[debhelper-devel] Bug#858467: Bug#858467: Please expand on error message "No packages to build." when architectures do not match

[Niels Thykier]

Michael Stapelberg:
> On Mon, Apr 10, 2017 at 12:55 PM, Niels Thykier <niels at thykier.net> wrote:
> 
>> On Wed, 22 Mar 2017 19:01:54 +0100 Michael Stapelberg
>> <stapelberg at debian.org> wrote:
>>> Package: debhelper
>>> Version: 10.2.5
>>> Severity: normal
>>>
>>> Currently, when trying to build a Debian package whose binary packages
>>> specify “€œArchitecture: arm64“€  on an amd64 machine, I get the
>> following
>>> error message:
>>>
>>> raspi3-firmware $ dh clean
>>> dh: No packages to build.
>>>
>>> While this is technically correct, the error message could be way
>>> friendlier: I’€™d suggest something along the lines of “No packages to
>>> build (architecture mismatch: got amd64, want arm64)“€ .
>>>
>>> What do you think?
>>>
>>> [...]
>>
>> I am fine with getting patches for the better error messages.
>>
> 
> Perfect. Find attached a patch to that effect.
> 
> 

Thanks,

I am not sure that it is safe to change the return value of
package_arch().  E.g. it is used to determine the name of the binNMU
changelog, and I suspect things will break if all binNMUs start to use
"changelog.Debian.linux-any.gz" regardless architecture. :)

>>
>> Please keep in mind that the "want" part includes architecture
>> wildcards, which debhelper doesn't deal with directly so far.
>>
> 
> I don’t follow. My patch displays the “want” part as-is. Shouldn’t that
> give users all the information they need?
> 
> [...]

Right, it will show wildcards and that is what you intended. :)  I agree
it is better than the status quo, so lets go with that.

Thanks,
~Niels