Pulling data in for package build

[Elizabeth Barham <lizzy@soggytrousers.net>]

Hi,

   I wrote a program that generates a db3 database from a set of
publicly available data. If anyone is interested, it is the
usfda-ndc-drug-info on:

       http://sourceforge.net/projects/medfo/

   Anyway, I'd like to make this into a Debian package and I'm having
difficulty resolving the best method to provide the generated software
with the correct data.

   Under normal circumstances, one builds the database this way:

	1) data is pulled down off of a public website
        2) software is built
        3) software reads data fetched in (1) and builds database

While this may seem well and good, I wonder if (1) is such a great
step and if it would be better to simply ship the data with the
sources. Two reasons come to mind:

	1) The data occasionally changes, meaning that some tweaking
           of the software's config file may be necessary.
        2) Fetching the data in an automated build environment seems
           overly redundant.

   So, I am here to ask the experts what you recommend.

   Thank you,

   Elizabeth