go-ian

Simple debian package building and management named in memory of the late Ian Murdock, founder of the Debian project.

The purpose of this tool is to decrease the overhead in maintaining a debian package stored in a git repository. It tries to mimic the CLI of other popular tools such as git and bundler. It is intended to be helpful when integrating other build tools/systems and with CI/CD.

It has been ported to golang from the ruby project of the same name.

You can download binaries and Debian packages from the releases page.

Requirements

I shell out a bit to save time, will eventually make things more native. For now, need the following tools:

dpkg-deb
fakeroot
rsync

This should do it.

sudo apt-get install fakeroot dpkg-dev rsync coreutils findutils

Installation

Simple to build / install, provided you have go setup:

go get github.com/penguinpowernz/go-ian
go install github.com/penguinpowernz/go-ian/cmd/ian

Or you can download a pre-built binary or Debian package from the releases page.

Usage

This tool is used for working with what Debian called “Binary packages” - that is ones that have the DEBIAN folder in capitals to slap Debian packages together quickly. It uses dpkg-deb -b in the background which most Debian package maintainers frown at but it is suitable enough for rolling your own packages quickly, and it scratches an itch.

Creation/Initializing

ian new my-package

Analogous to bundle new gemname or rails new appname this will create a folder called my-package in the current folder and initialize it with the appropriate debian files.

ian init

Analagous to git init this will do the same as new but do it in the current folder.

Now you will see you have a DEBIAN folder with a control and postinst file.

Info

ian info

This will simply dump the control file contents out.

Set fields in the control file

The architecture and the version can be set quickly in this manner. Other fields are not (yet) supported.

ian set -a amd64
ian set -v 1.2.3-test

You can also use increments on semantic versions like so:

ian set -v +M    # increment the Major number
ian set -v +m    # increment the minor number
ian set -v +p    # increment patch level

Packaging

ian pkg [-b]

The one you came here for. Packages the repo in a debian package, excluding junk files like .git and .gitignore, moves root files (like README.md) to a /usr/share/doc folder so you don’t dirty your root partition on install.
The package will be output to a pkg directory in the root of the repo. It will also generate the md5sums file and calculate the package size proir to packaging. By adding a -b flag it will run the build script before packaging.

Build

ian build

This will run the build script found in DEBIAN/build parsing it the following arguments:

root directory of the package git repository
architecture from the control file
version from the control file

It can do whatever things you need it to do to prepare for the packaging such as building binaries, etc.

Push

ian push [target]

Setup scripts to run in a file called .ianpush in the repo root and running ian push will run all the lines in the file as commands with the current package. The package filename will be appended to each command unless $PKG is found on the line, in which case that will be replaced with the package filename. Also the target name can be given as an argument to push to specfic targets (supports globbing).

package_cloud push user/app-testing/debian/wheezy
stable: package_cloud push user/app-stable/debian/wheezy
devbox: scp $PKG root@192.168.1.200:~
s3: aws s3 cp $PKG s3://mybucket/dpkg/

Note that targets requiring input will fail as there is no terminal attached to the command. For SCP, it is recommended to use the SSH config files to your advantage.

Other

Some other commands:

ian install     # installs the current package
ian excludes    # shows the excluded files
ian size        # calculates the package size (in kB)
ian -v          # prints the ian version
ian version     # prints the package version
ian versions    # prints all known versions
ian deps        # prints the dependencies line by line
bpi             # run build, pkg, install
pi              # run pkg, install
pp [target]     # run pkg, push
bp              # run build, pkg
bpp [target]    # run build, pkg push

You can also use the envvar IAN_DIR in the same way that you would use GIT_DIR - that is, to do stuff with ian but from a different folder location.

Use DEBUG=1 ian pkg to show debug logs for ian commands.

Library Usage

The Debian package Control struct could come in handy for others. As a quick overview here’s what it can do:

Parse([]byte) (Control, error) - parse the bytes from the control file
Read(string) (Control, error) - read the given file and parse it’s contents
Default() (Control) - a default package control file
ctrl.Filename() string - the almost Debian standard filename (missing distro name)
ctrl.String() string - render the control file as a string
ctrl.WriteFile(string) error - write the string into the given filename

Plus the exported fields on the Control struct that mirror the dpkg field names.

For more information please check the godocs.

Dogfooding

The debian package source for Ian is actually managed by Ian in the folder dpkg. So you can build the debian package for ian, using ian. Give it a try!

go get github.com/penguinpowernz/go-ian
go install github.com/penguinpowernz/go-ian/cmd/ian
cd $GOPATH/src/github.com/penguinpowernz/go-ian/dpkg
ian build
ian pkg
sudo $GOBIN/ian install # or sudo dpkg -i pkg/ian_v1.0.0_amd64.deb

TODO

Contributor Code of Conduct

This project adheres to No Code of Conduct. We are all adults. We accept anyone’s contributions. Nothing else matters.

For more information please visit the No Code of Conduct homepage.

Contributing

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome on GitHub at https://github.com/penguinpowernz/ian.

In Memory Of

In memory of Ian Ashley Murdock (1973 - 2015) founder of the Debian project.