Debian Plugin

The debian package specification is very robust and powerful. If you wish to do any advanced features, it’s best to understand how the underlying packaging system works. http://tldp.org/HOWTO/html_single/Debian-Binary-Package-Building-HOWTO/ is an excellent tutorial.

SBT Native Packager provides two ways to build debian packages. A native one, where you need dpkg-deb installed or a java, platform independent approach with jdeb. By default the native implementation is activated.

Requirements

If you use the native debian package implementation you need the following applications installed:

  • dpkg-deb
  • dpkg-sig
  • dpkg-genchanges
  • lintian
  • fakeroot

Build

sbt debian:packageBin

Required Settings

A debian package needs some mandatory settings to be valid. Make sure you have these settings in your build:

name := "Debian Example"

version := "1.0"

maintainer := "Max Smith <max.smith@yourcompany.io>"

packageSummary := "Hello World Debian Package"

packageDescription := """A fun package description of our software,
  with multiple lines."""

Enable the debian plugin to activate the native package implementation.

enablePlugins(DebianPlugin)

Java based packaging

If you want to use the java based implementation, enable the following plugin.

enablePlugins(JDebPackaging)

and this to your plugins.sbt

libraryDependencies += "org.vafer" % "jdeb" % "1.3" artifacts (Artifact("jdeb", "jar", "jar"))

JDeb is a provided dependency so you have to add it on your own. It brings a lot of dependencies that could slow your build times. This is the reason the dependency is marked as provided.

Configurations

Settings and Tasks inherited from parent plugins can be scoped with Debian.

linuxPackageMappings in Debian := linuxPackageMappings.value

Settings

Debian requires the following specific settings:

name in Debian
The name of the package for debian (if different from general linux name).
version in Debian
The debian-friendly version of the package. Should be of the form x.y.z-build-aa.
debianPackageDependencies in Debian
The list of debian packages that this package depends on.
debianPackageRecommends in Debian
The list of debian packages that are recommended to be installed with this package.
linuxPackageMappings in Debian
Debian requires a /usr/share/doc/{package name}/changelog.gz file that describes the version changes in this package. These should be appended to the base linux versions.
maintainerScripts in Debian (debianMaintainerScripts)
DEPRECATED use maintainerScripts in Debian instead. These are the packaging scripts themselves used by dpkg-deb to build your debian. These scripts are used when installing/uninstalling a debian, like prerm, postinstall, etc. These scripts are placed in the DEBIAN file when building. Some of these files can be autogenerated, for example when using a package archetype, like server_application. However, any autogenerated file can be overridden by placing your own files in the src/debian/DEBIAN directory.
changelog in Debian
This is the changelog used by dpkg-genchanges to create the .changes file. This will allow you to upload the debian package to a mirror.

Tasks

The Debian support grants the following commands:

debian:package-bin
Generates the .deb package for this project.
debian:lintian
Generates the .deb file and runs the lintian command to look for issues in the package. Useful for debugging.
debian:gen-changes
Generates the .changes, and therefore the .deb package for this project.

Customize

This section contains example on how you can customize your debian build.

Customizing Debian Metadata

A Debian package provides metadata, which includes dependencies and recommendations. A basic example to depend on java and recommend a git installation.

debianPackageDependencies in Debian ++= Seq("java2-runtime", "bash (>= 2.05a-11)")

debianPackageRecommends in Debian += "git"

To hook into the debian package lifecycle (https://wiki.debian.org/MaintainerScripts) you can add preinst , postinst , prerm and/or postrm scripts. Just place them into src/debian/DEBIAN. Or you can do it programmatically in your build.sbt

import DebianConstants._
maintainerScripts in Debian := maintainerScriptsAppend((maintainerScripts in Debian).value)(
  Preinst -> "echo 'hello, world'",
  Postinst -> s"echo 'installed ${(packageName in Debian).value}'"
)

The helper methods can be found in MaintainerScriptHelper Scaladocs.

If you use the JavaServerAppPackaging there are predefined postinst and preinst files, which start/stop the application on install/remove calls. Existing maintainer scripts will be extended not overridden.

Your control scripts are in a different castle.. directory? No problem.

debianControlScriptsDirectory <<= (sourceDirectory) apply (_ / "deb" / "control")