bzr for packaging

[Alexandre Vassalotti]

On 3/29/07, Reinhard Tartler <siretart at tauware.de> wrote:
> "Alexandre Vassalotti" <avassalotti at ubuntu.com> writes:
> > I tried to use bzr-builddeb for helping me maintaining my packages,
> > but unfortunately it didn't support legacy debian/changelog format,
> > when I tested it. Also, I had a hard time building some packages with
> > it (notably Emacs).
>
> Could you please be more specific on this point? Feel free to file bug
> reports and suggestions how to improve bzr-builddeb. I use bzr-builddeb
> myself mostly within emacs, and apart from a bug in the changelog
> parser, I didn't have problems with that.

There was bug in the changelog parser (I don't know if it's the same
bug as the one you saw) that made bzr-builddeb fail when it
encountered changelog entries in the legacy format:

<date> <author> (<email>)
  * <change>
  * <change>

However, this bug isn't be an issue with most packages.

> > I ended up using bzr only to version control the debian/ directory of
> > my packages and build the package with some scripts of my own. It
> > works, but I am doubtful of the usefulness of this method.
>
> bzr-builddeb also supports this mode of operation.
>

Yes. In fact, that is where I got this setup idea. But, some features,
which I don't remember well, of bzr-builddeb didn't work well for me.
I will have to check it again, since I haven't used bzr-builddeb
recently. Maybe, it is much better now.

> > This would probably require to create a new specialized utility, using
> > bzrlib, instead of a plugin.
>
> What specific problems do you see with implementing this packaging
> assistance as bzr plugin? It seems quite natural to me.
>

The problems, I see, are mostly related to the user-interface. Bzr
provides a lot of functionalities, which are unrelated to packaging. A
separate tool would make a clear distinction between bzr's features
and the packaging tool's features. In my humble opinion, that makes
documentation easier and it soften the learning curve. Another small
issue is that bzr revision model doesn't really fit to Debian
packages. Unlike programs, Debian packages don't always need to save
the revisions between the releases. Therefore, it would be nice to
have different revision model (e.g.  a "bd release" command would
commit and tag the current revision as a release). Of course, nothing
stop bzr-builddeb to provide a similar feature.

-- Alexandre