can use standard shell wildcard
characters (
? and
* and
[..] character
classes) in the files. You can also put comments in these files; lines
beginning with
# are ignored.
The syntax of these files is intentionally kept very simple to make them easy to
read, understand, and modify. If you prefer power and complexity, you can make
the file executable, and write a program that outputs whatever content is
appropriate for a given situation. When you do so, the output is not further
processed to expand wildcards or strip comments.
SHARED DEBHELPER OPTIONS¶
The following command line options are supported by all debhelper programs.
- -v, --verbose
- Verbose mode: show all commands that modify the package
build directory.
- --no-act
- Do not really do anything. If used with -v, the result is
that the command will output what it would have done.
- -a, --arch
- Act on architecture dependent packages that should be built
for the build architecture.
- -i, --indep
- Act on all architecture independent packages.
- -ppackage,
--package=package
- Act on the package named package. This option may be
specified multiple times to make debhelper operate on a given set of
packages.
- -s, --same-arch
- This used to be a smarter version of the -a flag,
but the -a flag is now equally smart.
- -Npackage,
--no-package=package
- Do not act on the specified package even if an -a,
-i, or -p option lists the package as one that should be
acted on.
- --remaining-packages
- Do not act on the packages which have already been acted on
by this debhelper command earlier (i.e. if the command is present in the
package debhelper log). For example, if you need to call the command with
special options only for a couple of binary packages, pass this option to
the last call of the command to process the rest of packages with default
settings.
- --ignore=file
- Ignore the specified file. This can be used if
debian/ contains a debhelper config file that a debhelper command
should not act on. Note that debian/compat, debian/control,
and debian/changelog can't be ignored, but then, there should never
be a reason to ignore those files.
For example, if upstream ships a debian/init that you don't want
dh_installinit to install, use --ignore=debian/init
- -Ptmpdir, --tmpdir=tmpdir
- Use tmpdir for package build directory. The default
is debian/ package
- --mainpackage=package
- This little-used option changes the package which debhelper
considers the "main package", that is, the first one listed in
debian/control, and the one for which debian/foo files can
be used instead of the usual debian/package.foo files.
- -O=option|bundle
- This is used by dh(1) when passing user-specified
options to all the commands it runs. If the command supports the specified
option or option bundle, it will take effect. If the command does not
support the option (or any part of an option bundle), it will be
ignored.
COMMON DEBHELPER OPTIONS¶
The following command line options are supported by some debhelper programs. See
the man page of each program for a complete explanation of what each option
does.
- -n
- Do not modify postinst, postrm, etc.
scripts.
- -Xitem, --exclude=item
- Exclude an item from processing. This option may be used
multiple times, to exclude more than one thing.
- -A, --all
- Makes files or other items that are specified on the
command line take effect in ALL packages acted on, not just the
first.
BUILD SYSTEM OPTIONS¶
The following command line options are supported by all of the
dh_auto_* debhelper programs. These programs support a variety
of build systems, and normally heuristically determine which to use, and how
to use them. You can use these command line options to override the default
behavior. Typically these are passed to
dh(1), which then passes them
to all the
dh_auto_* programs.
- -Sbuildsystem,
--buildsystem=buildsystem
- Force use of the specified buildsystem, instead of
trying to auto-select one which might be applicable for the package.
- -Ddirectory,
--sourcedirectory=directory
- Assume that the original package source tree is at the
specified directory rather than the top level directory of the
Debian source package tree.
- -B[directory],
--builddirectory=[directory]
- Enable out of source building and use the specified
directory as the build directory. If directory parameter is
omitted, a default build directory will chosen.
If this option is not specified, building will be done in source by default
unless the build system requires or prefers out of source tree building.
In such a case, the default build directory will be used even if
--builddirectory is not specified.
If the build system prefers out of source tree building but still allows in
source building, the latter can be re-enabled by passing a build directory
path that is the same as the source directory path.
- --parallel
- Enable parallel builds if underlying build system supports
them. The number of parallel jobs is controlled by the
DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS environment variable ("Debian Policy,
section 4.9.1") at build time. It might also be subject to a build
system specific limit.
If this option is not specified, debhelper currently defaults to not
allowing parallel package builds.
- --max-parallel=maximum
- This option implies --parallel and allows further
limiting the number of jobs that can be used in a parallel build. If the
package build is known to only work with certain levels of concurrency,
you can set this to the maximum level that is known to work, or that you
wish to support.
- --list, -l
- List all build systems supported by debhelper on this
system. The list includes both default and third party build systems
(marked as such). Also shows which build system would be automatically
selected, or which one is manually specified with the --buildsystem
option.
COMPATIBILITY LEVELS¶
From time to time, major non-backwards-compatible changes need to be made to
debhelper, to keep it clean and well-designed as needs change and its author
gains more experience. To prevent such major changes from breaking existing
packages, the concept of debhelper compatibility levels was introduced. You
tell debhelper which compatibility level it should use, and it modifies its
behavior in various ways.
