This file documents things you should know to write a new debhelper program. Standardization: --------------- There are lots of debhelper commands. To make the learning curve shallower, I want them all to behave in a standard manner: All debhelper programs have names beginning with "dh_". This is so we don't pollute the name space too much. Debhelper programs should never output anything to standard output except error messages, important warnings, and the actual commands they run that modify files under debian/ and debian/tmp, etc (this last only if they are passed -v, and if you output the commands, you should indent them with 1 tab). This is so we don't have a lot of noise output when all the debhelper commands in a debian/rules are run, so the important stuff is clearly visible. Debhelper programs should accept the options, -v, -i, -a, -p, --no-act, and -P, and any long forms of these options, like --verbose . If necessary, the options may be ignored. If debhelper commands need config files, they should use debian/package.filename as the name of the config file (replace filename with whatever your command wants), and debian/filename should also be checked for config information for the first binary package in debian/control. Also, debhelper commands should accept the same sort of information that appears in the config files, on their command lines, if possible, and apply that information to the first package they act on. Debhelper programs should never modify the debian/postinst, debian/prerm, etc scripts, instead, they can add lines to debian/postinst.debhelper, etc. The autoscript() function (see below) is one easy way to do this. dh_installdeb is an exception, it will run after the other commands and merge these modifications into the actual postinst scripts. There are always exceptions. Just ask me. Introducing Dh_Lib.pm: --------------------- Dh_lib.pm is the library used by all debhelper programs to parse their arguments and set some useful variables. It's not mandatory that your program use Dh_lib.pm, but it will make it a lot easier to keep it in sync with the rest of debhelper if it does, so this is highly encouraged. (There used to be a version of Dh_lib.pm that was a library of functions for shell scripts. If you want to write a debhelper command that is a shell script, I can dig up that old library for you. Only the perl one is supported now, though.) Use Dh_lib.pm like this: BEGIN { push @INC, "debian", "/usr/share/debhelper" } use Dh_Lib; init(); The BEGIN block is there to make perl look for the module in all the right places. The init() function in the perl version. This causes Dh_lib to parse the command line and do some other initialization tasks. Argument processing: ------------------- All debhelper programs should respond to certain arguments, such as -v, -i, -a, and -p. To help you make this work right, Dh_Lib.pm handles argument processing. Just call init(). After argument processing, some global variables are used to hold the results; programs can use them later. These variables are elements of the %dh hash. switch variable description -v VERBOSE should the program verbosely output what it is doing? --no-act NO_ACT should the program not actually do anything? -i,-a,-p,-N DOPACKAGES a space delimited list of the binary packages to act on (in Dh_Lib.pm, this is an array) -i,-p,-N DOINDEP a space delimited list of the binary independent packages to act on -a,-p,-N DOARCH a space delimited list of the binary dependent packages to act on -n NOSCRIPTS if set, do not make any modifications to the package's postinst, postrm, etc scripts. -X EXCLUDE exclude a something from processing (you decide what this means for your program) (This is an array) EXCLUDE_FIND same as DH_EXCLUDE, except all items are put into a string in a way that they will make find find them. (Use ! in front to negate that, of course) -x INCLUDE_CONFFILES include conffiles. It's -x for obscure historical reasons. -d D_FLAG you decide what this means to your program -r R_FLAG you decide what this means to your program -k K_FLAG you decide what this means to your program -P TMPDIR package build directory (implies only one package is being acted on) -u U_PARAMS will be set to a string, that is typically parameters your program passes on to some other program. (This is an array) -m M_PARAMS will be set to a string, you decide what it means to your program -V V_FLAG will be set to a string, you decide what it means to your program -V V_FLAG_SET will be 1 if -V was specified, even if no parameters were passed along with the -V -A PARAMS_ALL generally means that additional command line parameters passed to the program (other than those processed here), will apply to all binary packages the program acts on, not just the first --init-script INIT_SCRIPT will be set to a string, which specifies an init script name (probably only dh_installinit will ever use this) --sourcedir SOURCEDIR will be set to a string (probably only dh_movefiles will ever use this) --destdir DESTDIR will be set to a string (probably only dh_builddeb will ever use this) --flavor FLAVOR will be set to a string (probably only dh_installemacsen will ever use this) --number NUMBER will be set to a number Any additional command line parameters that do not start with "-" will be ignored, and you can access them later just as you normally would. If you need a new command line option, just ask me, and I will add it. Global variables: ---------------- The following keys are also set in the %dh hash when you call init(): MAINPACKAGE the name of the first binary package listed in debian/control FIRSTPACKAGE the first package we were instructed to act on. This package typically gets special treatment, additional arguments specified on the command line may effect it. Functions: --------- Dh_Lib.pm also contains a number of functions you may find useful. doit() Pass this function an array that is a shell command. It will run the command (unless $dh{NO_ACT} is set), and if $dh{VERBOSE} is set, it will also output the command to stdout. You should use this function for almost all commands your program performs that manipulate files in the package build directories. complex_doit() Pass this function a string that is a shell command, it will run it similarly to how doit() does. You can pass more complicated commands to this (ie, commands involving piping redirection), however, you have to worry about things like escaping shell metacharacters. verbose_print() Pass this command a string, and it will echo it if $dh{VERBOSE} is set. error() Pass this command a string, it will output it to standard error and exit. warning() Pass this command a string, and it will output it to standard error as a warning message. tmpdir() Pass this command the name of a binary package, it will return the name of the tmp directory that will be used as this package's package build directory. Typically, this will be "debian/tmp" or "debian/package". compat() Pass this command a number, and if the current compatability level equals that number, it will return true. Looks at DH_COMPAT to get the compatability level. pkgfile() Pass this command the name of a binary package, and the base name of a file, and it will return the actual filename to use. This is used for allowing debhelper programs to have configuration files in the debian/ directory, so there can be one config file per binary package. The convention is that the files are named debian/package.filename, and debian/filename is also allowable for the $dh{MAINPACKAGE}. If the file does not exist, nothing is returned. pkgext() Pass this command the name of a binary package, and it will return the name to prefix to files in debian/ for this package. For the $dh{MAINPACKAGE}, it returns nothing (there is no prefix), for the other packages, it returns "package.". isnative() Pass this command the name of a package, it returns 1 if the package is a native debian package. As a side effect, $dh{VERSION} is set to the version number of the package. autoscript() Pass parameters: - binary package to be affected - script to add to - filename of snippet - sed commands to run on the snippet. Ie, s/#PACKAGE#/$PACKAGE/ (optional) This command automatically adds shell script snippets to a debian maintainer script (like the postinst or prerm). -- Joey Hess