Package: dpkg-dev
Version: 1.23.7
Severity: minor
Dear Maintainer,
while packaging some plugins I noticed that dpkg-gencontrol emits the following
warning:
> substitution variable ${shlibs:Depends} used, but is not defined
afaiu, the problem here is that:
- the plugin is a compiled ELF object,
that links against "-lm -lc".
- as such, the package contains a "Depends: ${shlibs:Depends}" stanza.
- however, the plugin doesn't use any of these libraries' symbols, so the
dependencies correctly get stripped away.
- dpkg-makeshlibs correctly detects that there are no dependencies,
- but instead of setting ${shlibs:Depends} to an empty value, it unsets
it
- dpkg-gencontrol then emits a warning.
i don't think it is reasonable in this case for the maintainer to just
remove the "Depends: ${shlibs:Depends}" stanza.
afaict, the fix is "simple": if dpkg-gencontrol finds an ELF-binary that
doesn't link against any library, then shlibs:Depends should simply be
empty.
thanks.
-- System Information:
Debian Release: forky/sid
APT prefers unstable-debug
APT policy: (500, 'unstable-debug'), (500, 'testing-debug'), (500,
'oldstable-updates'), (500, 'oldstable-security'), (500, 'unstable'), (500,
'testing'), (500, 'oldstable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386, arm64, armhf
Kernel: Linux 6.19.14+deb14-amd64 (SMP w/24 CPU threads; PREEMPT)
Kernel taint flags: TAINT_PROPRIETARY_MODULE, TAINT_OOT_MODULE
Locale: LANG=C.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=C.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE not set
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled
Versions of packages dpkg-dev depends on:
ii binutils 2.46-3
ii bzip2 1.0.8-6+b2
ii libdpkg-perl 1.23.7
ii make 4.4.1-3
ii patch 2.8-2
ii perl 5.40.1-7+b1
ii tar 1.35+dfsg-4
ii xz-utils 5.8.3-1
Versions of packages dpkg-dev recommends:
ii build-essential 12.12
ii clang-19 [c-compiler] 1:19.1.7-20+b3
ii clang-21 [c-compiler] 1:21.1.8-7+b1
ii fakeroot 1.37.2-1+b1
ii gcc [c-compiler] 4:15.2.0-5+b1
ii gcc-15 [c-compiler] 15.2.0-17
ii gnupg 2.4.9-4
ii gpgv 2.4.9-4
ii libalgorithm-merge-perl 0.08-5
ii sqv 1.3.0-5+b1
Versions of packages dpkg-dev suggests:
ii debian-keyring 2026.04.23
ii debian-tag2upload-keyring 1.2
-- no debconf information
