Bug#501688: Getting dh-make-perl to use META.yml

[Paul Fenwick]

G'day Gunnar, Mark, and anyone else reading this ticket.

Firstly, this is my first time responding to a Debian bug.  If I've missed
something, or misunderstood the bug process, please let me know; I'm eager
to be educated.

I'm one of the Module::Install developers, and I've also been bitten by
dh-make-perl via Module::Depends::Intrusive failing to parse certain
Makefile.PL files.  However I'm a little confused as to why we'd want to,
since all modern CPAN modules should have a META.yml file.

Put very simply, all the meta information about a module, including its
dependencies, are placed in a machine-readable file so that systems such as
CPAN testing tools, dh-make-perl, and anything else can read them.  To give
an example, the Perl::Critic module has a complicated build system that
dh-make-perl currently chokes on.  However the META.yml file is easily
understood (the requires list is near the top of the file):

	http://search.cpan.org/src/THALJEF/Perl-Critic-1.092/META.yml

It strikes me that dh-make-perl is best using the META.yml file if it
exists, and then only falling back on Module::Depends::Intrusive and other
techniques if required.  This *should* solve all the Module::Install and
Module::Build problems, since both those systems automatically generate
META.yml files, as do modern versions of ExtUtils::MakeMaker.

The full META.yml spec can be found at:

	http://module-build.sourceforge.net/META-spec.html

The META.yml files should be readable by just about any language, including
Perl (via the YAML or YAML::Syck modules)[1].

If dh-make-perl is already moving toward META.yml support, then I'd be happy
to offer assistance.  If it's not, but you think it's a good idea, then I'd
be happy to do the coding, or find a volunteer who can.

Many thanks, and all the very best,

	Paul

[1] More about YAML as a mark-up can be found at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YAML

-- 
Paul Fenwick <pjf at perltraining.com.au> | http://perltraining.com.au/
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