Re: Build-Depends
> Very useful, but should not be relied on completly.
Sure. Central src deps are a bit different.
> Autconf depend on m4, so it need not be listed. It does use debhelper,
> moreover, it uses some specific features only present in newer versions. It
> should be built with X support.
debhelper and xlib6g-dev are essential for the central deps (just like
some other common packages, just to save space). The list of central
essential packages should be in the comment at the start of the file.
And forget about the m4, it is included in the substitution for
internal reasons: sbuild checks for some common dependencies via
access time changes. Many configure scripts check for autoconf and
automake though they aren't actually used, but their access time is
updated. m4 is used only if autoconf/automake really run. So I use it
as a signal to check for autoconf/automake usage.
> I have no idea if I am doing something wrong by not having versioned
> build-depends on the -dev packages. I think it should work with most
> versions of these packages, since aalib has not changed for about 3
> years now.
The versions are auto-generated together with -dev dependencies
(derived from the binary deps). They're often unnecessary, but don't
hurt. However, they're also often needed to ensure proper dependencies
of the resulting packages (e.g. to build with the newest version of a
shared lib; older versions are ok for compiling, but may cause runtime
problems.) Use common sense wether to include versions or not.
Roman
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