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## Auto-converted by kwiki2moinmoin v2005-10-07
ROOT for DebianScience

ROOT [http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00056.html provides a direct way to build deb packages from the sources] but is not in Debian main.
#language en
## page was renamed from DebianScienceROOT
#pragma section-numbers 1
= ROOT for DebianScience =
 * DebianScience
  * [[DebianScience/Physics]]
 * [[http://root.cern.ch|ROOT upstream]]
 * [[http://packages.qa.debian.org/root-system|Debian QA page]]
 * [[http://bugs.debian.org/|Bugs]]
 * Package page for the metapackage in [[http://packages.debian.org/sid/root-system|Sid]] and [[http://packages.debian.org/lenny/root-system|Lenny]]
As of July 8, 2008 (or so) ROOT version 5.18 has entered Debian Lenny and is expected to be shipped with the next Debian stable release.

<<TableOfContents(3)>>

Note: the name of the metapackage and source package, at the request of FTP masters, has been changed to ''root-system''. If you only want a minimal ROOT environment you may instead try installing ''root-system-bin''.

= Port status (23/09/2009): Buildd port status =
The current port status is summarised below. See also [[https://buildd.debian.org/~luk/status/package.php?p=root-system|buildd logs]] (and possibly [[http://buildd.debian.org/pkg.cgi?pkg=root-system|here]], [[http://buildd.debian.org/~jeroen/status/package.php?p=root-system|here]], and [[http://buildd.debian-ports.org/status/package.php?p=root-system|here]]).
||||||'''Currently accepted ports'''||
|| '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_endian|byte order]]/[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_size|word size]]''' ||''little-endian''||''big-endian''||
||''32-bit''|| [[http://www.debian.org/port/i386|i386]], [[http://wwww.debian.org/ports/mips|mipsel]] || [[http://www.debian.org/ports/mips|mips]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/hppa|hppa]] ||
||''64-bit''||[[http://www/debian.org/ports/amd64|amd64, ]][[http://www.debian.org/ports/ia64|ia64]]|| ||
||||||'''Currently awaiting dependencies'''||
|| '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_endian|byte order]]/[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_size|word size]]''' ||''little-endian''||''big-endian''||
||''32-bit''||<^>[[TheHurd|hurd-i386]]||[[M68k/Porting|m68k]], ||
||''64-bit''|| || ||
||||||'''Failed on buildd'''||
|| '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_endian|byte order]]/[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_size|word size]]''' ||''little-endian''||''big-endian''||
||<^>''32-bit''||<^>[[ArmPort|arm]]||<^>[[ArmEabiPort|armel]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/s390/|s390]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/powerpc|powerpc]], [[PortsSparc|sparc]],||
||''64-bit''||[[http://www.debian.org/ports/alpha|alpha]]||<^>||

== Notes on failed archs ==

  * powerpc failes because of missing build-dep on libsm-dev.
  * alpha - conflicting prototypes in ''cint/lib/posix/posix.h'' - most likely a wrong CPP condition.
  * arm - unclear why it fails, no logs.
  * armel - Incomplete support in XRootd
  * kfreebsd-* - need to implement autodetection of architecture. Please also refer to [[#Portingnotes]] below.
  * s390 - unknown, logs missing
  * sparc - xrootd explicitly disabled in debian/rules - it shouldn't be.

= Port status (8/9/2007): 2 more architectures, mips and hppa =
With the kind help of Dirk Van Hertem <[[mailto:dirk.vanhertem@ieee.org|dirk dot vanhertem at ieee dot org]]> and Boris (?) <[[mailto:boris@mogwitz.eu|boris at mogwitz dot eu]]> we have managed to build the ROOT packages on [[http://www.debian.org/ports/hppa/|hppa]] and [[http://www.debian.org/ports/mips/|mips]]. Thiemo Seufer <[[mailto:ths@networkno.de|ths at networkno dot de]]> helped on porting to [[http://www.debian.org/ports/mips/|mipsel]].

