[Debian-salsa-ci] Repacking source package files in Salsa-CI

[James Addison]

Thanks Otto,

On Tue, 6 Jan 2026 at 16:40, Otto Kekäläinen <otto at debian.org> wrote:
> [ ... snip ... ]
> ..
> > I've documented[4] the resulting source package build process.  That
> > build relies on invoking both 'gbp export-orig' and then
> > 'mk-origtargz' to repack the sources without the excluded files (NB:
> > 'gbp export-orig' does not yet[5] support this natively).
>
> What you have done seems way too complicated. All you need to do is to
> fork the upstream repository, create a branch debian/latest and in
> debian/copyright define the Files-Excluded, and then let `gbp
> import-orig` automation take care of all the details. See
> https://optimizedbyotto.com/post/debian-packaging-from-git/ for longer
> explanation in blog form and e.g.
> https://salsa.debian.org/games-team/godot/-/tree/debian/latest/debian
> for a real example in Salsa.

Unfortunately upstream here does not provide tagged git versions or
tarballs - we only have the individual commits to work from.  As far
as I am aware, gbp import-orig is not compatible with that kind of
workflow.

> Note also that concept of "fork" does not need to be bound to a single
> forge such as GitHub. If you have a copy of upstream git on
> salsa.debian.org, and I would also call it a fork.

Agreed.  Now in this case there is only the tagless upstream git repo
managed by the game developer, and my fork on Salsa with Debian
packaging included (previously there was also my intermediate fork --
with versioned tags -- on GitHub).

James