- Debhelper
debhelper is a suite of programs originally written by
Joey Hess that help aDebian packager write "rules" files. A "rules" file is amakefile that contains instructions for building and creating a Debian package.Overview
There are many tasks that need to be performed over and over again in the "rules" files. Instead of cutting and pasting code to do these tasks, debhelper allows a packager to simply call one of its 51 programs to do the task for them.
debhelper can greatly simplify things. Debian includes packages of
GNU hello made both with and without debhelper as examples for packagers. The "rules" file that does not use debhelper is 1,978 characters. In contrast, the version that uses debhelper is 1,022 characters.dh_make
Related to debhelper, there is also a tool called "dh_make". dh_make copies templates of all of the files needed to build a debian package to the source directory of a program. These templates are customized slightly based on information that the user gives and on a cursory examination of how the source code is built. After running dh_make, a developer still has to edit most of the template files to be able to build the package.
Although closely related to it, dh_make is not part of debhelper; it was separately developed by
Craig Small .See also
*
CDBS builds on debhelper to allow a user to write even shorter "rules" files.
*Debian GNU/Linux
*Debian build toolchain External links
* [http://kitenet.net/~joey/code/debhelper debhelper website]
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