postgresql-debian-packaging.md

Packaging PostgreSQL Extensions for Debian

January 2024, Christoph Berg myon@debian.org

Debian ships many PostgreSQL applications and extensions as packages. I often get asked by developers how they would get their programs packaged, and ended up writing the same reply over and over. This is a write-up intended as a more thorough answer.

Anatomy of Debian packages

Debian knows two sorts of packages: "source" packages and "binary" packages. The latter type is the .deb files that get installed using apt or dpkg. The first type is what this article is mostly about. For both sorts of packages, there is an unpacked form and a packed form.

Binary packages

Packed binary packages are a single .deb file:

$ ls -al postgresql-16-unit_7.7-1_amd64.deb
-rw-r--r-- 1 myon myon 136740 Jan 12 14:13 postgresql-16-unit_7.7-1_amd64.deb

$ dpkg-deb -I postgresql-16-unit_7.7-1_amd64.deb
 new Debian package, version 2.0.
 size 136740 bytes: control archive=1332 bytes.
     643 bytes,    15 lines      control
    2046 bytes,    25 lines      md5sums
 Package: postgresql-16-unit
 Source: postgresql-unit
 Version: 7.7-1
 Architecture: amd64
 Maintainer: Christoph Berg <myon@debian.org>
 Installed-Size: 500
 Depends: postgresql-16, postgresql-16-jit-llvm (>= 16), libc6 (>= 2.14)
 Section: database
 Priority: optional
 Homepage: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit
 Description: SI Units for PostgreSQL
  postgresql-unit implements a PostgreSQL datatype for SI units, plus byte. The
  base units can be combined to named and unnamed derived units using operators
  defined in the PostgreSQL type system. SI prefixes are used for input and
  output, and quantities can be converted to arbitrary scale.

$ dpkg-deb -c postgresql-16-unit_7.7-1_amd64.deb
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/doc/
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/doc/postgresql-16-unit/
-rw-r--r-- root/root       267 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/doc/postgresql-16-unit/NEWS.Debian.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root      7202 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/doc/postgresql-16-unit/README.md.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root       977 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/doc/postgresql-16-unit/changelog.Debian.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root       868 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/doc/postgresql-16-unit/copyright
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/postgresql/
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/postgresql/16/
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/postgresql/16/extension/
-rw-r--r-- root/root     19259 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/postgresql/16/extension/unit--7.sql
-rw-r--r-- root/root       244 2023-01-06 16:34 ./usr/share/postgresql/16/extension/unit.control
...

The unpacked binary package is of course the files being installed on the system.

Source packages

Unpacked source packages consist of the original upstream source code, with a debian/ directory added.

postgresql-unit/
├── debian/
│   ├── changelog
│   ├── control
│   ├── control.in
│   ├── copyright
│   ├── gitlab-ci.yml
│   ├── NEWS
│   ├── pgversions
│   ├── rules*
│   ├── source/
│   │   └── format
│   ├── tests/
│   │   ├── control
│   │   └── installcheck*
│   ├── upstream/
│   │   └── metadata
│   └── watch
├── Makefile
├── NEWS.md
├── README.md
├── unit--7.sql.in
├── unit.c
└── unit.control

Most packages are maintained in Git, which tracks this unpacked source package form. (Either with or without the original upstream source, more on that later.)

Packed source packages are actually a set of files:

-rw-rw-r--   1 myon myon   3848 Jan 12 14:31 postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz
-rw-rw-r--   1 myon myon   1100 Jan 12 14:31 postgresql-unit_7.7-1.dsc
-rw-rw-r--   1 myon myon 414114 Jan 12 14:12 postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz

This transport format is used for uploading to the Debian archive and for retrieving the source code using apt source. (It is not stored in Git.)

The .orig.tar.gz is the original source tarball as distributed by upstream, either as download from the upstream homepage, or for projects hosted on GitHub, often a tarball automatically generated by GitHub from an upstream Git tag.

The .debian.tar.xz file contains the debian/ directory.

The .dsc file is a descriptor that contains pointers to the other files in the source package, and more meta information.

