[debhelper-devel] Bug#765446: Bug#765446: debhelper build target status file packagename.debhelper.log is not documented

[Mikko Rapeli]

On Wed, Oct 15, 2014 at 12:41:19PM -0400, Joey Hess wrote:
> Mikko Rapeli wrote:
> > I have fought this issue for years. Build a package and then try to fix
> > some bugs locally. Silly bugs like bad .install or package scripts should be
> > straight forward to fix without complete rebuild of the package,
> > which can take hours, or even days on smaller machines. If I add a simple
> > fix to installed files or the scripts, another run with
> > 'fakeroot debian/rules binary' doesn't actually do anything more when
> > debhelper is used.
> > 
> > The developer use case is different from what debian infrastructure does and
> > yes proper builds need always be clean and start from scratch.
> > 
> > But I see nothing bad in documenting a useful development feature like
> > stepping back only few debhelper build steps without complete rebuild.
> 
> A better approach is to run dh_clean, which removes all debhelper cruft,
> while leaving the package built. Assuming a sane Makefile, or a
> debian/rules that uses build-stamp to work around a buggy upstream
> Makefile, debian/rules binary can then be run again and will reuse what
> has already been compiled.

Ok, I agree. dh_clean is the one that I should use then. Somehow I have managed
to mix it with dh_auto_clean or 'fakeroot debian/rules clean' which often
removes build directories but leaves some other temp files around.

Maybe debhelper man page could somehow highlight the difference to dh_auto_clean
but I can't put into a single sentence either. 'man dh_clean' says what this
does so well.

You can close this bug.

Thanks!

-Mikko