debhelper(7) Debhelper debhelper(7)
NAME
debhelper - the debhelper tool suite
SYNOPSIS
dh_* [-v] [-a] [-i] [--no-act] [-ppackage] [-Npackage] [-Ptmpdir]
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.
Except where the tool explicitly denotes otherwise, all of the
debhelper tools assume that they run from the root directory of an
unpacked source package. This is so they can locate find files like
debian/control when needed.
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_dwz(1)
optimize DWARF debug information in ELF binaries via dwz
dh_fixperms(1)
fix permissions of files in package build directories
dh_gencontrol(1)
generate and install control file
dh_icons(1)
Update caches of Freedesktop icons
dh_install(1)
install files into package build directories
dh_installalternatives(1)
install declarative alternative rules
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 service init files into package build directories
dh_installinitramfs(1)
install initramfs hooks and setup maintscripts
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 kernel modules
dh_installpam(1)
install pam support files
dh_installppp(1)
install ppp ip-up and ip-down files
dh_installsystemd(1)
install systemd unit files
dh_installsystemduser(1)
install systemd unit files
dh_installtmpfiles(1)
install tmpfiles.d configuration 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_missing(1)
check for missing files
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_systemd_enable(1)
enable/disable systemd unit files
dh_systemd_start(1)
start/stop/restart systemd unit files
dh_testdir(1)
test directory before building Debian package
dh_testroot(1)
ensure that a package is built with necessary level of root
permissions
dh_ucf(1)
register configuration files with ucf
dh_update_autotools_config(1)
Update autotools config files
dh_usrlocal(1)
migrate usr/local directories to maintainer scripts
Deprecated Commands
A few debhelper commands are deprecated and should not be used.
dh_gconf(1)
install GConf defaults files and register schemas (deprecated)
dh_installmanpages(1)
old-style man page installer (deprecated)
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.
However, it is often a good idea to keep the package. prefix as it is
more explicit. The primary exception to this are files that debhelper
by default installs in every binary package when it does not have a
package prefix (such as debian/copyright or debian/changelog).
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.
Substitutions in debhelper config files
In compatibility level 13 and later, it is possible to use simple
substitutions in debhelper config files for the following tools:
o dh_clean
o dh_install
o dh_installcatalogs
o dh_installdeb
o dh_installdirs
o dh_installdocs
o dh_installexamples
o dh_installinfo
o dh_installman
o dh_installwm
o dh_link
o dh_missing
o dh_ucf
All substitution variables are of the form ${foo} and the braces are
mandatory. Variable names are case-sensitive and consist of
alphanumerics (a-zA-Z0-9), hyphens (-), underscores (_), and colons
(:). The first character must be an alphanumeric.
If you need a literal dollar sign that cannot trigger a substitution,
you can either use the ${Dollar} substitution or the sequence ${}.
The following expansions are available:
DEB_HOST_*, DEB_BUILD_*, DEB_TARGET_*
Expands to the relevant dpkg-architecture(1) value (similar to
dpkg-architecture -qVARIABLE_HERE).
When in doubt, the DEB_HOST_* variant is the one that will work
both for native and cross builds.
For performance reasons, debhelper will attempt to resolve these
names from the environment first before consulting
dpkg-architecture(1). This is mostly mentioned for completeness as
it will not matter for most cases.
Dollar
Expands to a single literal $-symbol. This symbol will never be
considered part of a substitution variable. That is:
# Triggers an error
${NO_SUCH_TOKEN}
# Expands to the literal value "${NO_SUCH_TOKEN}"
${Dollar}{NO_SUCH_TOKEN}
This variable equivalent to the sequence ${} and the two can be
used interchangeably.
Newline, Space, Tab
Expands to a single ASCII newline, space and tab respectively.
This can be useful if you need to include a literal whitespace
character (e.g. space) where it would otherwise be stripped or used
as a separator.
env:NAME
Expands to the environment variable NAME. The environment variable
must be set (but can be set to the empty string).
Note that all variables must expand to a defined value. As an example,
if debhelper sees ${env:FOO}, then it will insist that the environment
variable FOO is set (it can be set to the empty string).
