[buildd-tools-devel] Bug#535943: please provide packaged schroot instances, ready to use

[Stefano Zacchiroli]

Package: schroot
Version: 1.2.3-1
Severity: wishlist

[ Reporting this feature request / design document as requested in the
  discussion started at
  http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2009/07/msg00135.html ]

In essence: we want packages that can be installed to provide ready to
use schroot instances.

Two use cases has emerged during the discussion:

1) schroot instances used by developers, e.g. integrated with pbuilder
   / cowbuilder to build packages for various Debian(/Ubuntu?)
   suites. That can result in packages like
   schroot-instance-{sid,squeeze,lenny,...} with Provides matching
   schroot-instance-{stable,testing,unstable}. (The "instance-"
   sub-string is an addition of my own, not sure it is nice though :))

2) "poor's men multi-arch", i.e., the ability to have 32 bits chroots
   on true 64 bits systems to install and run 32 bits missing 64 bits
   equivalents

Various design points have been already discussed:

* chroots can be debootstrap-ed at postinst

* APT settings can be inherited (in some smart way though, because
  they cannot simply be copied) from the host system

* chroots' conf can be simply dropped into /etc/schroot/chroot.d/

* mechanisms to update/upgrade in a batch way all schroot-instance's
  should be developed. sbuild wrapper scripts to do that can be
  mimicked. For security upgrades, unattended-upgrades integration
  should be investigated

* wrappers to run apps from a given chroot should be developed, most
  importantly for the multi-arch scenario. Something a-la wine could
  do, but it needs to be easy and most likely able to be used as a
  launched in desktop environment

... did I forget something?

Cheers.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.30-1-amd64 (SMP w/2 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=it_IT.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=it_IT.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages schroot depends on:
ii  libboost-filesystem1.38.0   1.38.0-7     filesystem operations (portable pa
ii  libboost-program-options1.3 1.38.0-7     program options library for C++
ii  libboost-regex1.38.0        1.38.0-7     regular expression library for C++
ii  libboost-system1.38.0       1.38.0-7     Operating system (e.g. diagnostics
ii  libc6                       2.9-19       GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  libgcc1                     1:4.4.0-10   GCC support library
ii  liblockdev1                 1.0.3-1.2+b1 Run-time shared library for lockin
ii  libpam0g                    1.0.1-9      Pluggable Authentication Modules l
ii  libstdc++6                  4.4.0-10     The GNU Standard C++ Library v3
ii  libuuid1                    1.41.7-1     Universally Unique ID library
ii  schroot-common              1.2.3-1      common files for schroot

schroot recommends no packages.

Versions of packages schroot suggests:
ii  debootstrap                   1.0.13     Bootstrap a basic Debian system
ii  lvm2                          2.02.44-3  The Linux Logical Volume Manager
ii  unzip                         6.0-1      De-archiver for .zip files

-- no debconf information