getconf(1) interface considered cross-harmful

[Guillem Jover <guillem@debian.org>]

Hi!

I recently noticed that the getconf(1) interface is broken by design
when it comes to cross-compiling. It always returns the information
for the build system (GNU/dpkg terms), via the build system libc.

This means that any package using getconf(1) to get build-specific
information such as LFS_CFLAGS, LONG_BIT, or many of the other
constants will produce at least unexpected results, and at worst can
produce broken builds. The exceptions would be for stuff like the
_NPROCESSORS_* variables, but not much more.

When it comes to LFS, starting with dpkg 1.19.0 you can now use the
new «lfs» feature from the «future» feature area (documented in the
dpkg-buildflags man page), which properly supports cross-building:

  ,---
  $ export DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS=future=+lfs
  $ DEB_HOST_ARCH=amd64 dpkg-buildflags --get CPPFLAGS
  -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2
  $ DEB_HOST_ARCH=x32 dpkg-buildflags --get CPPFLAGS
  -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2
  $ DEB_HOST_ARCH=i386 dpkg-buildflags --get CPPFLAGS
  -D_LARGEFILE_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2
  `---

I'll be filing a lintian report to emit a tag for any broken use of
getconf(1).

Thanks,
Guillem