Mail from the Ubuntu mame MOTU

[Jordi Mallach]

Hey Cesare,

On Thu, May 12, 2011 at 10:31:06AM +0200, Cesare Falco wrote:
> Basically, get-orig-source now fetches the two zips, and converts to a
> > mame.orig.tar.bz2 and a mame.orig-mess.tar.bz2, being careful to remove
> > the conflicting files that we mentioned before (the differences are just
> > line ending).
> this is my approach too.
> The source tree is saved in a temp directory for later cleaning, Mame is
> built first, then incremental source is added and it's Mess turn.

As I haven't tried a mess build yet, I don't know why this is needed. Why
do you need to build mame first, then mess? Can't you setup the build at
the beginning and build both at the same time? Wouldn't that just create
two different binaries?

> I've asked the former upstream maintainer of SDLMame, who is member of
> both Mame and Mess Teams. The claim is, *all* code from both projects is
> now released under the Mame licence and copyright is held by the Mame
> Team for main source and the Mess Team for the additional code.
> 
> We can trust him of course, but peeking at the files things look
> different.  I guess they are still in the process of updating per-file
> notes, but I think we should be as much specific as possible in
> debian/copyright.

The problem with this detailed handling of debian/copyright is the pain in
the ass it is to maintain properly. Right now, Manu is doing an awesome
job registering the new files, but are we checking changes to already
registered files? Are we removing files that get removed from the
distribution? If we don't find a way to make this easier to maintain,
it'll be a nightmare... :/

> they are the very same, built from the same source with the same name.
> Could this be managed with update-alternatives?

Yes, or maybe even a diversion, but probably an alternative is the optimal
way. It's silly, because it means providing an alternative for the very
same thing. Or, another proposal, just stick mess tools in mame-tools and
make it provide mess-tools. Are there many new tools in mess?

> 8 more IIRC.  If update-alternatives can't do, I'd rather prefer this to
> "direct" dependecy between *-tools packages, not so neat IMHO.

Given they are so closely related, I'd prefer the "one package for both"
thing, but I admit I've never come across this situation.

> I've (probably... ;) ) managed to register to Alioth and asked for
> membership in the Debian Games group. This according to Manu should
> grant me access to the git repository. In the meantime, is it permitted
> to post my debian/rules file as an attachment to the list?

Absolutely! I have pushed my stashed changes to the repo, but you're free
to improve it if needed.

Notes for those not used to this "component tarball" thing:

To get the source prepared for a build, do this:

# Get two tarballs in ../
$ debian/rules get-orig-source

# Unpack them...
$ cd ..
$ tar jxf mame_0.142.orig.tar.bz2
$ tar jxvf mame_0.142.orig-mess.tar.bz2

# ... and move mess to a mame subdictory
# (this subdir needs to match the component name, ie, the -mess bit in
# the tarball name)
$ mv mess-0.142 mame-0.142/mess

# Get our debian dir
$ cp -a ~/git/mamedeb/debian mame-0.142

# Generate a source package
$ dpkg-buildpackage -S
 dpkg-source -b mame-0.142
dpkg-source: info: using options from mame-0.142/debian/source/options: --compression=bzip2 --compression-level=9
dpkg-source: info: using source format `3.0 (quilt)'
dpkg-source: info: s'està construint mame emprant ./mame_0.142.orig-mess.tar.bz2 ./mame_0.142.orig.tar.bz2 existent
dpkg-source: info: s'està construint mame a mame_0.142-2.debian.tar.bz2
dpkg-source: info: s'està construint mame a mame_0.142-2.dsc

As you see, it generated a source package taking into account both
sources. Yay! 

If you now try to extract the .dsc, you'll see it does the right thing:
jordi at aigua:/tmp$ dpkg-source -x ~/git/debian/mame_0.142-2.dsc 
dpkg-source: info: s'està extraient mame des de mame-0.142
dpkg-source: info: s'està desempaquetant mame_0.142.orig.tar.bz2
dpkg-source: info: s'està desempaquetant mame_0.142.orig-mess.tar.bz2
dpkg-source: info: s'està desempaquetant mame_0.142-2.debian.tar.bz2
dpkg-source: info: s'està aplicant kfreebsd-build.patch
dpkg-source: info: s'està aplicant fix-help-file.patch

Now, my idea is to setup a few symlinks to make mess appear in the mame
usual tree so it can get compiled. Dunno if Cesare had another idea or
approach.

> Just to put it right, I'm just a contributor, not a MOTU. I still need
> sponsorship to upload to the official repository. Difference is subtle,
> but I don't want to steal any merit from the mentors who spend their
> time to revise my package. :)

Yeah, mentors and sponsors are cool people. ;)

Jordi
-- 
Jordi Mallach Pérez  --  Debian developer     http://www.debian.org/
jordi at sindominio.net     jordi at debian.org     http://www.sindominio.net/
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