Git pkg

Mer Project packaging in git project.

Upstream repository

• github.com/lbt/git-pkg (documentation can also be found there)

Installing gitpkg

root@mer:~# zypper in gitpkg

Naming branches and tags

• Upstream's master branch is still called that (obviously)
• Upstream's releases are tagged in some way (e.g. X.Y.Z or PKGNAME-X.Y.Z)
• gitpkg's orphan branch containing packaging files is called pkg-mer
• Changes from an upstream release (e.g. X.Y.Z) are tagged mer-X.Y.Z-R (where R is the RPM release number)
• Packaging files for a specific RPM release are tagged pkg-mer-X.Y.Z-R

Generic example

• Branch master (upstream source code)
  • Tag X.Y.Z: Describes upstream's vanilla X.Y.Z release
    • Tag mer-X.Y.Z-R: Builds on top of X.Y.Z and (possibly) describes patches for the R release

• Branch pkg-mer (packaging information)
  • Tag pkg-mer-X.Y.Z-R: Contains the 4 packaging files for the R release

Specific example: Packaging zsh

See https://github.com/thp/mer-tools-zsh:

• Branch master
  • Tag zsh-5.0.2: Upstream 5.0.2 release
    • Tag mer-5.0.2-2: Packaging-related patches against 5.0.2
• Branch pkg-mer
  • Tag pkg-mer-5.0.2-2: Contains _src, zsh.changes, zsh.yaml and zsh.spec

Contents of the orphan branch (pkg-mer)

The pkg-mer usually contains 4 files:

• _src
• <packagename>.changes
• <packagename>.yaml
• <packagename>.spec

Specific example: Packaging zsh

Contents of the _src file:

git:zsh-5.0.2.tar.bz2:zsh-5.0.2:mer-5.0.2-2

This means:

• The source tarball zsh-5.0.2.tar.bz2 is generated from Git commit zsh-5.0.2
• The patches are generated from zsh-5.0.2 to mer-5.0.2-2
• Therefore: Tarball + patches will end up representing the state of code in mer-5.0.2-2

The patches are generated by running gp_mkpkg - it takes the _src file as input and generates the tarball and patches (if any), and outputs the changes required to the .yaml file.