StarlingX/CentosToDebian
Contents
Overview
The purpose of this wiki is to provide some guidance for converting a CentOS package to a Debian package.
CentOS Package Files
There are two main files which specify the CentOS build of a package:
- build_srpm.data - Specifies the input sources for the build (both within and external to the package repository).
- <packageName>.spec - Specification file which defines the package(s), dependencies, build rules and install rules.
These files are found in the "centos" directory which is generally a top-level directory in the root package directory. For example:
- Repository: nfv
- Package directory: nfv/nova-api-proxy
- CentOS build directory: nfv/nova-api-proxy/centos
The "debian" build directory is a peer of the "centos" directory (i.e. nfv/nova-api-proxy/debian).
build_srpm.data
The build_srpm.data file defines the source inputs for the package build. The inputs may be files from the package repo itself, files from another repo or files from a download mirror.
The following variables are commonly used for these inputs:
- CGCS_BASE - An import mirror (/import/mirrors/starlingx).
- PKG_BASE - The root package directory.
- STX_BASE - The root directory for all StarlingX repositories.
Specification File
The specification file drives the CentOS package build. It contains two main sections:
- Preamble - Defines metadata for the build.
- Body - Contains the build instructions.
The following table describes the commonly used fields (SPEC directives) in the specification file.
| Directive | Type | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Summary | Preamble | A brief description of the package. |
| Name | Preamble | The name of the package. |
| Version | Preamble | The current version of the package. |
| Source* | Preamble | Specifies a source file for the build. |
| BuildRequires | Preamble | Specifies a dependency for the package. |
| Requires | Preamble | Specifies a dependency for the package. |
| %package | Body | Defines an RPM file to be built. This is used if multiple RPMs are built from the SPEC file. |
| %description | Body | A detailed description of the package |
| %prep | Body | Steps for preparing the software to be built. This might include extracting a tar file of upstream source code, for example. |
| %build | Body | Specifies the rules to build the software of the package. |
| %install | Body | Specifies the install rules for the package. Files are copied from the build directory to the directory structure containing the files to be installed. |
| %files | Body | Defines the files to be installed on a a system when the package is installed |
Mapping a CentOS Specification file to Debian Build Files
The following table shows at a high level how to map sections of Centos .spec
