#1052224 ITP: libalien-base-modulebuild-perl -- subclass of Module::Build for building Alien:: modules and their libraries

Package:
wnpp
Source:
wnpp
Submitter:
Francesco P. Lovergine
Date:
2025-11-29 16:53:40 UTC
Severity:
normal
#1052224#5
Date:
2023-09-19 09:37:29 UTC
From:
To:
* Package name    : libalien-base-modulebuild-perl
  Version         : 1.17
  Upstream Contact: Joel A Berger <joel.a.berger@gmail.com>
* URL             : https://metacpan.org/release/Alien-Base-ModuleBuild
* License         : Artistic or GPL-1+
  Programming Lang: Perl
  Description     : subclass of Module::Build for building Alien:: modules and their libraries

 This is a subclass of Module::Build, that with Alien::Base allows for easy
 creation of Alien distributions. Alien::Base::ModuleBuild is used during the
 build step of your distribution. When properly configured it will
 use pkg-config to find and use the system version of the library
 download, build and install the library if the system does not provide it.
 .
 This module is in maintenance mode, use Alien::Build for new stuff.
#1052224#10
Date:
2023-09-19 15:39:12 UTC
From:
To:
…

Alien::Build is already questionable¹, although I admit that patching
the requirement out can be a bit cumbersome -- but a subclass that
says "This module is in maintenance mode, use Alien::Build for new
stuff." looks a bit like a candidate for not-packaging to me …

Cheers,
gregor


¹ it's great for e.g. Windows where building C libraries is a pain
but on Debian it's problematic as downloading stuff from the internet
is not something we can or want to do
#1052224#15
Date:
2023-09-19 15:48:41 UTC
From:
To:
Unfortunately yes for me, it is in the dep chain for Geo::GDAL::FFI, as for
https://wiki.debian.org/BookwormGdalPerl
which is my main goal to avoid to mantain an unofficial repo for the rest
of time.
#1052224#20
Date:
2023-09-19 16:13:09 UTC
From:
To:
You mean because of Alien::gdal?

I can't really test now, because Geo::GDAL::FFI also needs the
unpackaged FFI::Platypus::Declare, but from reading
https://metacpan.org/release/AJOLMA/Geo-GDAL-FFI-0.1/source/Makefile.PL
and
https://metacpan.org/release/AJOLMA/Geo-GDAL-FFI-0.1/source/README.md
a simple

override_dh_auto_configure:
    dh_auto_configure -- GDAL=/usr

plus build dependencies on gdal-bin (for /usr/bin/gdalinfo) and libgdal-dev
might be enough without any Alien::gdal. Maybe :)

(Not sure about
https://metacpan.org/release/AJOLMA/Geo-GDAL-FFI-0.1/source/lib/Geo/GDAL/FFI.pm#L1567
but this is also guarded by an if())

Cheers,
gregor
#1052224#25
Date:
2023-09-19 16:36:13 UTC
From:
To:
Mmmm, let me see. The chain I used was to impact minimally on changes for the module
taken from CPAN. I would be happy to minimize the use of all that stuff, I was not exactly
enthusiastic about the new course at the time.
#1052224#30
Date:
2023-09-20 08:29:49 UTC
From:
To:
Ok, it seems that the solution is much more easy than the prospected. The implementation is smart
enough to keep the gdal.so in the right place, something I oversight before. The resulting
package needs to be arch:any to create a correct internal Geo::GDAL::gdal.pm module per arch,
but it seems working. That said, I would try to patch to avoid the Platypus::Declare use
which is currently discouraged/deprecated: I would avoid to read other complains by gregor :-D

Thanks a lot for the hints.
#1052224#35
Date:
2023-09-20 08:46:45 UTC
From:
To:
Err, not required if depending on libgdal-dev, indeed.
#1052224#40
Date:
2023-09-20 14:55:15 UTC
From:
To:
[…]

Sounds great, thanks for investigating.

Heh :)


Cheers,
gregor