Bug#1087626: debian-policy: Please support building the binaries without requiring fakeroot

[Niels Thykier]

Package: debian-policy
Severity: wishlist
Tags: patch
X-Debbugs-Cc: ni...@thykier.net

Hi





Best regards,
Niels

PS: It is also possible to do a few more minor tweaks to d/rules such as:

 1) Replace `debian/compat` with a Build-Depends on
    `debhelper-compat (= 10)`

 2) Replace the `override_dh_auto_install` hook target with
    `execute_after_dh_auto_install` (while removing the
    "dh_auto_install" from the target).


From b359973952c989faa1b1781aae37b3643822a5fb Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Niels Thykier <ni...@thykier.net>
Date: Sat, 16 Nov 2024 12:59:09 +0000
Subject: [PATCH] Support assembling debian-policy's binary packages without
 (fake)root

---
 Makefile       | 4 ++--
 debian/control | 1 +
 2 files changed, 3 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index 0c8765d..b2d9746 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -35,8 +35,8 @@ docdir      = $(datadir)/doc/$(PACKAGE)
 infodir     = $(datarootdir)/info
 
 # Installation programs to use.
-INSTALL = install -p -o root -g root -m 644
-MKDIR   = install -d -o root -g root -m 755
+INSTALL = install -p -m 644
+MKDIR   = install -d -m 755
 
 # Files included by debconf_specification.xml.
 DEBCONF_INCLUDES := debconf/commands.xml debconf/priorities.xml	\
diff --git a/debian/control b/debian/control
index 09efe0c..93a3fe5 100644
--- a/debian/control
+++ b/debian/control
@@ -24,6 +24,7 @@ Build-Depends:
  texlive-xetex,
  xindy,
  xsltproc,
+Rules-Requires-Root: no
 Standards-Version: 4.7.0
 Vcs-Browser: https://salsa.debian.org/dbnpolicy/policy
 Vcs-Git: https://salsa.debian.org/dbnpolicy/policy.git
-- 
2.45.2

Please see consider patch to remove the need for `fakeroot` (packaging-only change; that is, it is not a normative policy change). Without this patch, `debian-policy` will require `fakeroot` (or real root) to assemble the debs even though modern `dpkg-deb` normalize the ownership to root:root without needing `fakeroot` anymore. Note that `debhelper` (dh_builddeb) does the heavily lifting in this case, which is why there are no changes to `debian/rules`. I spotted those while reviewing the package anyway, but I left them out, since they were not directly related to the problem I was solving. For both, you would need debhelper/12.8 or later. Since oldstable has 13.3.4, you should be fine (only oldoldstable cannot satisfy the second bullet, but it can still satisfy the first).

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