Ben Finney writes ("Easy discovery of ‘debian/rules’ build problems (was: Unsustainable debian/rules as official build entry point?)"): > From the rest of your message I infer that the mention of “one consumer” > there refers to (current or future) ‘dpkg-buildpackage’, is that correct?
Yes. > Ian Jackson <ijack...@chiark.greenend.org.uk> writes: > > Important consequences of my views include: > > > > * The package-provided rules interface needs to remain managed as part > > of policy (and to continue to have a controlled approach to updates, > > etc.). > > > > * The interface is not *defined by* dpkg-buildpackage: ie it is still > > possible for dpkg-buildpackage to have a bug where it does not > > implement the de-jure interface. > > > > * Packages may still need to work around bugs in old versions of > > dpkg-buildpackage; conversely, new versions of dpkg-buildpackage may > > need to work around bugs in old packages. > > > > * For a long time, packages should try to be compatible with old > > builders which invoke rules directly, even old builders other than > > dpkg-buildpackage. > > I had been under the impression the build tools (SBuild, PBuilder, etc.) > invoke ‘debian/rules’ directly, and so are a good way to test that > compatibility. Evidently that impression is wrong, and the use of those > build tools is not helping to find such bugs. I think some of those tools may invoke rules directly some of the time. I haven't done a survey. > What tools exist to allow package maintainers – as many as possible – to > get easy (automatic?) notification when the package they maintain is not > presenting a compatible ‘debian/rules’ build interface? I'm not aware of anything. Ian. -- Ian Jackson <ijack...@chiark.greenend.org.uk> These opinions are my own. If I emailed you from an address @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk, that is a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.