Creating deb packages.

mynotes.

I want to make an extensive analysis presenting deb side by side by installing from source and installing from a package like style. That will bring more clearly in front the merits of deb packaging aligning with Devuan guidelines.

Examples

xfe

xfe / description

xfe is a lightweight file manager.

xfe (ver 1.45.2) in Daedalus

$ sudo apt-cache show xfe
Package: xfe
Version: 1.45-2
Installed-Size: 4106
..
$ dpkg -l xfe
||/ Όνομα          Έκδοση       Architecture Περιγραφή
+++-==============-============-============-=================================
ii  xfe            1.45-2       amd64        lightweight file manager for X11

xfe (ver 2) / upstream deb package

pre : install zstd , or use tar (has zstd support)

Download: xfe_2.0-1jammy_amd64.deb , @

$ ar x xfe_2.0-1jammy_amd64.deb 
control.tar.zst  data.tar.zst  debian-binary     // The extension .zst means that the archive is compressed by zstd.
$ tar --zstd -xvf control.tar.zst 
./
./control
./md5sums
./postinst
./postrm
$ tar --zstd -xvf data.tar.zst
$ tree -L 2 usr
usr
├── bin
│   ├── xfa
│   ├── xfe
│   ├── xfi
│   ├── xfp
│   └── xfw
└── share
    ├── applications
    ├── doc
    ├── icons
    ├── locale
    ├── man
    ├── menu
    ├── polkit-1
    └── xfe

xfe (ver 2) / Install without dependency

packaging type: makeself ( @)

xfe is released also as a makeself package named xfe-install-linux-amd64.run and we can downloaded from here. That file is 4.8 MB lot bigger than the offered deb package (3.5MB). As we can see if we list the makeself package contents:

./xfe-install-linux-amd64.run --list

That is an install script and the content in the same file.

To install Xfe, type in a terminal: chmod +x xfe-install-linux-amd64.run sudo ./xfe-install-linux-amd64.run

xfe-install-linux-amd64.run

./xfe-install-linux-amd64.run --list

xfe (ver 2) / compile in Devuan Daedalus

xfe (ver 2) / compile in Devuan Daedalus / download xfe source code

Download from : here

We get the file : xfe-2.0.tar.xz // A tar archive compressed by xz.

xfe (ver 2) / compile in Devuan Daedalus / unpack and decompress

To extract a tar.xz file, invoke the tar command with the --extract (-x) option and specify the archive file name after the -f option. We don’t have to tell tar to decompress with xz as tar does this automatically by inspecting the file and detecting the xz compression. Also we use the -v flag for verbose output.

$ tar -x -v -f xfe-2.0.tar.xz     // short options   
$ tar --extract --verbose --file=xfe-2.0.tar.xz   // full options

We can if we want give our decompress option : -J, --xz 'Filter the archive through xz(1)'. tar auto-detects compression type and extracts the archive. The same command can be used to extract tar archives compressed with other algorithms, such as .tar.gz or .tar.bz2 .

xfe (ver 2) / compile in Devuan Daedalus / depedencies

libfox-1.6-dev

xfe (ver 2) / compile in Devuan Daedalus / install depedencies

$ ./configure 

$ sudo apt-get install libfox-1.6-dev

$ sudo apt-get install libxcb-util-dev 

$ sudo apt-get install libx11-xcb-dev

$ sudo apt-get install libpolkit-gobject-1-dev

$ make

$ sudo make install
installing fr.gmo as /usr/local/share/locale/
 /bin/mkdir -p '/usr/local/bin' (install here xfe, xfw ,xfp , xfa, xfi)
/bin/mkdir -p '/usr/local/share/icons/hicolor/48x48/apps'
/bin/mkdir -p '/usr/local/share/icons/hicolor/scalable/apps'
/bin/mkdir -p '/usr/local/share/xfe/icons/default-theme'

xfe / install locations of ver 1.4.2 in Daedalus.

$ dpkg -L xfe /etc/xfe/xferc /usr/bin/xfe /usr/share/man|pixmaps|icons|applications

xfe / install locations / by makeself file

/usr/local / under that folder everything will be installed , binaries,libraries and various other files.

xfe / install locations / by deb package

$ dpkg -L xfe /etc/xfe/xferc /usr/bin/xfe

xfe / install locations / by compiling sources

Transfer of a upstream package in Devuan

required wfs : examine a deb package

As of 02-2025:

upstream version : 2.0 (11/01/2025) 1.46.2 (09/06/2024) , @
- packaging : deb, makaself , tar.xz
debian : @ (unstable 1.46.2-1) (note that there is a reminded of a new version released)
devuan : @ (unstable 1.46.2-1)

So as of 02-2025 debian and devuan repos dont have xfe_2.0-1jammy_amd64.deb