That brings the list of supported and confirmed architectures up to
|| '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_endian|byte order]]/[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_size|word size]]''' || ''little-endian'' || ''big-endian'' ||
|| ''32-bit'' || [[http://www.debian.org/port/i386|i386]], [[http://wwww.debian.org/ports/mips|mipsel]] || [[http://www.debian.org/ports/powerpc|powerpc]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/mips|mips]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/hppa|hppa]] ||
|| ''64-bit'' || [[http://www/debian.org/ports/amd64|amd64]] || ||


The list of unconfirmed architectures is now
|| '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_endian|byte order]]/[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_size|word size]]''' || ''little-endian'' || ''big-endian'' ||
|| ''32-bit'' || [[ArmPort|arm]] || [[ArmEabiPort|armeb[*]]], [[M68k/Porting|m68k]], [[PortsSparc|sparc]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/s390|s390]][[http://www.debian.org/ports/s390|,]] ||
|| ''64 bit'' || [[http://www.debian.org/ports/ia64|ia64]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/alpha|alpha]] || [[http://debian-ppc64.alioth.debian.org/|ppc64[*]]], s390x[*], sparc64[*] ||


[*] Experimental or not fully supported ports.

Apart from that, there's a number of non-linux ports, like
|| '''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_endian|byte order]]/[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Word_size|word size]]''' || ''little-endian'' || ''big-endian'' ||
|| ''32-bit'' || [[TheHurd|hurd-i386]], [[http://www.debian.org/ports/netbsd/|netbsd-i386]], [[Debian_GNU/kFreeBSD|kfreebsd-gnu]] || ||
|| ''64-bit'' || [[http://www.debian.org/ports/netbsd/|netbsd-alpha]] || ||


which have not been tested. In principle it should work on HURD but I haven't tried it in a very long time.

<<Anchor(porting)>>
= Porting notes =
When porting to a non i386 platform not already supported for Linux, the following points should be considered.

 1. Enable auto-detection in {{{configure}}}. This normally involves figuring out what platform {{{uname -m}}} returns, and then add something like
 {{{
      linux:<arch>*:*) arch=linux ;;
}}}
 1. If the generic {{{linux}}} arch does not fit the machine (e.g., 64bit word-size, or big-endian, unsupported compiler options, or the like), we need to define a new platform.
  i. Look for a similar architecture, and copy that architectures {{{config/Makefile.linux}}}''other'' to {{{config/Makefile}}}''foo''.
  i. Set the definition in {{{configure}}} to
  {{{
      linux:<arch>*:*) arch=linux<foo> ;;
}}}
  where {{{<foo>}}} is the Debian system name.
  i. Add an entry for the architecture to {{{config/ARCHS}}}
  {{{
linuxfoo for FOO Linux gcc and glibc
}}}
  i. In {{{config/root-config.in}}} add an appropriate entry for the new architecture
  {{{
linuxfoo)
   # Linux with gcc >= 3.x
   auxcflags="-m32" # replace with -m64 for 64bit machines
   auxldflags="-m32" # replace with -m64 for 64bit machines
   auxlibs="-lm -ldl -rdynamic"
   ;;
}}}
  i. In {{{test/Makefile.arch}}} add appropriate lines for the new architecture.
  {{{
ifeq ($(ARCH),linux)
# Linux with egcs, gcc 2.9x, gcc 3.x
CXX = g++
CXXFLAGS = $(OPT2) -Wall -fPIC
LD = g++
LDFLAGS = $(OPT2)
SOFLAGS = -shared
endif
}}}
  i. Check that the platform is properly identified by the ''XRootd'' in the {{{xrootd/src/xrootd/configure.classic}}} script
  {{{
       linux:foo*:*) arch=foo_linux ; platform=linux; ccflv=gcc;;
}}}
  i. Also add an entry to {{{xrootd/src/xrootd/ARCHS}}}
  {{{
foo_linux gcc all for GNU/Linux on FOO
}}}
 1. Check that the system is properly recognized in {{{base/inc/RConfig.h}}}. Run
 {{{
 touch dummy_file.c; gcc -E -dM dummy_file.c
}}}
 to see a list of GCC predefined pre-processor symbols. Look for an chip definition (e.g., {{{__i386__}}}, {{{__powerpc__}}}). If no valid entry exists in {{{base/inc/RConfig.h}}}, then add something like
 {{{
#!cplusplus
#if defined(linux) && defined(<cpp_arch>)
# define R__LINUX
# define R__UNIX
# define NEED_SIGJMP
# if defined(_ABI64) // For 64-bit word size
# define R__B64
# endif
# if defined(__BYTE_ORDER) && __BYTE_ORDER == __LITTLE_ENDIAN
# define R__BYTESWAP // For little endian machines
# endif
#endif
}}}
 1. Check that the chip/os combo is properly detected in {{{clib/src/Getline.c}}}. The generic entries may be OK - that is the pre-processor conditional
 {{{
#!cplusplus
#if defined(TIOCGETP) && !defined(__sgi) && !defined(R__PPCLINUX) && \
    !defined(R__ALPHALINUX) && !defined(R__MIPSLINUX) /* use BSD interface if possible */
#include <sgtty.h>
struct sgttyb new_tty, old_tty;
struct tchars tch;
struct ltchars ltch;
#else
#ifdef SIGTSTP /* need POSIX interface to handle SUSP */
#include <termios.h>
#if defined(__sun) || defined(__sgi) || defined(R__PPCLINUX) || \
    defined(R__ALPHALINUX) || defined(R__MIPSLINUX)
#undef TIOCGETP /* Solaris and SGI define TIOCGETP in <termios.h> */
#undef TIOCSETP
#endif
}}}
 the ''second'' POSIX branch will be chosen ({{{termios.h}}} is included). If not, add detection code as for for example {{{R__MIPSLINUX}}} and include that define in the BSD excluded list above.
 1. In {{{cint/inc/G__ci.h}}} check that CINT knows how to deal with variadic arguments to functions. Check if there's some entry that corresponds more or less to the the OS/CPU combo, and make a new switch. For example
 {{{
#!cplusplus
#elif (defined(__foo__)&&defined(__linux__))
/**********************************************
 * FOO, Linux
 **********************************************/
#if defined(_ABI64) /* For 64-bit word size */
# define G__VAARG_INC_COPY_N 8
#else
# define G__VAARG_INC_COPY_N 4
#endif
#define G__VAARG_PASS_BY_REFERENCE 8
#else
/**********************************************
 * Other platforms,
 * Try copying object as value.
 **********************************************/
#define G__VAARG_NOSUPPORT
#define G__VAARG_INC_COPY_N 4
/* #define G__VAARG_PASS_BY_REFERENCE 8 */
#endif
}}}
 If this does not work, you will get the error message
 {{{
Limitation: Variable argument is not supported for this platform
}}}
 when executing interpreted code like
 {{{
#!cplusplus
Form("Hello, World from %s", "me")
}}}
 In this case, we will need input from the [[http://root.cern.ch/Cint.html|CINT]] developers. Send a message to cint@root.cern.ch describing the problem and the architecture (OS, chip, kernel version, compiler, etc.).
Non-Linux platforms may need more work. The basic thing is to assume that the OS is like Linux, except of course, if there's a closer alternative, like BSD or Cygwin.

