Build packages for different distributions?

[Ole Streicher]

Hi Loic,

Loïc Minier <lool at dooz.org> writes:
> On Sat, Jun 12, 2010, Ole Streicher wrote:
>> I have some packages which I compiled for Ubuntu, but I am quite sure
>> that they would also work under Debian.

>  This is a very bad idea; binary package differ between the
>  distributions, even when the source is the same.  This can be the
>  dependency on the version of libc6, or the tools used during build such
>  as debhelper or cdbs, or anything really.  For instance Debian might be
>  using a trigger to support some stuff while Ubuntu isn't, or
>  vice-versa.


Yes, ofcourse. What I meant is a build system that allows to build the
packages for > 1 system, by using (almost) the same source. Ubuntu and
Debian dont differ too much IMO that such a thing should be impossible.

>  There is no PPA for Debian, but a lot of teams host packages on alioth.
>  The best thing to do is to push your packages straight to Debian,
>  either Debian unstable or experimental.  You could get these sponsored
>  or become a Debian Maintainer or a Debian Developer to get them
>  included.

I am even not a Debian user! I just thought that -- since I already did
this for Ubuntu -- it would be not a hard work to build (and maintain)
also Debian packages. However, I dont want to install debian on my
computer just for this... so I would need an external build environment
The build routine already includes tests with the compiled package, so
there is also no need to really manually test them.

As a slightly different topic: can I use the same debian/ subdirectory
for different distributions? In my (Ubuntu) case, I have packages for
10.04 (lucid), but when the first 10.10 (maverick) beta comes out, I
would like to build packages for both versions. How would one do that
with minimal effort?

Best regards

Ole