Substitution limits
To avoid infinite loops and resource exhaustion, debhelper will stop
with an error if the text contains many substitution variables (50) or
they expand beyond a certain size (4096 characters or 3x length of the
original input - whichever is bigger).
Executable debhelper config files
If you need additional flexibility, many of the debhelper tools (e.g.
dh_install(1)) support executing a config file as a script.
To use this feature, simply mark the config file as executable (e.g.
chmod +x debian/package.install) and the tool will attempt to execute
it and use the output of the script. In many cases, you can use
dh-exec(1) as interpreter of the config file to retain most of the
original syntax while getting the additional flexibility you need.
When using executable debhelper config files, please be aware of the
following:
o The executable config file must exit with success (i.e. its return
code should indicate success).
o In compatibility level 13+, the output will be subject to
substitutions (see "Substitutions in debhelper config files") where
the tool support these. Remember to be careful if your generator
also provides substitutions as this can cause unnecessary
confusion.
Otherwise, the output will be used exactly as-is. Notably,
debhelper will not expand wildcards or strip comments or strip
whitespace in the output.
If you need the package to build on a file system where you cannot
disable the executable bit, then you can use dh-exec(1) and its strip-
output script.
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
DEB_HOST_ARCH 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
Deprecated alias of -a.
This option is removed in compat 12.
-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.
-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. The item is typically part
of a filename, and any file containing the specified text will be
excluded.
-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.
Pass none as buildsystem to disable auto-selection.
-Ddirectory, --sourcedir=directory, --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.
Warning: The --sourcedir variant matches a similar named option in
dh_install and dh_missing (etc.) for historical reasons. While
they have a similar name, they have very distinct purposes and in
some cases it can cause errors when this variant is passed to dh
(when then passes it on to all tools).
-B[directory], --builddir[=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 be 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, --no-parallel
Control whether parallel builds should be used 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 neither option is specified, debhelper currently defaults to
--parallel in compat 10 (or later) and --no-parallel otherwise.
As an optimization, dh will try to avoid passing these options to
subprocesses, if they are unnecessary and the only options passed.
Notably this happens when DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS does not have a
parallel parameter (or its value is 1).
--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.
Notably, setting the maximum to 1 is effectively the same as using
--no-parallel.
--reload-all-buildenv-variables
By default, dh(1) will compute several environment (e.g. by using
dpkg-buildflags(1)) and cache them to avoid having all dh_auto_*
tool recompute them.
When passing this option, the concrete dh_auto_* tool will ignore
the cache from dh(1) and retrigger a rebuild of these variables.
This is useful in the very rare case where the package need to do
multiple builds but with different ...FLAGS options. A concrete
example would be needing to change the -O parameter in CFLAGS in
the second build:
export DEB_CFLAGS_MAINT_APPEND=-O3
%:
dh $@
override_dh_auto_configure:
dh_auto_configure -Bbuild-deb ...
DEB_CFLAGS_MAINT_APPEND=-Os dh_auto_configure \
--reload-all-buildenv-variables -Bbuild-udeb ...
Without --reload-all-buildenv-variables in the second call to
dh_auto_configure(1), the change in DEB_CFLAGS_MAINT_APPEND would
be ignored as dh_auto_configure(1) would use the cached value of
CFLAGS set by dh(1).
This option is only available with debhelper (>= 12.7~) when the
package uses compatibility level 9 or later.
--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 must tell debhelper which compatibility
level it should use, and it modifies its behavior in various ways.
In current debhelper, you can specify the compatibility level in
debian/control by adding a Build-Depends on the debhelper-compat
package. For example, to use v13 mode, ensure debian/control has:
Build-Depends: debhelper-compat (= 13)
This also serves as an appropriate versioned build dependency on a
sufficient version of the debhelper package, so you do not need to
specify a separate versioned build dependency on the debhelper package
unless you need a specific point release of debhelper (such as for the
introduction of a new feature or bugfix within a compatibility level).
Note that debhelper does not provide debhelper-compat for experimental
or beta compatibility levels; packages experimenting with those
compatibility levels should use debian/compat or DH_COMPAT.
