diff -Nru mdevctl-0.78/debian/changelog mdevctl-0.81/debian/changelog
--- mdevctl-0.78/debian/changelog	2020-11-25 08:02:19.000000000 +0100
+++ mdevctl-0.81/debian/changelog	2021-07-01 16:07:15.000000000 +0200
@@ -1,3 +1,12 @@
+mdevctl (0.81-1) unstable; urgency=medium
+
+  * Merge new upstream 0.81
+    - Fixes combined use of -p and json (Closes: #990535)
+  * d/control: bump to compat level 13 (no changes needed)
+  * d/source/local-options: remove (currently) unused files
+
+ -- Christian Ehrhardt <christian.ehrhardt@canonical.com>  Thu, 01 Jul 2021 16:07:15 +0200
+
 mdevctl (0.78-1) unstable; urgency=medium
 
   * new upstream release 0.78
diff -Nru mdevctl-0.78/debian/control mdevctl-0.81/debian/control
--- mdevctl-0.78/debian/control	2020-11-25 08:02:19.000000000 +0100
+++ mdevctl-0.81/debian/control	2021-07-01 16:07:15.000000000 +0200
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
 Priority: optional
 Maintainer: Christian Ehrhardt <christian.ehrhardt@canonical.com>
 Rules-Requires-Root: no
-Build-Depends: debhelper-compat (= 12),
+Build-Depends: debhelper-compat (= 13),
                pkg-config,
                systemd,
                udev,
diff -Nru mdevctl-0.78/debian/patches/series mdevctl-0.81/debian/patches/series
--- mdevctl-0.78/debian/patches/series	2020-11-25 08:02:19.000000000 +0100
+++ mdevctl-0.81/debian/patches/series	1970-01-01 01:00:00.000000000 +0100
@@ -1,6 +0,0 @@
-# You must remove unused comment lines for the released package.
-#
-# The patch files of the -p1 format included in the debian/patches directory 
-# are applied to the upstream source in the order listed below.
-# This is manually managed by users with dquilt (quilt(1) wrapper) etc.
-# Also this may be updated by dpkg-source(1) when making a package.
diff -Nru mdevctl-0.78/mdevctl mdevctl-0.81/mdevctl
--- mdevctl-0.78/mdevctl	2020-11-24 20:48:33.000000000 +0100
+++ mdevctl-0.81/mdevctl	2021-06-10 18:49:09.000000000 +0200
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
 persist_base=/etc/mdevctl.d
 mdev_base=/sys/bus/mdev/devices
 parent_base=/sys/class/mdev_bus
-version="0.78"
+version="0.81"
 
 # Alias 'lsmdev' to 'mdevctl list'
 if [ $(basename $0) == "lsmdev" ]; then
@@ -609,6 +609,7 @@
                 exit 1
             fi
 
+            mkdir -p "$persist_base/$parent"
             write_config "$persist_base/$parent/$uuid"
             if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
                 exit 1