= Future plans =
 * The intent is to upload ROOT "development" versions '''5.''odd''.''xx'' ''' only to "experimental", and ROOT "production" versions '''5.''even''.00''' to "unstable", allowing the production versions to propagate into testing and stable over time.
 * Unfortunately the current production release of ROOT, '''5.20.00''', has been released probably too late to make it into Lenny, but we intend to upload ROOT 5.20 to [[http://backports.org|backports.org]] for Lenny users once it is in unstable.
= History =
 * [[http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=325306|ITP]] submitted by ChristianHolm.
  * Packages uploaded to [[http://ftp-master.debian.org/new.html|NEW]] queue on April 27, 2006, by KevinMcCarty and ChristianHolm. These were targeted for "experimental".
  * FTPmaster rejected these packages on the grounds of licensing issues. In the mean time, these issues have been worked out with the upstream authors and 3rd party developers.
  * Since then, the debian/copyright file has been greatly expanded, and the copyright holders of the non-free material were contacted and agreed to relicense it under LGPL. New ROOT packages targeted at "experimental" were uploaded to the NEW queue on November 3, 2006.
  * These packages were unfortunately rejected due to "too generic name". A third upload to experimental, with the source and some binary packages renamed, was permitted to enter the archive.
  * ROOT 5.18 was uploaded to unstable in mid-June 2008, and following a new upload with some FTBFS bug fixes, entered the current testing distribution "Lenny" on about July 8, 2008.
== The current unofficial repository ==
 * ROOT [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00056.html|provides a direct way to build deb packages from the sources]] but is not in Debian main.
  * See [[http://mirror.phy.bnl.gov/debian-root/|the unofficial ROOT deb repository]] for some build instructions and a repository for unstable (i386, amd64, powerpc) and stable (i386 only).
  * [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00101.html|buildd]] point is __very__ attractive to ROOT
  * [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00101.html|previously]] ported ROOT to Debian GNU/Hurd
  * Looks for testers on [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00101.html|non-i386]] Debian architectures.
== Technical issues for packaging ==
The approach is that the ROOT source tree contains [[http://root.cern.ch/viewcvs/build/package/lib/|scripts]] and [[http://root.cern.ch/viewcvs/build/package/common|templates]] to deal with packaging in general (that is for Debian and RPM), as well as some [[http://root.cern.ch/viewcvs/build/package/debian|Debian]] and [[http://root.cern.ch/viewcvs/build/package/redhat|RPM]] specific templates.