Prior versions of debhelper required specifying the compatibility level
in the file debian/compat, and current debhelper still supports this
for backward compatibility, though a package may not specify a
compatibility level via multiple methods at once. To use this method,
debian/compat should contain the compatibility level as a single
number, and no other content. If you specify the compatibility level by
this method, your package will also need a versioned build dependency
on a version of the debhelper package equal to (or greater than) the
compatibility level your package uses. So, if you specify compatibility
level 13 in debian/compat, ensure debian/control has:
Build-Depends: debhelper (>= 13~)
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.
Supported compatibility levels
These are the available compatibility levels:
v5 This is the lowest supported compatibility level.
If you are upgrading from an earlier compatibility level, please
review debhelper-obsolete-compat(7).
This mode is deprecated.
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.
This mode is deprecated.
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.
This mode is deprecated.
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.
This mode is deprecated.
v9 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
(Obsolete: As the dh_pysupport tool was removed from Debian
stretch. Since debhelper/10.3, dh no longer enables this
sequence add-on regardless of compat level)
- 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.
This mode is deprecated.
v10 Changes from v9 are:
- dh_installinit will no longer install a file named
debian/package as an init script.
- dh_installdocs will error out if it detects links created
with --link-doc between packages of architecture "all" and
non-"all" as it breaks binNMUs.
- dh_installdeb no longer installs a maintainer-provided
debian/package.shlibs file. This is now done by
dh_makeshlibs instead.
- dh_installwm refuses to create a broken package if no man
page can be found (required to register for the x-window-
manager alternative).
- Debhelper will default to --parallel for all buildsystems
that support parallel building. This can be disabled by
using either --no-parallel or passing --max-parallel with a
value of 1.
- The dh command will not accept any of the deprecated
"manual sequence control" parameters (--before, --after,
etc.). Please use override targets instead.
Retroactively applied to earlier compat levels: dh no
longer accepts any of these since debhelper/12.4.
- The dh command will no longer use log files to track which
commands have been run. The dh command still keeps track
of whether it already ran the "build" sequence and skip it
if it did.
The main effects of this are:
- With this, it is now easier to debug the install or/and
binary sequences because they can now trivially be re-
run (without having to do a full "clean and rebuild"
cycle)
- The main caveat is that dh_* now only keeps track of
what happened in a single override target. When all
the calls to a given dh_cmd command happens in the same
override target everything will work as before.
Example of where it can go wrong:
override_dh_foo:
dh_foo -pmy-pkg
override_dh_bar:
dh_bar
dh_foo --remaining
In this case, the call to dh_foo --remaining will also
include my-pkg, since dh_foo -pmy-pkg was run in a
separate override target. This issue is not limited to
--remaining, but also includes -a, -i, etc.
- The dh_installdeb command now shell-escapes the lines in
the maintscript config file. This was the original intent
but it did not work properly and packages have begun to
rely on the incomplete shell escaping (e.g. quoting file
names).
- The dh_installinit command now defaults to
--restart-after-upgrade. For packages needing the previous
behaviour, please use --no-restart-after-upgrade.
- The autoreconf sequence is now enabled by default. Please
pass --without autoreconf to dh if this is not desirable
for a given package
- The systemd sequence is now enabled by default. Please
pass --without systemd to dh if this is not desirable for a
given package.
- Retroactively removed: dh no longer creates the package
build directory when skipping running debhelper commands.
This will not affect packages that only build with
debhelper commands, but it may expose bugs in commands not
included in debhelper.
This compatibility feature had a bug since its inception in
debhelper/9.20130516 that made it fail to apply in compat 9
and earlier. As there has been no reports of issues caused
by this bug in those ~5 years, this item have been removed
rather than fixed.
v11 This mode is discouraged.
The compat 11 is discouraged for new packages as it suffers from
feature interaction between dh_installinit and dh_installsystemd
causing services to not run correctly in some cases. Please
consider using compatibility mode 10 or 12 instead. More details
about the issue are available in Debian#887904 and
<https://lists.debian.org/debian-release/2019/04/msg01442.html>.
