Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Joey Hess jo...@debian.org writes: Russ Allbery wrote: I really think this is a bug in make. Probably, but who knows. It could just be a misfeature on which ghod knows what somehow depends. .PHONY: precompiled-binary-we-cannot-regenerate-with-gcc.o It feels like the next step is to ask make upstream whether they think this is a bug that can be fixed. If so, great, and we can move forward with that approach. If not, we can pursue the alternatives. But it seems like it would be worthwhile to ask. Given that you can achieve the same goal in a much more straightforward and traditional manner (I think) with: precompiled-binary-we-cannot-regenerate-with-gcc.o: it feels like an unintentional side effect of an internal implementation to me. -- Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org) http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
* Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de [090217 21:18]: So will the new minimal example look like the following then? #/usr/bin/make -Bf %: dh $@ Note that there is also the possibility of #/usr/bin/make -f Makefile: @# %: Makefile dh $@ which is another way to make things phony. (and avoids dh being called for the Makefile target as it is when naming that target FORCE as make's info file suggest). But I definitly think a debian/rules file should list all the required and optional rules it supports via a .PHONY: line. Even better the % rule should already list which targets it actually supports as #include /usr/share/debhelper/bla $(SUPPORTED_RULES): %: dh $@ .PHONY: $(SUPPORTED_RULES) everything else is just very fragile... Hochachtungsvoll, Bernhard R. Link -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
dh 7 broken by design?
Hi, I recently tried converting my packages to dh 7 and ... failed. The simple rule %: dh $@ will fail miserably if there is any file named like a target. Try `touch build' in your favourite dh-7-package to see it break. GNU make users probably know that this is why there is a .PHONY: ... rule. However that one does not work with implicit dependencies and results in make thinking there is nothing to be done. Another idea was to supply the -B switch to make: -B, --always-make Unconditionally make all targets. However `make -Bf ./debian/rules clean' does not seem to work since make executes `dh ./debian/rules'. I did not find out why. Any ideas? (And no, removing all files named after targets is a non-option for the general case.) I reverted to the customisation dh 7 example defining all targets and .PHONY for now. Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: The simple rule %: dh $@ will fail miserably if there is any file named like a target. Try `touch build' in your favourite dh-7-package to see it break. GNU make users probably know that this is why there is a .PHONY: ... rule. Yes. For this reason, I avoid the three-line rules file (despite its cuteness), and use the .PHONY feature. However that one does not work with implicit dependencies and results in make thinking there is nothing to be done. Can you give an example of a ‘debian/rules’ that does not work, and what the desired behaviour would be? -- \“You can't have everything; where would you put it?” —Steven | `\Wright | _o__) | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Yes. For this reason, I avoid the three-line rules file (despite its cuteness), and use the .PHONY feature. OK. However that one does not work with implicit dependencies and results in make thinking there is nothing to be done. Can you give an example of a ???debian/rules??? that does not work, and what the desired behaviour would be? Well my basic idea was to add a .PHONY line to the 3-line example like: #!/usr/bin/make -f %: $@ .PHONY:build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary This rules file is semantically equivalent to an empty one. The intention was to force make to build everything even though files like clean or build may exist. BTW: This gets even worse with Joey's plans for future dh improvements like override_foo targets. Even though it is less probable that a file named like that exists it creates a bunch of more forbidden files. Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
On Tuesday 17 February 2009 14:35:27 Helmut Grohne wrote: Hi, Can you give an example of a ???debian/rules??? that does not work, and what the desired behaviour would be? Well my basic idea was to add a .PHONY line to the 3-line example like: #!/usr/bin/make -f %: $@ .PHONY:build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary There is no way of knowing in advance how a particilar .PHONY should look like, thus it is left to the user to decide on per package basis and populate it as well. You can hardly blame dh scripts about the lack of artificial intelligence. This rules file is semantically equivalent to an empty one. The intention was to force make to build everything even though files like clean or build may exist. BTW: This gets even worse with Joey's plans for future dh improvements like override_foo targets. Even though it is less probable that a file named like that exists it creates a bunch of more forbidden files. citation needed... -- pub 4096R/0E4BD0AB 2003-03-18 people.fccf.net/danchev/key pgp.mit.edu -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
#!/usr/bin/make -f %: $@ .PHONY:build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary There is no way of knowing in advance how a particilar .PHONY should look like, thus it is left to the user to decide on per package basis and populate it as well. You can hardly blame dh scripts about the lack of artificial intelligence. Could you stop ranting and try to understand the real question? I only tried to fix the broken example by adding a .PHONY rule. What I blame dh for is that it implements .PHONY rules without marking them as such. Let me explain the example in further detail: For some reason some upstream ships a file ./clean that is invoked by make clean. Everything else is assumed to be fine, so the simple 3-line dh 7 example from the man page can be used. The package will then ftbfs when built twice in a row, because ./debian/rules clean notices that clean is already built and has no dependencies. Thus no action is required and the build fails when creating the .diff.gz, because binaries cannot be represented in