The debian packaging directory is then build by running the script '''[[http://root.cern.ch/viewcvs/build/package/lib/makedebdir.sh|makedebdir.sh]]''', followed by '''fakeroot debian/rules debian/control'''. The packaging scripts will try to build as many packages as possible on the build host. Note, that that sometimes means that you can get packages that wouldn't be possible on a pristine build system.

Note, that this scheme does not change the way the packages are built. It merely changes how the debian directory is prepared. After the debian directory is made, the developer can still tweak it to fit the system. Of course, such tweaks should eventually be propegated back to the packaging scripts in ROOT itself, to assure consistency.

In the eventual "official" Debian packages to come, the package maintainer would presumably run these two commands himself before '''dpkg-buildpackage''', and the results of the commands (for instance the debian/ directory) would therefore enter into the diff.gz of the source package. Thus the source package uploaded to Debian would always be buildable with the normal steps of '''dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot'''.

If an end-user does '''apt-get source root''' and then re-runs the makedebdir script, it will overwrite the existing debian directory with information about the dependencies installed on the end-user's system. Hence an end-user may recompile Debian packages of ROOT building with support for unofficial (non-DFSG-free) libraries.

It is important that the maintainer ensure that he has all the needed "official" build-depends installed on his system when running the makedebdir.sh script, and none of the "unofficial" non-DFSG-free libraries (e.g. Pythia) installed, perhaps by building on a pristine machine or in a pristine chroot. That is, use '''pbuilder''' :-). In any case, official packages are not allowed to munge debian/control in such a way that their Build-Depends change during the dpkg-buildpackage step!

== Licensing ==
 * [[http://root.cern.ch/root/License.html|ROOT License]] is now LGPL.
 * The production version of ROOT (5.08 as of Jan 8, 2005) is LGPL'ed. The LGPL only applies to version 5.03 and higher of ROOT; prior versions still have the [[http://root.cern.ch/viewcvs/LICENSE?rev=1.2&content-type=text/vnd.viewcvs-markup|original]] non-free license.
 * [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/01/msg00278.html|Debian legal thread]] and [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00085.html|why]] it is never too much to be careful about licenses. Long-awaited [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00087.html|fix]] to the problem has now been implemented.
 * [[http://people.debian.org/~kmccarty/physics-software-rant.html|educational article on licensing and more]]
= Thanks =
 * [[http://lists.debian.org/debian-science/2005/08/msg00066.html|Brad Sawatzky]] among [[http://mirror.phy.bnl.gov/debian-root/#thanks|others]].

1. ROOT for DebianScience

As of July 8, 2008 (or so) ROOT version 5.18 has entered Debian Lenny and is expected to be shipped with the next Debian stable release.

Note: the name of the metapackage and source package, at the request of FTP masters, has been changed to root-system. If you only want a minimal ROOT environment you may instead try installing root-system-bin.

2. Port status (23/09/2009): Buildd port status

The current port status is summarised below. See also buildd logs (and possibly here, here, and here).

Currently accepted ports

byte order/word size

little-endian

big-endian

32-bit

i386, mipsel

mips, hppa

64-bit

amd64,ia64

Currently awaiting dependencies

byte order/word size

little-endian

big-endian

32-bit

hurd-i386

m68k,

64-bit

Failed on buildd

byte order/word size

little-endian

big-endian

32-bit

arm

armel, s390, powerpc, sparc,

64-bit

alpha

2.1. Notes on failed archs

  • powerpc failes because of missing build-dep on libsm-dev.
  • alpha - conflicting prototypes in cint/lib/posix/posix.h - most likely a wrong CPP condition.

  • arm - unclear why it fails, no logs.
  • armel - Incomplete support in XRootd
  • kfreebsd-* - need to implement autodetection of architecture. Please also refer to #Portingnotes below.

  • s390 - unknown, logs missing
  • sparc - xrootd explicitly disabled in debian/rules - it shouldn't be.

3. Port status (8/9/2007): 2 more architectures, mips and hppa

With the kind help of Dirk Van Hertem <dirk dot vanhertem at ieee dot org> and Boris (?) <boris at mogwitz dot eu> we have managed to build the ROOT packages on hppa and mips. Thiemo Seufer <ths at networkno dot de> helped on porting to mipsel.