Changes from v10 are:
- dh_installinit no longer installs service or tmpfile files,
nor generates maintainer scripts for those files. Please
use the new dh_installsystemd helper.
- The dh_systemd_enable and dh_systemd_start helpers have
been replaced by the new dh_installsystemd helper. For the
same reason, the systemd sequence for dh has also been
removed. If you need to disable the dh_installsystemd
helper tool, please use an empty override target.
Please note that the dh_installsystemd tool has a slightly
different behaviour in some cases (e.g. when using the
--name parameter).
- dh_installdirs no longer creates debian/package directories
unless explicitly requested (or it has to create a
subdirectory in it).
The vast majority of all packages will be unaffected by
this change.
- The makefile buildsystem now passes INSTALL="install
--strip-program=true" to make(1). Derivative buildsystems
(e.g. configure or cmake) are unaffected by this change.
- The autoconf buildsystem now passes --runstatedir=/run to
./configure.
- The cmake buildsystem now passes
-DCMAKE_INSTALL_RUNSTATEDIR=/run to cmake(1).
- dh_installman will now prefer detecting the language from
the path name rather than the extension.
- dh_auto_install will now only create the destination
directory it needs. Previously, it would create the
package build directory for all packages. This will not
affect packages that only build with debhelper commands,
but it may expose bugs in commands not included in
debhelper.
- The helpers dh_installdocs, dh_installexamples,
dh_installinfo, and dh_installman now error out if their
config has a pattern that does not match anything or
reference a path that does not exist.
Known exceptions include building with the nodoc profile,
where the above tools will silently permit failed matches
where the patterns are used to specify documentation.
- The helpers dh_installdocs, dh_installexamples,
dh_installinfo, and dh_installman now accept the parameter
--sourcedir with same meaning as dh_install. Furthermore,
they now also fall back to debian/tmp like dh_install.
Migration note: A bug in debhelper 11 up to 11.1.5 made
dh_installinfo incorrectly ignore --sourcedir.
- The perl-makemaker and perl-build build systems no longer
pass -I. to perl. Packages that still need this behaviour
can emulate it by using the PERL5LIB environment variable.
E.g. by adding export PERL5LIB=. in their debian/rules file
(or similar).
- The PERL_USE_UNSAFE_INC environment variable is no longer
set by dh or any of the dh_auto_* tools. It was added as a
temporary work around to avoid a lot of packages failing to
build at the same time.
Note this item will eventually become obsolete as upstream
intends to drop support for the PERL_USE_UNSAFE_INC
environment variable. When perl drops support for it, then
this variable will be removed retroactively from existing
compat levels as well.
- The dh_makeshlibs helper will now exit with an error if
objdump returns a non-zero exit from analysing a given
file.
- The dh_installdocs and dh_installexamples tools may now
install most of the documentation in a different path to
comply with the recommendation from Debian policy
<section>12.3 (since version 3.9.7).
Note that if a given source package only contains a single
binary package in debian/control or none of the packages
are -doc packages, then this change is not relevant for
that source package and you can skip to the next change.
By default, these tools will now attempt to determine a
"main package for the documentation" (called a doc-main-
package from here on) for every -doc package. If they find
such a doc-main-package, they will now install the
documentation into the path /usr/share/doc/doc-main-package
in the given doc package. I.e. the path can change but the
documentation is still shipped in the -doc package.
The --doc-main-package option can be used when the auto-
detection is insufficient or to reset the path to its
previous value if there is a reason to diverge from Debian
policy recommendation.
Some documentation will not be affected by this change.
These exceptions include the copyright file, changelog
files, README.Debian, etc. These files will still be
installed in the path /usr/share/doc/package.
- The dh_strip and dh_shlibdeps tools no longer uses filename
patterns to determine which files to process. Instead,
they open the file and look for an ELF header to determine
if a given file is an shared object or an ELF executable.
This change may cause the tools to process more files than
previously.
v12 Changes from v11 are:
- The dh_makeshlibs tool now generates shlibs files with
versioned dependency by default. This means that
-VUpstream-Version (a.k.a. -V) is now the default.