$ cat postgresql-unit_7.7-1.dsc
Format: 3.0 (quilt)
Source: postgresql-unit
Binary: postgresql-16-unit
Architecture: any
Version: 7.7-1
Maintainer: Christoph Berg <myon@debian.org>
Homepage: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit
Standards-Version: 4.6.1
Vcs-Browser: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit
Vcs-Git: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit.git
Testsuite: autopkgtest
Testsuite-Triggers: make
Build-Depends: bison, debhelper-compat (= 13), flex, postgresql-server-dev-all (>= 217~)
Package-List:
 postgresql-16-unit deb database optional arch=any
Checksums-Sha1:
 c2f81968bfbe83fed49b084b737e3aba423bf15a 414114 postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz
 b8a1917ddecb99b1441218bc74a0b7cb30752235 3848 postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz
Checksums-Sha256:
 411d05beeb97e5a4abf17572bfcfbb5a68d98d1018918feff995f6ee3bb03e79 414114 postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz
 36e89c762e50ddf997b079703200c0df6967b4fe911bde8e9482d8e82dcb6a98 3848 postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz
Files:
 33a22586c8b81564ba7e9c05f430ad40 414114 postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz
 a0b31860b86c12c7173a78d6ecd525cb 3848 postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz

Building the source package

To get started with working with a Debian package, get the unpacked source package. This could mean invoking apt source, but most often checking out the packaging Git repository is the better option as it might contain changes that have not been uploaded yet. It also makes contributing changes easier. For packages, that are already part of Debian, the debcheckout tool can automate that (it uses the Vcs-Git field in the metadata).

To build the packed source packed from the unpacked one, enter the package directory, and invoke dpkg-buildpackage -S --no-sign:

postgresql-unit $ dpkg-buildpackage -S --no-sign
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source package postgresql-unit
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source version 7.7-1
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source distribution unstable
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source changed by Christoph Berg <myon@debian.org>
 dpkg-source --before-build .
 debian/rules clean
dh clean --with pgxs
...
 dpkg-source -b .
dpkg-source: info: using source format '3.0 (quilt)'
dpkg-source: info: building postgresql-unit using existing ./postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz
dpkg-source: info: building postgresql-unit in postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz
dpkg-source: info: building postgresql-unit in postgresql-unit_7.7-1.dsc
 dpkg-genbuildinfo --build=source -O../postgresql-unit_7.7-1_source.buildinfo
 dpkg-genchanges --build=source -O../postgresql-unit_7.7-1_source.changes
dpkg-genchanges: info: including full source code in upload
 dpkg-source --after-build .
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source-only upload (original source is included)

Note that the artifacts produced by dpkg-buildpackage are always in the parent directory of the working directory. To make room for that, I always create two levels of directory for my working copies, so a typical case looks like this:

postgresql-unit/
├── postgresql-unit/   <--- most commands are invoked from here
│   ├── debian/
│   │   ├── changelog
│   │   ├── control
│   │   ├── control.in
│   │   ├── copyright
│   │   ├── files
│   │   ├── gitlab-ci.yml
│   │   ├── NEWS
│   │   ├── pgversions
│   │   ├── rules*
│   │   ├── source/
│   │   │   └── format
│   │   ├── tests/
│   │   │   ├── control
│   │   │   └── installcheck*
│   │   ├── upstream/
│   │   │   └── metadata
│   │   └── watch
│   ├── Makefile
│   ├── NEWS.md
│   ├── powers.c
│   ├── powers.h
│   ├── README.md
│   ├── unit--7.sql.in
│   ├── unit.c
│   └── unit.control
├── postgresql-16-unit_7.7-1_amd64.deb
├── postgresql-16-unit-dbgsym_7.7-1_amd64.deb
├── postgresql-unit_7.7-1_amd64.changes
├── postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz
├── postgresql-unit_7.7-1.dsc
└── postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz

Building binary packages

Binary packages are built using dpkg-buildpackage --no-sign.

