Bug#858319: uscan: Handling of non-trivial repacking

[Christopher Hoskin]

Package: devscripts
Version: 2.17.2
Severity: normal

Dear Maintainer,

Sometimes it is necessary to repack an upstream tarball when it contains
material which violates the DFSG. In the case that whole files need to be
removed, this is adequately handled by mk-origtargz. However, there are
other situations which cannot be handled simply by excluding files, for
example, removing non-DFSG ICC profiles from images [0].

The watch file can specify a script to be called by uscan instead of
uupdate. Current practice seems to be to use this script to call a repack
script to perform custom repacking. For example, the Perl Team use [1].

There are a couple of problems with this approach however:

* the repacksuffix in the watch file is not passed to the repack script
* the <target> tag isn't set to the name of the repacked tarball

Thus there is no agreement between uscan/watch and the repack script about
what the repacked tarball should be called.

The impact of this is that when a command  such as

gbp import-orig --uscan --pristine-tar 

is called, the original tarball is commited to the pristine branch rather
than the repacked tarball.

Thanks.

Christopher Hoskin


[0] https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2014/05/msg00312.html
[1] https://pkg-perl.alioth.debian.org/howto/repacking.html#3._REPACKAGING%2C_in_the_olden_days

-- Package-specific info:

--- /etc/devscripts.conf ---

--- ~/.devscripts ---
DEBFULLNAME="Christopher Hoskin"
DEBEMAIL="christopher.hoskin at gmail.com"
DEBSIGN_KEYID=7FF2B8B8
DEBSIGN_PROGRAM=gpg2
DSCVERIFY_KEYRINGS="~/.gnupg/pubring.gpg" 

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 9.0
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (500, 'testing'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 4.9.0-2-amd64 (SMP w/4 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_GB.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_GB.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)

Versions of packages devscripts depends on:
ii  dpkg-dev     1.18.23
ii  libc6        2.24-9
ii  perl         5.24.1-1
pn  python3:any  <none>

Versions of packages devscripts recommends:
ii  apt                         1.4~rc2
ii  at                          3.1.20-3
ii  curl                        7.52.1-3
ii  dctrl-tools                 2.24-2+b1
ii  debian-keyring              2017.01.20
ii  dput                        0.12.0
ii  equivs                      2.0.9+nmu1
ii  fakeroot                    1.21-3.1
ii  file                        1:5.29-3
ii  gnupg                       2.1.18-6
ii  gnupg2                      2.1.18-6
ii  libdistro-info-perl         0.14
ii  libdpkg-perl                1.18.23
ii  libencode-locale-perl       1.05-1
ii  libgit-wrapper-perl         0.047-1
ii  liblist-compare-perl        0.53-1
ii  liblwp-protocol-https-perl  6.06-2
ii  libsoap-lite-perl           1.20-1
ii  liburi-perl                 1.71-1
ii  libwww-perl                 6.15-1
ii  licensecheck                3.0.29-1
ii  lintian                     2.5.51
ii  man-db                      2.7.6.1-2
ii  patch                       2.7.5-1+b2
ii  patchutils                  0.3.4-2
ii  python3-debian              0.1.30
ii  python3-magic               1:5.29-3
ii  sensible-utils              0.0.9
ii  strace                      4.15-2
ii  unzip                       6.0-21
ii  wdiff                       1.2.2-2
ii  wget                        1.18-5
ii  xz-utils                    5.2.2-1.2+b1

Versions of packages devscripts suggests:
ii  adequate                     0.15.1
ii  autopkgtest                  4.3
pn  bls-standalone               <none>
ii  bsd-mailx [mailx]            8.1.2-0.20160123cvs-3
ii  build-essential              12.3
pn  check-all-the-things         <none>
ii  cvs-buildpackage             5.26
pn  devscripts-el                <none>
pn  diffoscope                   <none>
pn  disorderfs                   <none>
pn  dose-extra                   <none>
pn  duck                         <none>
pn  faketime                     <none>
pn  gnuplot                      <none>
ii  gpgv                         2.1.18-6
pn  how-can-i-help               <none>
ii  libauthen-sasl-perl          2.1600-1
ii  libfile-desktopentry-perl    0.22-1
pn  libnet-smtps-perl            <none>
pn  libterm-size-perl            <none>
ii  libtimedate-perl             2.3000-2
pn  libyaml-syck-perl            <none>
pn  mozilla-devscripts           <none>
ii  mutt                         1.7.2-1
ii  openssh-client [ssh-client]  1:7.4p1-7
ii  piuparts                     0.76
pn  ratt                         <none>
pn  reprotest                    <none>
ii  svn-buildpackage             0.8.6
ii  w3m                          0.5.3-34

-- no debconf information