the diff. BTW: This gets even worse with Joey's plans for future dh improvements like override_foo targets. Even though it is less probable that a file named like that exists it creates a bunch of more forbidden files. citation needed... http://kitenet.net/~joey/blog/entry/debhelper_dh_overrides/ Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne wrote: I recently tried converting my packages to dh 7 and ... failed. The simple rule %: dh $@ will fail miserably if there is any file named like a target. Try `touch build' in your favourite dh-7-package to see it break. GNU make users probably know that this is why there is a .PHONY: ... rule. However that one does not work with implicit dependencies and results in make thinking there is nothing to be done. I was not aware of this behavior of make and had assumed .PHONY could be used as usual in this case. But I see that bug #509756 was recently opened on make about it. Another idea was to supply the -B switch to make: -B, --always-make Unconditionally make all targets. However `make -Bf ./debian/rules clean' does not seem to work since make executes `dh ./debian/rules'. I did not find out why. Apparently make always tries to run a target with the name of the Makefile. So this causes it to try to build the Makefile even though it's up-to-date. I will make dh handle this case in the next release, by doing the equivilant of: debian/rules: # no-op -- see shy jo signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 12:39:10PM -0500, Joey Hess wrote: GNU make users probably know that this is why there is a .PHONY: ... rule. However that one does not work with implicit dependencies and results in make thinking there is nothing to be done. I was not aware of this behavior of make and had assumed .PHONY could be used as usual in this case. But I see that bug #509756 was recently opened on make about it. Oh. I found the behavior weired, but never thought about it being a bug. Good to know it is already reported. However `make -Bf ./debian/rules clean' does not seem to work since make executes `dh ./debian/rules'. I did not find out why. Apparently make always tries to run a target with the name of the Makefile. So this causes it to try to build the Makefile even though it's up-to-date. Thanks for explaining ... I will make dh handle this case in the next release, by doing the equivilant of: debian/rules: # no-op and solving. :-) So will the new minimal example look like the following then? #/usr/bin/make -Bf %: dh $@ Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
(Please preserve attribution lines so we can see who wrote what quoted material.) Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: However that one does not work with implicit dependencies and results in make thinking there is nothing to be done. Here, you state that something about a ‘debian/rules’ file “does not work”. Can you give an example of a ???debian/rules??? that does not work, and what the desired behaviour would be? Well my basic idea was to add a .PHONY line to the 3-line example like: #!/usr/bin/make -f %: $@ .PHONY:build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary What is it about this ‘debian/rules’ file that “does not work”, as you said in your original message? What behaviour is expected, and what behaviour do you get instead? -- \ “I have never imputed to Nature a purpose or a goal, or | `\anything that could be understood as anthropomorphic.” —Albert | _o__)Einstein, unsent letter, 1955 | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: I only tried to fix the broken example by adding a .PHONY rule. What I blame dh for is that it implements .PHONY rules without marking them as such. I don't understand this statement. ‘dh’ is a program, it doesn't implement *any* makefile rules. That's up to the person who writes the makefile (which in our context is named ‘debian/rules’). I'm having trouble understanding what it is you expect to happen. What would the result of “dh marking .PHONY rules as such” actually look like? Should something change on the system when ‘debhelper’ version 7 or above is installed? If so, what? -- \ “Pray, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in | `\ behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy.” —Ambrose | _o__) Bierce, _The Devil's Dictionary_, 1906 | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: So will the new minimal example look like the following then? #/usr/bin/make -Bf %: dh $@ If the -B flag is necessary, this will require a change in Debian Policy; currently, the above arguably violates a must. I'm inclined to think this isn't the right solution, since it also breaks invoking debian/rules as a makefile instead of as an executable. -- Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org) http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
On Wed, Feb 18, 2009 at 08:35:03AM +1100, Ben Finney wrote: Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: I only tried to fix the broken example by adding a .PHONY rule. What I blame dh for is that it implements .PHONY rules without marking them as such. I don't understand this statement. ???dh??? is a program, it doesn't implement *any* makefile rules. That's up to the person who writes the makefile (which in our context is named ???debian/rules???). Ok, you're ranting on improper wording. It of course does not implement rules, but (common) actions. So with the simple-dh-example-rules-file ./debian/rules foo will invoke dh foo. dh implements actions for makefile targets. These targets all do not created a target file. The lacking marking applies to the example listed in man 1 dh. I'd expected the example to include some code forcing make to rebuild the targets even when files with the same name exist. I'm having trouble understanding what it is you expect to happen. What would the result of ???dh marking .PHONY rules as such??? actually look like? Should something change on the system when ???debhelper??? version 7 or above is installed? If so, what? The result would be changing the 3-line example in man 1 dh to a 4-line example. However this is not possible, because either make is buggy (#509756) or it just doesn't work. rant I don't get rid of the feeling that some people try to misunderstand me as long as possible instead of even considering there might be bugs in dh (I'm not saying that this is the case) while others (Joey, Russ) can just add valuable content. /rant Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