 dpkg-buildpackage --no-sign
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source package postgresql-unit
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source version 7.7-1
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source distribution unstable
dpkg-buildpackage: info: source changed by Christoph Berg <myon@debian.org>
dpkg-buildpackage: info: host architecture amd64
 dpkg-source --before-build .
 debian/rules clean
dh clean --with pgxs
...
 dpkg-source -b .
dpkg-source: info: using source format '3.0 (quilt)'
dpkg-source: info: building postgresql-unit using existing ./postgresql-unit_7.7.orig.tar.gz
dpkg-source: info: building postgresql-unit in postgresql-unit_7.7-1.debian.tar.xz
dpkg-source: info: building postgresql-unit in postgresql-unit_7.7-1.dsc
 debian/rules binary
dh binary --with pgxs
   dh_update_autotools_config
   dh_autoreconf
   dh_auto_configure
   dh_auto_build --buildsystem=pgxs
	pg_buildext build build-%v
### PostgreSQL 16 build ###
make[1]: Entering directory '/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit/build-16'
gcc -Wall -Wmissing-prototypes -Wpointer-arith -Wdeclaration-after-statement -Werror=vla -Wendif-labels -Wmissing-format-attribute -Wimplicit-fallthrough=3 -Wcast-function-type -Wshadow=compatible-local -Wformat-security -fno-strict-aliasing -fwrapv -fexcess-precision=standard -Wno-format-truncation -Wno-stringop-truncation -g -g -O2 -fstack-protector-strong -fstack-clash-protection -Wformat -Werror=format-security -fcf-protection -fno-omit-frame-pointer -g -O2 -ffile-prefix-map=/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit=. -fstack-protector-strong -fstack-clash-protection -Wformat -Werror=format-security -fcf-protection -fPIC -fvisibility=hidden -ffp-contract=off -I. -I/home/myon/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit -I/usr/include/postgresql/16/server -I/usr/include/postgresql/internal  -Wdate-time -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2 -D_GNU_SOURCE -I/usr/include/libxml2   -c -o unit.o /home/myon/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit/unit.c
...
### End 16 build ###
   create-stamp debian/debhelper-build-stamp
   dh_prep
   dh_auto_install --buildsystem=pgxs --destdir=debian/postgresql-16-unit/
	pg_buildext install build-%v postgresql-%v-unit
### PostgreSQL 16 install ###
make[1]: Entering directory '/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit/build-16'
/usr/bin/install -c -m 755  unit.so '/home/myon/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit/debian/postgresql-16-unit/usr/lib/postgresql/16/lib/unit.so'
...
### End 16 install ###
   debian/rules override_dh_installdocs
make[1]: Entering directory '/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit'
dh_installdocs --all README.*
make[1]: Leaving directory '/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit'
   dh_installchangelogs
   dh_perl
   dh_link
   debian/rules override_dh_pgxs_test
make[1]: Entering directory '/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit'
# defer testing to autopkgtest, the data tables are not in /usr/share/postgresql yet
make[1]: Leaving directory '/home/myon/projects/postgresql/postgresql-unit/postgresql-unit'
   dh_strip_nondeterminism
   dh_compress
   dh_fixperms
   dh_missing
   dh_dwz -a
   dh_strip -a
   dh_makeshlibs -a
   dh_shlibdeps -a
   dh_installdeb
   dh_gencontrol
   dh_md5sums
   dh_builddeb
dpkg-deb: building package 'postgresql-16-unit' in '../postgresql-16-unit_7.7-1_amd64.deb'.
dpkg-deb: building package 'postgresql-16-unit-dbgsym' in '../postgresql-16-unit-dbgsym_7.7-1_amd64.deb'.
 dpkg-genbuildinfo -O../postgresql-unit_7.7-1_amd64.buildinfo
 dpkg-genchanges -O../postgresql-unit_7.7-1_amd64.changes
dpkg-genchanges: info: including full source code in upload
 dpkg-source --after-build .
dpkg-buildpackage: info: full upload (original source is included)

Again, the resulting .deb files are placed in the parent directory.

