"dpkg-source: warning: ignoring deletion" caused by no files in root of orig.tar.gz

["Durk Strooisma" <durk@kern.nl>]

Hi,

I was busy trying to package some source. When I had all stuff ready, I
tried to build the packages (dkpg-buildpackage). While building I got
several "dpkg-source: warning: ignoring deletion" warnings which ended in an
error. The strange thing is, I didn't delete any file from the original
source, neither are incorrect timestamps.
So I did some testing with different orig.tar.gz contents. The contents of
the orig.tar.gz I used which resulted in warnings consisted of 1 directory
with serveral files and subdirectories. Then I tested a orig.tar.gz without
a single directory and with all files and former subdirectory immediately in
the root op the orig.tar.gz. Guess what? The package was built fine! The
next test I did was to use the orig.tar.gz with the single directory in the
root plus an extra file in the root. Yeah... that worked too.
Obvious, a minimum of one file is required in the root of the orig.tar.gz
file to be able to build a package. Is this normal behaviour?

I used the following packages, relevant to this "problem", in my build
environment (a Debian 3.0 system with some newer packages):

debhelper         4.1.29
dpkg              1.9.21
dpkg-dev          1.9.21

Thanks in advance,

Durk