That brings the list of supported and confirmed architectures up to

byte order/word size

little-endian

big-endian

32-bit

i386, mipsel

powerpc, mips, hppa

64-bit

amd64

The list of unconfirmed architectures is now

byte order/word size

little-endian

big-endian

32-bit

arm

armeb[*], m68k, sparc, s390,

64 bit

ia64, alpha

ppc64[*], s390x[*], sparc64[*]

[*] Experimental or not fully supported ports.

Apart from that, there's a number of non-linux ports, like

byte order/word size

little-endian

big-endian

32-bit

hurd-i386, netbsd-i386, kfreebsd-gnu

64-bit

netbsd-alpha

which have not been tested. In principle it should work on HURD but I haven't tried it in a very long time.

4. Porting notes

When porting to a non i386 platform not already supported for Linux, the following points should be considered.

  1. Enable auto-detection in configure. This normally involves figuring out what platform uname -m returns, and then add something like

          linux:<arch>*:*)      arch=linux ;;
  2. If the generic linux arch does not fit the machine (e.g., 64bit word-size, or big-endian, unsupported compiler options, or the like), we need to define a new platform.

    1. Look for a similar architecture, and copy that architectures config/Makefile.linuxother to config/Makefilefoo.

    2. Set the definition in configure to

            linux:<arch>*:*)      arch=linux<foo> ;;

      where <foo> is the Debian system name.

    3. Add an entry for the architecture to config/ARCHS

      linuxfoo             for FOO Linux gcc and glibc
    4. In config/root-config.in add an appropriate entry for the new architecture

      linuxfoo)
         # Linux with gcc >= 3.x
         auxcflags="-m32"   # replace with -m64 for 64bit machines
         auxldflags="-m32"  # replace with -m64 for 64bit machines
         auxlibs="-lm -ldl -rdynamic"
         ;;
    5. In test/Makefile.arch add appropriate lines for the new architecture.

      ifeq ($(ARCH),linux)
      # Linux with egcs, gcc 2.9x, gcc 3.x
      CXX           = g++
      CXXFLAGS      = $(OPT2) -Wall -fPIC
      LD            = g++
      LDFLAGS       = $(OPT2)
      SOFLAGS       = -shared
      endif
    6. Check that the platform is properly identified by the XRootd in the xrootd/src/xrootd/configure.classic script

             linux:foo*:*)    arch=foo_linux      ; platform=linux; ccflv=gcc;;
    7. Also add an entry to xrootd/src/xrootd/ARCHS

      foo_linux       gcc       all    for GNU/Linux on FOO
  3. Check that the system is properly recognized in base/inc/RConfig.h. Run

     touch dummy_file.c; gcc -E -dM dummy_file.c

    to see a list of GCC predefined pre-processor symbols. Look for an chip definition (e.g., __i386__, __powerpc__). If no valid entry exists in base/inc/RConfig.h, then add something like

       1 #if defined(linux) && defined(<cpp_arch>)
       2 #   define R__LINUX
       3 #   define R__UNIX
       4 #   define NEED_SIGJMP
       5 #   if defined(_ABI64) // For 64-bit word size
       6 #      define R__B64
       7 #   endif
       8 #   if defined(__BYTE_ORDER) && __BYTE_ORDER == __LITTLE_ENDIAN
       9 #      define R__BYTESWAP // For little endian machines
      10 #   endif
      11 #endif
      12 
    
  4. Check that the chip/os combo is properly detected in clib/src/Getline.c. The generic entries may be OK - that is the pre-processor conditional

       1 #if defined(TIOCGETP) && !defined(__sgi) && !defined(R__PPCLINUX) && \
       2     !defined(R__ALPHALINUX)  && !defined(R__MIPSLINUX) /* use BSD interface if possible */
       3 #include <sgtty.h>
       4 struct sgttyb   new_tty, old_tty;
       5 struct tchars   tch;
       6 struct ltchars  ltch;
       7 #else
       8 #ifdef SIGTSTP          /* need POSIX interface to handle SUSP */
       9 #include <termios.h>
      10 #if defined(__sun) || defined(__sgi) || defined(R__PPCLINUX) || \
      11     defined(R__ALPHALINUX) || defined(R__MIPSLINUX)
      12 #undef TIOCGETP         /* Solaris and SGI define TIOCGETP in <termios.h> */
      13 #undef TIOCSETP
      14 #endif
      15 
    

    the second POSIX branch will be chosen (termios.h is included). If not, add detection code as for for example R__MIPSLINUX and include that define in the BSD excluded list above.