If an unversioned dependency in the shlibs file is wanted,
this can be obtained by passing -VNone instead. However,
please see dh_makeshlibs(1) for the caveat of unversioned
dependencies.
- The -s (--same-arch) option is removed. Please use -a
(--arch) instead.
- Invoking dh_clean -k now causes an error instead of a
deprecation warning.
- The --no-restart-on-upgrade option in dh_installinit has
been removed. Please use the new name --no-stop-on-upgrade
- There was a bug in the doit (and similar) functions from
Debian::Debhelper::Dh_Lib that made them spawn a shell in
one particular circumstance. This bug is now removed and
will cause helpers that rely on the bug to fail with a
"command not found"-error.
- The --list-missing and --fail-missing in dh_install has
been removed. Please use dh_missing and its corresponding
options, which can also see the files installed by other
helpers.
- The dh_installinit helper no longer installs configuration
for the upstart init system. Instead, it will abort the
build if it finds an old upstart configuration file. The
error is there to remind the package maintainer to ensure
the proper removal of the conffiles shipped in previous
versions of the package (if any).
- The dh_installdeb tool will do basic validation of some
dpkg-maintscript-helper(1) commands and will error out if
the commands appear to be invalid.
- The dh_missing tool will now default to --list-missing.
- The dh_makeshlibs tool will now only pass libraries to
dpkg-gensymbols(1) if the ELF binary has a SONAME
(containing ".so").
- The dh_compress tool no longer compresses examples (i.e.
anything installed in </usr/share/doc/package/examples>.)
- The standard sequence in dh now includes dh_dwz and
dh_installinitramfs by default. This makes the dwz and
installinitramfs sequences obsolete and they will now fail
with an error. If you want to skip these commands, then
please insert an empty override target for them in
debian/rules (e.g. override_dh_dwz:)
- The build systems meson and autoconf no longer explicitly
set the --libexecdir variable and thus relies on the build
system default - which should be /usr/libexec (per FHS 3.0,
adopted in Debian Policy 4.1.5).
If a particular upstream package does not use the correct
default, the parameter can often be passed manually via
dh_auto_configure(1). E.g. via the following example:
override_dh_auto_configure:
dh_auto_configure -- --libexecdir=/usr/libexec
Note the -- before the --libexecdir parameter.
- The dh_installdeb tool no longer installs the maintainer
provided conffiles file. The file has mostly been obsolete
since compatibility level 3, where dh_installdeb began to
automatically compute the resulting conffiles control file.
- The dh_installsystemd tool no longer relies on
dh_installinit for handling systemd services that have a
sysvinit alternative. Both tools must now be used in such
a case to ensure the service is properly started under both
sysvinit and systemd.
If you have an override for dh_installinit (e.g. to call it
with --no-start) then you will probably need one for
dh_installsystemd as well now.
This change makes dh_installinit inject a misc:Pre-Depends
for init-system-helpers (>= 1.54~). Please ensure that the
package lists ${misc:Pre-Depends} in its Pre-Depends field
before upgrading to compat 12.
- The third-party dh_golang tool (from dh-golang package) now
defaults on honoring DH_GOLANG_EXCLUDES variable for source
installation in -dev packages and not only during the
building process. Please set DH_GOLANG_EXCLUDES_ALL to
false to revert to the previous behaviour. See
Debian::Debhelper::Buildsystem::golang(3pm) for details and
examples.
- dh_installsystemduser is now included in the dh standard
sequence by default.
- The python-distutils buildsystem is now removed. Please
use the third-party build system pybuild instead.
v13 This is the recommended mode of operation.
Changes from v12 are:
- The meson+ninja build system now uses meson test instead of
ninja test when running the test suite. Any override of
dh_auto_test that passes extra parameters to upstream test
runner should be reviewed as meson test is not command line
compatible with ninja test.
- All debhelper like tools based on the official debhelper
library (including dh and the official dh_* tools) no
longer accepts abbreviated command parameters. At the same
time, dh now optimizes out calls to redundant dh_* helpers
even when passed long command line options.
