[buildd-tools-devel] Bug#731573: sbuild: Please clarify help output of sbuild-adduser

[Reuben Thomas]

Package: sbuild
Version: 0.64.0-1ubuntu1
Severity: wishlist

When I run sbuild-adduser, it outputs the following:

# BUILD
# HOME directory in chroot, user:sbuild, 0770 perms, from
# passwd/group copying to chroot, filtered
# Maybe source 50sbuild, or move into common location.

I find this hard to understand, even after some searching online and
reading the documentation. I end up with the following questions:

1. Is BUILD an environment variable? What must I do with it? (It’s not
mentioned in sbuild(1))

2. Does the second line mean that I should set up a HOME directory in
the chroot, with user:group user:sbuild (why not substitute the first
user argument supplied to sbuild-adduser to be more illustrative?),
and 0770 perms?

3. I can’t work out whether the end of the second line “from…” is
meant to lead into the third line (“passwd/group copying to chroot”)
or not. Is this something about copying /etc/{passwd,group} to the
chroot? Or passwords and groups for my user? What does “from” mean
here? This is the bit I found hardest to understand. What does
“filtered” mean here?

4. The last line: where should I source 50sbuild? If I move it into a
common location, what would that be?

All the above may mean something to a seasoned user, but I presume
it’s intended to be helpful to a first timer. I first read this output
while following along with the recipe in:
https://wiki.debian.org/sbuild This page does not seem to refer to ANY
of the matters referred to in the output of sbuild-adduser, which only
left me more confused: should it be self-evident? Do I have to do
something, or are those bits of advice either irrelevant to me, or
covered somehow by other steps in the recipe on that page?

-- System Information:
Debian Release: wheezy/sid
  APT prefers trusty-updates
  APT policy: (500, 'trusty-updates'), (500, 'saucy-updates'), (500, 'saucy-security'), (500, 'saucy'), (90, 'trusty')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 3.11.0-13-generic (SMP w/4 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_GB.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_GB.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages sbuild depends on:
ii  adduser         3.113+nmu3ubuntu2
ii  apt-utils       0.9.9.1~ubuntu3
ii  libsbuild-perl  0.64.0-1ubuntu1
ii  perl            5.14.2-21build1
ii  perl-modules    5.14.2-21build1

Versions of packages sbuild recommends:
ii  debootstrap  1.0.53ubuntu0.1
ii  fakeroot     1.20-1

Versions of packages sbuild suggests:
ii  deborphan  1.7.28.8
ii  wget       1.14-2ubuntu1

-- no debconf information