  5. In cint/inc/G__ci.h check that CINT knows how to deal with variadic arguments to functions. Check if there's some entry that corresponds more or less to the the OS/CPU combo, and make a new switch. For example

       1 #elif (defined(__foo__)&&defined(__linux__))
       2 /**********************************************
       3  * FOO, Linux
       4  **********************************************/
       5 #if defined(_ABI64) /* For 64-bit word size */
       6 # define G__VAARG_INC_COPY_N 8
       7 #else
       8 # define G__VAARG_INC_COPY_N 4
       9 #endif
      10 #define G__VAARG_PASS_BY_REFERENCE 8
      11 #else
      12 /**********************************************
      13  * Other platforms,
      14  *  Try copying object as value.
      15  **********************************************/
      16 #define G__VAARG_NOSUPPORT
      17 #define G__VAARG_INC_COPY_N 4
      18 /* #define G__VAARG_PASS_BY_REFERENCE 8 */
      19 #endif
      20 
    
    If this does not work, you will get the error message
    Limitation: Variable argument is not supported for this platform
    when executing interpreted code like
       1 Form("Hello, World from %s", "me")
    

    In this case, we will need input from the CINT developers. Send a message to cint@root.cern.ch describing the problem and the architecture (OS, chip, kernel version, compiler, etc.).

Non-Linux platforms may need more work. The basic thing is to assume that the OS is like Linux, except of course, if there's a closer alternative, like BSD or Cygwin.

5. Future plans

  • The intent is to upload ROOT "development" versions 5.odd.xx only to "experimental", and ROOT "production" versions 5.even.00 to "unstable", allowing the production versions to propagate into testing and stable over time.

  • Unfortunately the current production release of ROOT, 5.20.00, has been released probably too late to make it into Lenny, but we intend to upload ROOT 5.20 to backports.org for Lenny users once it is in unstable.

6. History

  • ITP submitted by ChristianHolm.

    • Packages uploaded to NEW queue on April 27, 2006, by KevinMcCarty and ChristianHolm. These were targeted for "experimental".

    • FTPmaster rejected these packages on the grounds of licensing issues. In the mean time, these issues have been worked out with the upstream authors and 3rd party developers.
    • Since then, the debian/copyright file has been greatly expanded, and the copyright holders of the non-free material were contacted and agreed to relicense it under LGPL. New ROOT packages targeted at "experimental" were uploaded to the NEW queue on November 3, 2006.
    • These packages were unfortunately rejected due to "too generic name". A third upload to experimental, with the source and some binary packages renamed, was permitted to enter the archive.
    • ROOT 5.18 was uploaded to unstable in mid-June 2008, and following a new upload with some FTBFS bug fixes, entered the current testing distribution "Lenny" on about July 8, 2008.

6.1. The current unofficial repository

6.2. Technical issues for packaging

The approach is that the ROOT source tree contains scripts and templates to deal with packaging in general (that is for Debian and RPM), as well as some Debian and RPM specific templates.

The debian packaging directory is then build by running the script makedebdir.sh, followed by fakeroot debian/rules debian/control. The packaging scripts will try to build as many packages as possible on the build host. Note, that that sometimes means that you can get packages that wouldn't be possible on a pristine build system.

Note, that this scheme does not change the way the packages are built. It merely changes how the debian directory is prepared. After the debian directory is made, the developer can still tweak it to fit the system. Of course, such tweaks should eventually be propegated back to the packaging scripts in ROOT itself, to assure consistency.

In the eventual "official" Debian packages to come, the package maintainer would presumably run these two commands himself before dpkg-buildpackage, and the results of the commands (for instance the debian/ directory) would therefore enter into the diff.gz of the source package. Thus the source package uploaded to Debian would always be buildable with the normal steps of dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot.

If an end-user does apt-get source root and then re-runs the makedebdir script, it will overwrite the existing debian directory with information about the dependencies installed on the end-user's system. Hence an end-user may recompile Debian packages of ROOT building with support for unofficial (non-DFSG-free) libraries.

It is important that the maintainer ensure that he has all the needed "official" build-depends installed on his system when running the makedebdir.sh script, and none of the "unofficial" non-DFSG-free libraries (e.g. Pythia) installed, perhaps by building on a pristine machine or in a pristine chroot. That is, use pbuilder :-). In any case, official packages are not allowed to munge debian/control in such a way that their Build-Depends change during the dpkg-buildpackage step!

6.3. Licensing

7. Thanks