By default, this also builds the source. If this fails (often when there are files that differ from the tarball version, more on patches later), use -b to skip building the source: dpkg-buildpackage -b --no-sign.

If building fails because of missing dependencies, install them using apt build-dep ..

There are various front-end utilities to automate these building steps better (git-buildpackage, sbuild, pbuilder, debuild), but dpkg-buildpackage is just fine.

The debian/ directory

The debian/ directory contains metadata and build instructions for the package. "Creating a Debian package" really means editing the files in this directory to make the package behave as desired.

debian/control

The control file contains one section for the source package, followed by one or more sections for binary packages.

$ cat debian/control
Source: postgresql-unit
Section: database
Priority: optional
Maintainer: Christoph Berg <myon@debian.org>
Build-Depends:
 bison,
 debhelper-compat (= 13),
 flex,
 postgresql-server-dev-all (>= 217~),
Standards-Version: 4.6.1
Rules-Requires-Root: no
Vcs-Git: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit.git
Vcs-Browser: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit
Homepage: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit

Package: postgresql-16-unit
Architecture: any
Depends: ${misc:Depends}, ${shlibs:Depends}, postgresql-16
Description: SI Units for PostgreSQL
 postgresql-unit implements a PostgreSQL datatype for SI units, plus byte. The
 base units can be combined to named and unnamed derived units using operators
 defined in the PostgreSQL type system. SI prefixes are used for input and
 output, and quantities can be converted to arbitrary scale.

(In the case of PostgreSQL extension packages, the control file is automatically generated from debian/control.in, see below. Normal packages do not have a control.in file.)

debian/rules

The rules file handles the actual binary package building steps, in Makefile syntax.

Almost all packages today use a helper system called debhelper which consists of various building blocks called dh_* that handle the build steps. Historically, rules files would consist of long lists of dh_* steps (similar to the build output above), but there is a "sequencer" command dh that knows how to invoke the basic steps.

Many packages that don't need any tweaking at that level have a very short debian/rules file. (Make sure the indentation is a tab, not spaces!)

#!/usr/bin/make -f

%:
        dh $@

Or in the case of PostgreSQL extensions:

#!/usr/bin/make -f

%:
        dh $@ --with pgxs

If any of the dh_* steps need changes, we can override them in the rules file by adding a override_dh_* target:

#!/usr/bin/make -f

override_dh_installdocs:
        dh_installdocs --all README.*

override_dh_pgxs_test:
        # defer testing to autopkgtest, the data tables are not in /usr/share/postgresql yet

%:
        dh $@ --with pgxs

Build steps

The most interesting build steps to hook into are:

dh_auto_configure

Autodetects the build system and runs ./configure, cmake and the like with a set of default options.

To add options, do:

override_dh_auto_configure:
        dh_auto_configure -- -DEXTRA_OPTION=foo --with-bar

dh_auto_build

The main build step. If the automatically run command is wrong, just override it.

override_dh_auto_build:
        $(MAKE) -C some_sub_dir world

dh_auto_install

Runs upstreams' make install or equivalent. The files are installed into DESTDIR=debian/foo (single-binary package) or DESTDIR=debian/tmp (multi-binary package).

dh_install and debian/foo.install

If there is more than one binary package, the files installed in debian/tmp need to be distributed to the individual binary packages. This is done by directory/file lists in debian/*.install.

debian/source/format

Should be verbatim this:

3.0 (quilt)

(More on quilt and patches below.)

debian/copyright

Debian wants copyright information on all files in a package. For private package, this file can be omitted, but for anything official, this file has to list all the copyright holders, along with any copyright terms and license texts.

debian/watch

To get informed about new upstream versions, Debian runs a "watch" system that polls upstream download locations for new package versions. The debian/watch file tells the uscan tool where to look and (optionally) how to transform upstream's version naming scheme into a Debian-compatible one.

version=4
https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit/tags .*/([0-9.]*).tar.gz

This is a simple example where uscan looks at some GitHub "tags" URL, parses the HTML, and recognizes all links pointing to .tar.gz files as new versions. The regexp part of the URL in parentheses is used as the version number.