- The ELF related debhelper tools (dh_dwz, dh_strip,
dh_makeshlibs, dh_shlibdeps) are now only run for arch
dependent packages by default (i.e. they are excluded from
*-indep targets and are passed -a by default). If you need
them for *-indep targets, you can add an explicit Build-
Depends on dh-sequence-elf-tools.
- The third-party gradle build system (from gradle-debian-
helper package) now runs the upstream-provided test suite
automatically. To suppress such behavior, override
dh_auto_test.
- The dh_installman tool now aborts if it sees conflicting
definitions of a manpage. This typically happens if the
upstream build system is installing a compressed version
and the package lists an uncompressed version of the
manpage in debian/package.manpages. Often the easiest fix
is to remove the manpage from debian/package.manpages
(assuming both versions are identical).
- The dh_auto_* helpers now resets the environment variables
HOME and common XDG_* variable. Please see description of
the environment variables in "ENVIRONMENT" for how this
handled.
This feature changed between between debhelper 13 and
debhelper 13.2.
- The dh command will now error if an override or hook target
for an obsolete command are present in debian/rules (e.g.
override_dh_systemd_enable:).
- The dh_missing command will now default to --fail-missing.
This can be reverted to a non-fatal warning by explicitly
passing --list-missing like it was in compat 12.
If you do not want the warning either, please omit the call
to dh_missing. If you use the dh command sequencer, then
you can do this by inserting an empty override target in
the debian/rules file of the relevant package. As an
example:
# Disable dh_missing
override_dh_missing:
- The dh command sequencer now runs dh_installtmpfiles in the
default sequence. The dh_installtmpfiles takes over
handling of tmpfiles.d configuration files. Related
functionality in dh_installsystemd is now disabled.
Note that dh_installtmpfiles responds to
debian/package.tmpfiles where dh_installsystemd used a name
without the trailing "s".
- Many dh_* tools now support limited variable expansion via
the ${foo} syntax. In many cases, this can be used to
reference paths that contain either spaces or
dpkg-architecture(1) values. While this can reduce the
need for dh-exec(1) in some cases, it is not a replacement
dh-exec(1) in general. If you need filtering, renaming,
etc., the package will still need dh-exec(1).
Please see "Substitutions in debhelper config files" for
syntax and available substitution variables. To dh_* tool
writers, substitution expansion occurs as a part of the
filearray and filedoublearray functions.
- The dh command sequencer will now skip all hook and
override targets for dh_auto_test, dh_dwz and dh_strip when
DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS lists the relevant nocheck / nostrip
options.
Any package relying on these targets to always be run
should instead move relevant logic out of those targets.
E.g. non-test related packaging code from
override_dh_auto_test would have to be moved to
execute_after_dh_auto_build or
execute_before_dh_auto_install.
- The cmake buildsystem now passes
-DCMAKE_SKIP_INSTALL_ALL_DEPENDENCY=ON to cmake(1) to speed
up automatic installation process. If for some reason you
need previous behavior, override the flag:
dh_auto_configure -- -DCMAKE_SKIP_INSTALL_ALL_DEPENDENCY=OFF ...
v14 This compatibility level is still open for development; use with
caution.
Changes from v13 are:
- The cmake buildsystem now passes -DCMAKE_SKIP_RPATH=ON and
-DBUILD_RPATH_USE_ORIGIN=ON to cmake(1) to avoid some
reproducibility issues.
This can cause issues with running binaries directly from
the build directories as they might now require a manually
set LD_LIBRARY_PATH. If you need to override this change,
we recommend that you try to pass the
-DCMAKE_SKIP_RPATH=OFF option first to see if that fixes
the problem (leaving BUILD_RPATH_USE_ORIGIN at its new
default). This should undo the need for LD_LIBRARY_PATH
and avoid the reproducibility issues on Linux, where
$ORIGIN is supported by the runtime linkers.
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, with the exceptions below.
First, any package whose Architecture field in debian/control does not
match the DEB_HOST_ARCH architecture will be excluded ("Debian Policy,
section 5.6.8").