Tell debhelper what compatibility level to use by writing a number to
debian/compat. For example, to turn on v9 mode:
% echo 9 > debian/compat
Your package will also need a versioned build dependency on a version of
debhelper equal to (or greater than) the compatibility level your package
uses. So for compatibility level 9, ensure debian/control has:
Build-Depends: debhelper (>= 9)
Unless otherwise indicated, all debhelper documentation assumes that you are
using the most recent compatibility level, and in most cases does not indicate
if the behavior is different in an earlier compatibility level, so if you are
not using the most recent compatibility level, you're advised to read below
for notes about what is different in earlier compatibility levels.
These are the available compatibility levels:
- v1
- This is the original debhelper compatibility level, and so
it is the default one. In this mode, debhelper will use debian/tmp
as the package tree directory for the first binary package listed in the
control file, while using debian/ package for all other packages
listed in the control file.
This mode is deprecated.
- v2
- In this mode, debhelper will consistently use
debian/package as the package tree directory for every package that
is built.
This mode is deprecated.
- v3
- This mode works like v2, with the following additions:
- -
- Debhelper config files support globbing via * and
?, when appropriate. To turn this off and use those characters raw,
just prefix with a backslash.
- -
- dh_makeshlibs makes the postinst and
postrm scripts call ldconfig.
- -
- Every file in etc/ is automatically flagged as a
conffile by dh_installdeb.
- v4
- Changes from v3 are:
- -
- dh_makeshlibs -V will not include the Debian part of
the version number in the generated dependency line in the shlibs
file.
- -
- You are encouraged to put the new ${misc:Depends}
into debian/control to supplement the ${shlibs:Depends}
field.
- -
- dh_fixperms will make all files in bin/
directories and in etc/init.d executable.
- -
- dh_link will correct existing links to conform with
policy.
- v5
- Changes from v4 are:
- -
- Comments are ignored in debhelper config files.
- -
- dh_strip --dbg-package now specifies the name of a
package to put debugging symbols in, not the packages to take the symbols
from.
- -
- dh_installdocs skips installing empty files.
- -
- dh_install errors out if wildcards expand to
nothing.
- v6
- Changes from v5 are:
- -
- Commands that generate maintainer script fragments will
order the fragments in reverse order for the prerm and
postrm scripts.
- -
- dh_installwm will install a slave manpage link for
x-window-manager.1.gz, if it sees the man page in
usr/share/man/man1 in the package build directory.
- -
- dh_builddeb did not previously delete everything
matching DH_ALWAYS_EXCLUDE, if it was set to a list of things to
exclude, such as CVS:.svn:.git. Now it does.
- -
- dh_installman allows overwriting existing man pages
in the package build directory. In previous compatibility levels it
silently refuses to do this.
- v7
- Changes from v6 are:
- -
- dh_install, will fall back to looking for files in
debian/tmp if it doesn't find them in the current directory (or
wherever you tell it look using --sourcedir). This allows
dh_install to interoperate with dh_auto_install, which
installs to debian/tmp, without needing any special
parameters.
- -
- dh_clean will read debian/clean and delete
files listed there.
- -
- dh_clean will delete toplevel *-stamp
files.
- -
- dh_installchangelogs will guess at what file is the
upstream changelog if none is specified.
- v8
- Changes from v7 are:
- -
- Commands will fail rather than warning when they are passed
unknown options.
- -
- dh_makeshlibs will run dpkg-gensymbols on all
shared libraries that it generates shlibs files for. So -X can be
used to exclude libraries. Also, libraries in unusual locations that
dpkg-gensymbols would not have processed before will be passed to
it, a behavior change that can cause some packages to fail to build.
- -
- dh requires the sequence to run be specified as the
first parameter, and any switches come after it. Ie, use " dh $@
--foo", not " dh --foo $@".
- -
- dh_auto_* prefer to use Perl's
Module::Build in preference to Makefile.PL.
- v9
- This is the recommended mode of operation.
Changes from v8 are:
- -
- Multiarch support. In particular, dh_auto_configure
passes multiarch directories to autoconf in --libdir and
--libexecdir.
- -
- dh is aware of the usual dependencies between targets in
debian/rules. So, "dh binary" will run any build, build-arch,
build-indep, install, etc targets that exist in the rules file. There's no
need to define an explicit binary target with explicit dependencies on the
other targets.
- -
- dh_strip compresses debugging symbol files to reduce
the installed size of -dbg packages.
- -
- dh_auto_configure does not include the source
package name in --libexecdir when using autoconf.
- -
- dh does not default to enabling
--with=python-support
- -
- All of the dh_auto_* debhelper programs and
dh set environment variables listed by dpkg-buildflags,
unless they are already set.
- -
- dh_auto_configure passes dpkg-buildflags
CFLAGS, CPPFLAGS, and LDFLAGS to perl Makefile.PL and
Build.PL
- -
- dh_strip puts separated debug symbols in a location
based on their build-id.