The uscan tool is part of the devscripts package which holds a bunch of utilities useful for packaging tasks.

Patching the upstream source

Debian packages are based on upstream tarballs, and dpkg-buildpackage does not like changed (or new) files (except in the debian/ directory). Changes need to be done using patch files stored in the debian/patches/ directory, and applied in the order listed in debian/patches/series.

At package build time, support is built-in in dpkg-buildpackage. Patches can edited with whatever tool, with quilt being the easiest solution. (It's an optional package that likely isn't preinstalled.) quilt needs some configuration in ~/.quiltrc:

QUILT_DIFF_OPTS="-p"
QUILT_REFRESH_ARGS="-p ab --no-timestamps --no-index"
QUILT_PATCHES=debian/patches

Some useful commands:

• Apply all patches: quilt push -a
• Unapply all patches: quilt pop -a
• Create a new patch: quilt new foo
• Add a file to a patch: quilt add bar (do this before changing the file!)
• Add a file and edit it: quilt edit bar
• Show current diff: quilt diff
• Save a patch after editing: quilt refresh

Suppose we want to fix something in the unit.c file:

$ quilt new unit-dllexport
Patch unit-dllexport is now on top

$ quilt add unit.c
File unit.c added to patch unit-dllexport

$ vi unit.c

$ quilt diff | cat
Index: postgresql-unit/unit.c
===================================================================
--- postgresql-unit.orig/unit.c	2023-11-08 20:51:04.343207806 +0100
+++ postgresql-unit/unit.c	2024-01-12 16:10:23.143509535 +0100
@@ -136,7 +136,7 @@ unit_get_definitions(void)
 
 PG_MODULE_MAGIC;
 
-void _PG_init(void);
+void PGDLLEXPORT _PG_init(void);
 
 void
 _PG_init(void)

$ quilt refresh
Refreshed patch unit-dllexport

This creates the debian/patches/ directory:

postgresql-unit/debian/patches/
├── series
└── unit-dllexport

At build-time, dpkg-buildpackage will then automatically apply and un-apply patches as needed.

Tests

Package tests are run in two flavors: at build-time and later independently on packages installed on some system.

Build-time package tests

If an upstream project has a test suite, it is recommended to run it at build time. In many cases, dh_auto_test will guess how to do that and no extra configuration is needed. If it guesses incorrectly, use override_dh_auto_test to provide a better command.

Install-time package tests

Next to tests at build-time, we can also run tests when the binary packages are installed on some actual system. This has the advantage that it runs when all files are in their final location, and can also interface with other packages and services that might not be available at build time. It can also run periodically to spot regression, while build-time tests would usually not be repeated.

Debian's system to run these tests is autopkgtest. The TL;DR version of the documentation is this: In the debian/tests/ directory, provide a command (usually a shell script) that exercises some package smoke test or more complex scenario. Register that test in debian/tests/control.

postgresql-unit/debian/tests/
├── control
└── installcheck*

$ cat debian/tests/control
Depends: @, postgresql-common-dev
Tests: installcheck
Restrictions: allow-stderr

$ cat debian/tests/installcheck
#!/bin/sh
pg_buildext -i '--locale=C.UTF-8' installcheck

In Depends the @ is a shorthand for all binary packages built from this source. Other packages that the tests needs (and that the binaries don't depend on) can be listed here. Restrictions declare tests properties. Examples are allow-stderr (don't consider stderr output to be a test failure) and root-needed (run test as root instead of an unprivileged user).

In Debian, these tests are run automatically for QA, see https://ci.debian.net/. More details are in the autopkgtest package documentation in /usr/share/doc/autopkgtest/.

PostgreSQL extension packages

Packages for PostgreSQL extensions work as described above, but since extensions have to be compiled for each PostgreSQL major version separately, things are a bit more complex.

For Debian, the process is changed to still have one source package per upstream project, but to build separate binary packages for each PostgreSQL major version. The naming scheme is postgresql-NN-foo. (In case the upstream project is called pg_foo, make a judgment call if postgresql-NN-pg-foo or postgresql-NN-foo is better.)