Also, some additional packages may be excluded based on the contents of
the DEB_BUILD_PROFILES environment variable and Build-Profiles fields
in binary package stanzas in debian/control, according to the draft
policy at <https://wiki.debian.org/BuildProfileSpec>.
Interaction between package selections and Build-Profiles
Build-Profiles affect which packages are included in the package
selections mechanisms in debhelper. Generally, the package selections
are described from the assumption that all packages are enabled. This
section describes how the selections react when a package is disabled
due to the active Build-Profiles (or lack of active Build-Profiles).
-a/--arch, -i/--indep OR no selection options (a raw "dh_X" call)
The package disabled by Build-Profiles is silently excluded from
the selection.
Note you will receive a warning if all packages related to these
selections are disabled. In that case, it generally does not make
sense to do the build in the first place.
-N package / --no-package package
The option is accepted and effectively does nothing.
-p package / --package package
The option is accepted, but debhelper will not act on the package.
Note that it does not matter whether a package is enabled or disabled
by default.
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 $temp="set -e\nset -- @ARGV\n" . << 'EOF';
#DEBHELPER#
EOF
if (system($temp)) {
my $exit_code = ($? >> 8) & 0xff;
my $signal = $? & 0x7f;
if ($exit_code) {
die("The debhelper script failed with error code: ${exit_code}");
} else {
die("The debhelper script was killed by signal: ${signal}");
}
}
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
This section describes some of the environment variables that
influences the behaviour of debhelper or which debhelper interacts
with.
It is important to note that these must be actual environment variables
in order to affect the behaviour of debhelper (not simply Makefile
variables). To specify them properly in debian/rules, be sure to
"export" them. For example, "export DH_VERBOSE".
DH_VERBOSE
Set to 1 to enable verbose mode. Debhelper will output every
command it runs. Also enables verbose build logs for some build
systems like autoconf.
DH_QUIET
Set to 1 to enable quiet mode. Debhelper will not output commands
calling the upstream build system nor will dh print which
subcommands are called and depending on the upstream build system
might make that more quiet, too. This makes it easier to spot
important messages but makes the output quite useless as buildd
log. Ignored if DH_VERBOSE is also set.
DH_COMPAT
Temporarily specifies what compatibility level debhelper should run
at, overriding any value specified via Build-Depends on debhelper-
compat or via the debian/compat file.
DH_NO_ACT
Set to 1 to enable no-act mode.
DH_OPTIONS
All debhelper tools will parse command line arguments listed in
this variable before any command option (as if they had been
prepended to the command line arguments). Unfortunately, some
third-party provided tools may not support this variable and will
ignore these command line arguments.
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
DH_EXTRA_ADDONS
If set, this adds the specified dh addons to be run in the
appropriate places in the sequence of commands. This is equivalent
to specifying the addon to run with the --with flag in the
debian/rules file. Any --without calls specifying an addon in this
environment variable will not be run.
This is intended to be used by downstreams or specific local
configurations that require a debhelper addon to be run during
multiple builds without having to patch a large number of rules
file. If at all possible, this should be avoided in favor of a
--with flag in the rules file.
DH_COLORS, DPKG_COLORS
These variables can be used to control whether debhelper commands
should use colors in their textual output. Can be set to "always",
"auto" (the default), or "never".
Note that DPKG_COLOR also affects a number of dpkg related tools
and debhelper uses it on the assumption that you want the same
color setting for dpkg and debhelper. In the off-hand chance you
want different color setting for debhelper, you can use DH_COLORS
instead or in addition to DPKG_COLORS.
NO_COLOR
If no explicit request for color has been given (e.g. DH_COLORS and
DPKG_COLORS are both unset), the presence of this environment
variable cause the default color setting to be "never".
The variable is defined according to <https://no-color.org/>. In
this project, the environment variables (such as DH_COLORS) are
considered an explicit request for color.
CFLAGS, CPPFLAGS, CXXFLAGS, OBJCFLAGS, OBJCXXFLAGS, GCJFLAGS, FFLAGS,
FCFLAGS, LDFLAGS
By default (in any non-deprecated compat level), debhelper will
automatically set these flags by using dpkg-buildflags(1), when
they are unset. If you need to change the default flags, please
use the features from dpkg-buildflags(1) to do this (e.g.