On Wed, Feb 18, 2009 at 08:27:33AM +1100, Ben Finney wrote: Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: Well my basic idea was to add a .PHONY line to the 3-line example like: #!/usr/bin/make -f %: $@ .PHONY:build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary What is it about this ???debian/rules??? file that ???does not work???, as you said in your original message? What behaviour is expected, and what behaviour do you get instead? I'm sorry, but my example is very subtly wrong. It's lacking the three characters dh before $@. Adding these will result in the example from man 1 dh plus a .PHONY line. The expected behaviour would be that there is no difference to the simple 3-line example if none of the files listed with .PHONY exist. The observed behaviour is that all targets listed with .PHONY are nothing to be done targes, see #509756. Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne wrote: So will the new minimal example look like the following then? #/usr/bin/make -Bf %: dh $@ Yes, that's how it's looking now. -- see shy jo signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 07:40:41PM -0500, Joey Hess wrote: Helmut Grohne wrote: So will the new minimal example look like the following then? #/usr/bin/make -Bf %: dh $@ Yes, that's how it's looking now. You should then take Russ Allbery's comment into account: On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 02:06:09PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: If the -B flag is necessary, this will require a change in Debian Policy; currently, the above arguably violates a must. I'm inclined to think this isn't the right solution, since it also breaks invoking debian/rules as a makefile instead of as an executable. We probably need a different solution for this. :-/ Helmut -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 07:40:41PM -0500, Joey Hess wrote: Helmut Grohne wrote: So will the new minimal example look like the following then? #/usr/bin/make -Bf %: dh $@ Yes, that's how it's looking now. You should then take Russ Allbery's comment into account: On Tue, Feb 17, 2009 at 02:06:09PM -0800, Russ Allbery wrote: If the -B flag is necessary, this will require a change in Debian Policy; currently, the above arguably violates a must. I'm inclined to think this isn't the right solution, since it also breaks invoking debian/rules as a makefile instead of as an executable. We probably need a different solution for this. :-/ I really think this is a bug in make. We can change Policy if we have to. Arguably that line complies with Policy, but it feels icky to me; Policy's requirement that debian/rules be a makefile to me means that you should be able to use it as a makefile, which means not requiring special make flags. Policy also currently says: It must start with the line #!/usr/bin/make -f, so that it can be invoked by saying its name rather than invoking make explicitly. but that's a bit more nit-picky. More to the point, though, declaring a target as .PHONY shouldn't, I think, cause it to not be processed by pattern rules. That really feels like a bug in make that should be fixed in make, and then debhelper can just depend on a fixed version of make. I'd much rather see that approach than adding a workaround by adding -B. You still then have to list the rules as .PHONY in the minimal makefile, which is annoying, but you only have to do that if your particular package has files by those names. Right now, rather than changing dh, I'd recommend that people who have packages that have such files just not use the dh 7 minimal makefile and instead spell out the necessary rule. -- Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org) http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Russ Allbery wrote: I really think this is a bug in make. Probably, but who knows. It could just be a misfeature on which ghod knows what somehow depends. .PHONY: precompiled-binary-we-cannot-regenerate-with-gcc.o We can change Policy if we have to. Arguably that line complies with Policy, but it feels icky to me; Policy's requirement that debian/rules be a makefile to me means that you should be able to use it as a makefile, which means not requiring special make flags. I don't remember all the examples of ways to use debian/rules as a makefile that tend to come up whenever someone suggests that that (IMHO restrictive and counter-innovative) requirement be dropped. (And would prefer recapitulating that thread..) But I had rather thought that they all tended to involve either: - Testing if a target exists. Ie, something like `make -nf debian/rules get-orig-source` (close to equivilant: `debian/rules -n get-orig-source`) - Being able to rely on various make features when running debian/rules. Ie: `debian/rules clean build FOO=1` Both sorts of things continue to work with rules files that pass additional options to make. I'm having a hard time imagining a rationalle for building a package by running `make -f debian/rules binary` -- see shy jo signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: dh 7 broken by design?
Helmut Grohne hel...@subdivi.de writes: rant I don't get rid of the feeling that some people try to misunderstand me as long as possible I can't speak for others, but my purpose on this forum is to assist where I can and to be assisted in return. I can't see any benefit in *trying* to misunderstand others in this forum. Perhaps there's a language barrier involved with your communications here; in which case, it seems far more likely that misunderstandings are not deliberate nor wilfully maintained. instead of even considering there might be bugs in dh (I'm not saying that this is the case) Certainly any program can have bugs, and ‘dh’ is no exception. I don't know anyone here who would discount that possibility. while others (Joey, Russ) can just add valuable content. /rant They certainly do. Perhaps we can all benefit from trying to emulate the discussion styles of those whose communications we admire. -- \ “If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; | `\ but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.” —Donald | _o__) Robert Perry Marquis | Ben Finney -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-mentors-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