In Debian, only one PostgreSQL major version is supported at a time, but in the https://apt.postgresql.org/ repository, many major versions are supported in parallel (currently PostgreSQL 10 everything newer, even when 10 is already EOL).

debian/control.in

In order not to have to edit the list of binary packages built when a new PostgreSQL major version comes out, or when a source package is built both for Debian and for apt.postgresql.org, the debian/control file is generated from a template in debian/control.in.

$ cat debian/control.in
Source: postgresql-unit
Section: database
Priority: optional
Maintainer: Christoph Berg <myon@debian.org>
Build-Depends:
 bison,
 debhelper-compat (= 13),
 flex,
 postgresql-server-dev-all (>= 217~),
Standards-Version: 4.6.2
Rules-Requires-Root: no
Vcs-Git: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit.git
Vcs-Browser: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit
Homepage: https://github.com/df7cb/postgresql-unit

Package: postgresql-PGVERSION-unit
Architecture: any
Depends: ${misc:Depends}, ${shlibs:Depends}, ${postgresql:Depends}
Description: SI Units for PostgreSQL
 postgresql-unit implements a PostgreSQL datatype for SI units, plus byte. The
 base units can be combined to named and unnamed derived units using operators
 defined in the PostgreSQL type system. SI prefixes are used for input and
 output, and quantities can be converted to arbitrary scale.

The section with the PGVERSION token is duplicated for each major version supported, with the version number filled in.

debian/pgversions

Not every package supports all PostgreSQL major versions. The debian/pgversions file is used to mark which versions are actually supported, so apt.postgresql.org can skip building the other version.

Unless we know the exact versions supported, we should use all:

$ cat debian/pgversions
all

If 14 or newer is supported:

$ cat debian/pgversions
14+

Supported versions

debian/pgversions lists the versions supported by the package. The other half of that system is the set of versions supported by the system. This list is configured in /etc/postgresql-common/supported_versions or by setting the PG_SUPPORTED_VERSIONS environment variable. (Set this variable to test building for other major versions.) The actual build process will use the intersection of these two lists.

pg_buildext

The process of building PostgreSQL extensions for several major versions is automated by the pg_buildext utility. It provides commands for the most common tasks.

Package building:

• pg_buildext supported-versions - print list of supported versions. Use this to loop over versions in debian/rules.
• pg_buildext build build-%v - build in build-%v directory
• pg_buildext install build-%v postgresql-%v-unit - invoke make install
• pg_buildext installcheck build-%v postgresql-%v-unit - invoke make installcheck for build-time testing
• pg_buildext loop postgresql-%v-unit - use instead of build/install/installcheck if the package doesn't support out-of-tree builds in subdirectories
• pg_buildext updatecontrol - rebuild debian/control from debian/control.in. Run this manually when the set of supported versions has changed. This is not run automatically because the Debian packaging policy forbids changing the set of binary packages at build time. (In environments where this is not an issue, set PG_UPDATECONTROL=yes.)

Package testing:

• pg_buildext installed-versions - print list of installed versions. Use this to loop over versions in debian/tests/*.
• pg_buildext installcheck - invoke make installcheck on installed packages

dh --with pgxs

A debhelper extension pgxs is provided that adds builds steps to the dh build sequence.

$ cat debian/rules
#!/usr/bin/make -f

%:
        dh $@ --with pgxs

If the package doesn't support out-of-tree builds, use dh $@ --with pgxs_loop.

   dh_auto_build --buildsystem=pgxs
        pg_buildext build build-%v
   dh_auto_install --buildsystem=pgxs
        pg_buildext install build-%v postgresql-%v-unit
   dh_pgxs_test
        pg_buildext installcheck . build-%v postgresql-%v-unit

To override any of these steps, use override_dh_auto_* in debian/rules.

Package template

To get started with a new package, the dh_make_pgxs tool can generate a skeleton debian/ directory:

$ dh_make_pgxs

If the auto-detected values are wrong, hit ^C and add more command line parameters.