DEB_BUILD_MAINT_OPTIONS=hardening=all or
DEB_CPPFLAGS_MAINT_APPEND=-DCUSTOM_MACRO=true) rather than setting
the concrete variable directly.
HOME, XDG_*
In compat 13 and later, these environment variables are reset
before invoking the upstream build system via the dh_auto_*
helpers. The variables HOME (all dh_auto_* helpers)and
XDG_RUNTIME_DIR (dh_auto_test only) will be set to a writable
directory. All remaining variables and XDG_RUNTIME_DIR (except for
during dh_auto_test) will be cleared.
The HOME directory will be created as an empty directory but it
will be reused between calls to dh_auto_*. Any content will
persist until explicitly deleted or dh_clean.
DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS
Please see "Supported flags in DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS" for this
environment variable.
Please note that this variable should not be altered by package
maintainers inside debian/rules to change the behaviour of
debhelper. Instead, where the package maintainer need these
features, they should look disabling the relevant feature directly
(e.g. by overriding the concrete tools).
DEB_MAINT_BUILD_OPTIONS
This is a dpkg specific environment variable (see e.g.
dpkg-buildflags(1)). The debhelper tool suite silently ignores it.
It is documented here because it has a similar name to
DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS, which make some people mistakenly assume that
debhelper will also react to this variable.
Supported flags in DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS
The debhelper tool suite reacts to the following flags in
DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS.
dherroron=obsolete-compat-levels
This is a debhelper specific value.
When dherroron is present and set to obsolete-compat-levels, then
debhelper tools will promote deprecation warnings for usage of old
soon to be removed compat levels into errors.
This is useful for automated checking for code relying on
deprecated compat levels that is scheduled for removal.
This environment variable is intended for testing purposes; not
production builds.
nostrip
This value will change the content of the debs being built. The
.deb packages built when this is set is therefore not bit-for-bit
reproducible with a regular build in the general case.
This value will cause the official debhelper tools will skip
actions and helpers that either remove, detach or deduplicate
debugging symbols in ELF binaries.
This value affects dh_dwz(1) and dh_strip(1).
nocheck
This value will cause the official debhelper build systems to skip
runs of upstream test suites.
Package maintainers looking to avoid running the upstream tests
should not rely on this. Instead, they can add an empty override
target to skip dh_auto_test.
This value affects dh_auto_test(1).
nodoc
This value will change the content of the debs being built. The
.deb packages built when this is set is therefore not bit-for-bit
reproducible with a regular build in the general case.
This value will cause several debhelper tools to skip installation
of documentation such as manpages or upstream provided
documentation. Additionally, the tools will also ignore if
declared documentation is "missing" on the assumption that the
documentation has not been built.
This value effects tools like dh_installdocs(1), which knows it is
working with documentation.
noautodbgsym, noddebs
The official name is autodbgsym. The noddebs variant is accepted
for historical reasons.
This value causes debhelper to skip the generation of automatically
generated debug symbol packages.
This value affects dh_strip(1).
parallel=N
This value enables debhelper to use up to N threads or processes
(subject to parameters like --no-parallel and --max-parallel=M).
Not all debhelper tools work with parallel tasks and may silently
ignore the request.
This value affects many debhelper tools. Most notably dh_auto_*,
which will attempt to run the underlying upstream build system with
that number of threads.
terse
This value will cause the official debhelper build systems to
configure upstream builds to be terse (i.e. reduce verbosity in
their output). This is subject to the upstream and the debhelper
build system supporting such features.
This value affects most dh_auto_* tools.
Unknown flags are silently ignored.
Note third-party debhelper-like tools or third-party provided build
systems may or may not react to the above flags. This tends to depend
on implementation details of the tool.
SEE ALSO
/usr/share/doc/debhelper/examples/
A set of example debian/rules files that use debhelper.
<http://joeyh.name/code/debhelper/>
Debhelper web site.
AUTHOR
Joey Hess <joeyh@debian.org>
13.2 2020-07-05 debhelper(7)