kicad-developers team mailing list archive

["Brian Sidebotham" <brian.sidebotham@...>]

2008/12/13 Richard A Burton <richardaburton@...>:
>> Why is there a specific debian source package? Is this an official
>> part of Kicad, and why is it needed?
>
> Why does it exist? Because it's used to build the official debian
> kicad packages, as well as the official ubuntu ones.
> Why is it needed?
> a) because that's how debian packages are built, it's a standard
> system which people working with debian and its derivatives should be
> familiar with
> b) it's used to build the official kicad packages that come with your
> distro, unsurprisingly they have to be built according to the
> documented standard system
> c) it makes it a whole lot easier to build than the manual way you
> specified, everything is setup in the appropriate debian way (i.e.
> meets debian policy, installs to normal locations for the distro,
> doesn't require you to manually figure out the dependencies, etc.)
> d) allows you to produce a packages that can easily distribute between
> machines or other users (i.e. gives you the standard advantages of a
> linux package)
> e) if you use the official package stuff it gives you the chance to
> contribute to raise any issues you may find as kicad is developed,
> thus speeding up adoption of new versions into ubuntu

Thanks for the thorough information.

>> This is of course why it would be nice for the Wiki to include
>> information about building under different linux distro's.
>
> It's been discussed in the mailing list a number of times before. And
> of course since there are kicad packages in your distro a good place
> to start when you wanted to know how to build your own would have been
> to look at those existing packages. At the very least you could have
> looked at the package build dependencies and saved yourself "half the
> battle". If you want it on the wiki too feel free to add it.

Pretty pointless me adding anything to the wiki as I got it all wrong
apparently! Perhaps if there is an official way, someone who know's
the official way could add it.

Best Regards,

Brian.