- -
- Executable debhelper config files are run and their output
used as the configuration.
- v10
- This compatibility level is still open for development; use
with caution.
Changes from v9 are:
NOTES¶
Multiple binary package support¶
If your source package generates more than one binary package, debhelper
programs will default to acting on all binary packages when run. If your
source package happens to generate one architecture dependent package, and
another architecture independent package, this is not the correct behavior,
because you need to generate the architecture dependent packages in the
binary-arch
debian/rules target, and the architecture independent
packages in the binary-indep
debian/rules target.
To facilitate this, as well as give you more control over which packages are
acted on by debhelper programs, all debhelper programs accept the
-a,
-i,
-p, and
-s parameters. These parameters are
cumulative. If none are given, debhelper programs default to acting on all
packages listed in the control file.
Automatic generation of Debian install scripts¶
Some debhelper commands will automatically generate parts of Debian maintainer
scripts. If you want these automatically generated things included in your
existing Debian maintainer scripts, then you need to add
#DEBHELPER# to
your scripts, in the place the code should be added.
#DEBHELPER# will
be replaced by any auto-generated code when you run
dh_installdeb.
If a script does not exist at all and debhelper needs to add something to it,
then debhelper will create the complete script.
All debhelper commands that automatically generate code in this way let it be
disabled by the -n parameter (see above).
Note that the inserted code will be shell code, so you cannot directly use it in
a Perl script. If you would like to embed it into a Perl script, here is one
way to do that (note that I made sure that $1, $2, etc are set with the set
command):
my $temp="set -e\nset -- @ARGV\n" . << 'EOF';
#DEBHELPER#
EOF
system ($temp) / 256 == 0
or die "Problem with debhelper scripts: $!";
Automatic generation of miscellaneous dependencies.¶
Some debhelper commands may make the generated package need to depend on some
other packages. For example, if you use
dh_installdebconf(1), your
package will generally need to depend on debconf. Or if you use
dh_installxfonts(1), your package will generally need to depend on a
particular version of xutils. Keeping track of these miscellaneous
dependencies can be annoying since they are dependent on how debhelper does
things, so debhelper offers a way to automate it.
All commands of this type, besides documenting what dependencies may be needed
on their man pages, will automatically generate a substvar called
${misc:Depends}. If you put that token into your
debian/control
file, it will be expanded to the dependencies debhelper figures you need.
This is entirely independent of the standard
${shlibs:Depends} generated
by
dh_makeshlibs(1), and the
${perl:Depends} generated by
dh_perl(1). You can choose not to use any of these, if debhelper's
guesses don't match reality.
Package build directories¶
By default, all debhelper programs assume that the temporary directory used for
assembling the tree of files in a package is debian/
package.
Sometimes, you might want to use some other temporary directory. This is
supported by the
-P flag. For example, "
dh_installdocs
-Pdebian/tmp", will use
debian/tmp as the temporary directory.
Note that if you use
-P, the debhelper programs can only be acting on a
single package at a time. So if you have a package that builds many binary
packages, you will need to also use the
-p flag to specify which binary
package the debhelper program will act on.
udebs¶
Debhelper includes support for udebs. To create a udeb with debhelper, add
"
Package-Type: udeb" to the package's stanza in
debian/control. Debhelper will try to create udebs that comply with
debian-installer policy, by making the generated package files end in
.udeb, not installing any documentation into a udeb, skipping over
preinst,
postrm,
prerm, and
config scripts, etc.
ENVIRONMENT¶
- DH_VERBOSE
- Set to 1 to enable verbose mode. Debhelper will
output every command it runs that modifies files on the build system.
- DH_COMPAT
- Temporarily specifies what compatibility level debhelper
should run at, overriding any value in debian/compat.
- DH_NO_ACT
- Set to 1 to enable no-act mode.
- DH_OPTIONS
- Anything in this variable will be prepended to the command
line arguments of all debhelper commands.
When using dh(1), it can be passed options that will be passed on to
each debhelper command, which is generally better than using
DH_OPTIONS.
- DH_ALWAYS_EXCLUDE
- If set, this adds the value the variable is set to to the
-X options of all commands that support the -X option.
Moreover, dh_builddeb will rm -rf anything that matches the
value in your package build tree.
This can be useful if you are doing a build from a CVS source tree, in which
case setting DH_ALWAYS_EXCLUDE=CVS will prevent any CVS directories
from sneaking into the package you build. Or, if a package has a source
tarball that (unwisely) includes CVS directories, you might want to export
DH_ALWAYS_EXCLUDE=CVS in debian/rules, to make it take
effect wherever your package is built.
Multiple things to exclude can be separated with colons, as in
DH_ALWAYS_EXCLUDE=CVS:.svn
SEE ALSO¶
- /usr/share/doc/debhelper/examples/
- A set of example debian/rules files that use
debhelper.
- <http://kitenet.net/~joey/code/debhelper/>
- Debhelper web site.
AUTHOR¶
Joey Hess <joeyh@debian.org>