Getting started with CDBS (Re: libgs9: please Recommends: (not Depends:) gs-cjk-resource)

[Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>]

Jonas Smedegaard wrote:

> I will be happy to help teach about CDBS issues if anyone is
> interested.  It is not like "I have no time to deal with mere
> mortals" but more that I really love the way CDBS uses make and
> dislike how short-form dh reinvents make with its core "redirect any
> build target to debhelper" trick.  So feel free to ask questions
> about CDBS, and don't expect to convince me that short-form dh is
> better for _me_. :-)

Thank you for this explanation.  Sensible. [*]

My first two CDBS questions: 

 - how can I list the makefiles involved in building a given
   target (e.g., debian/control)?  How does one find the corresponding
   documentation for those files?

 - how does one go about figuring out how to tweak some particular
   behavior?  For example, suppose I want to allow the "clean" target
   to run as non-root, or to set some particular CFLAGS in the "build"
   target.

Jonathan

[*] When using short-form dh, I tend to write:

	build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary:
		+dh $@ --parallel $(opt_no_act)
	.PHONY: build clean install binary-arch binary-indep binary

	opt_no_act =
	ifneq (,$(findstring n,$(MAKEFLAGS)))
	    opt_no_act = --no-act
	endif

I dislike the "default pattern rule" style, too.  And I want
"debian/rules -n <target>" to work.  Even with this, dh does not feel
like native "make" because dh lists targets it has built in
debhelper.log and skips them unless one manually deletes that log.

So your explanation sounds about right.