[gentoo-dev] writing ebuild scripts

[Erik Grinaker]

Hi

First I'd like to extend my respect to the Gentoo developers, I
installed Gentoo Linux on one of my workstations yesterday, and I am
very impressed so far. If no bad things happen I may even start using it
as my primary distro.

I am making some ebuild-scripts for a few pieces of software I need to
install, and will submit these to the Bugzilla for inclusion in the
distro. I am a bit uncertain about how, and under what policies, these
scripts should be written.

Some of the following questions may be answered in the documentation,
but in order to avoid any misunderstandings (and as the documentation
seems a bit dated) it's probably better to just ask.

- What is the best way to determine dependencies for a file, and how
important is it to have minimum version info for dependencies? Unless I
find any info in the docs, would common sense and a quick peek at
configure-scripts/makefiles ot the source suffice?

- What is the best way to install built files? Using make install or
using the dobin/doman/whatever scripts? ...which brings me on to the
next question ;

- Is there any database over what files belong to what package?

- Do you have any policies for testing? Is it enough that I test the
package on my own system, or should I have a clean installation (via
chroot, usermode linux, dualboot or whatever) I can use for testing?

- Should I work against cvs or the Bugzilla?


-- 

Erik Grinaker
Freelance UNIX/Linux systems consultant

"Perfection is acheived not when there is nothing more to add, but
rather when there is nothing more to take away"
- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry