Explain staging

[Anton Shterenlikht]

>From kpaasial at gmail.com Mon Oct  7 10:32:26 2013
>
>On Mon, Oct 7, 2013 at 12:23 PM, Anton Shterenlikht <mexas at bris.ac.uk> wrote:
>>>From: Matthew Seaman <m.seaman at infracaninophile.co.uk>
>>>To: freebsd-ports at freebsd.org
>>>Subject: Re: Explain staging
>>>
>>>On 03/10/2013 08:56, Anton Shterenlikht wrote:
>>>> sorry, I still don't get it.
>>>> What is achived by staging?
>>>
>>>There are 4 main advantages:
>>>
>>>   1) You can build a port and then create a package from the stage
>>>      directory without having to install it on your build system.  You
>>>      usually don't need root privileges to do this.
>>
>> What about "make fetch"? It puts files by default under
>> ports/distfiles, which, by default, is 755:
>>
>> $ make fetch
>> ===>   xearth-1.2 depends on file: /usr/local/sbin/pkg - found
>> => xearth-1.2.tar.xz doesn't seem to exist in /usr/ports/distfiles/.
>> => /usr/ports/distfiles is not writable by you; cannot fetch.
>> *** Error code 1
>>
>> Stop.
>> make: stopped in /usr/ports/astro/xearth
>> $
>>
>> What about "make extract"? Same problem:
>>
>> $ make extract
>> ===>   xearth-1.2 depends on file: /usr/local/sbin/pkg - found
>> ===> Fetching all distfiles required by xearth-1.2 for building
>> ===>  Extracting for xearth-1.2
>> => SHA256 Checksum OK for xearth-1.2.tar.xz.
>> mkdir: /usr/ports/astro/xearth/work: Permission denied
>> *** Error code 1
>>
>> Stop.
>> make: stopped in /usr/ports/astro/xearth
>> $
>>
>> "make checksum" works, of course, because no files are
>> created:
>>
>> $ make checksum
>> ===>   xearth-1.2 depends on file: /usr/local/sbin/pkg - found
>> ===> Fetching all distfiles required by xearth-1.2 for building
>> => SHA256 Checksum OK for xearth-1.2.tar.xz.
>> $
>>
>> Then "make stage" fails again:
>>
>> $ make stage
>> ===>  Patching for xearth-1.2
>> touch: /usr/ports/astro/xearth/work/.patch_done.xearth._usr_local: Permission denied
>> *** Error code 1
>>
>> Stop.
>> make: stopped in /usr/ports/astro/xearth
>> $
>>
>> So I make it under root.
>> Then "make check-orphans" fail:
>>
>> $ make check-orphans
>> cannot create /usr/ports/astro/xearth/work/.expanded-plist: Permission denied
>> *** Error code 2
>>
>> Stop.
>> make: stopped in /usr/ports/astro/xearth
>> $
>>
>> Finally, "make package" fails:
>>
>> $ make package
>> ===>  Building package for xearth-1.2
>> mkdir: /usr/ports/astro/xearth/work/.metadir: Permission denied
>> *** Error code 1
>>
>> Stop.
>> make: stopped in /usr/ports/astro/xearth
>> $
>>
>> I'm probably missing something important here.
>> The wiki page only says: "Make sure you tested
>> make package as a normal user (not root).
>> If that fails, add NEED_ROOT in the port. "
>> Why would it not fail?
>>
>> Do I need to set up separate distfiles directory,
>> or something like this?
>>
>>>   2) Instead of (typically) just running the install target of the
>>>      piece of software, and then trusting that the pkg-plist contains
>>>      an accurate list of what gets installed, now we take the pkg-plist
>>>      and extract the matching items from the stage directory to make a
>>>      package.  Only things on the plist get installed, and things on
>>>      the plist but not present in the staging dir will flag up as an
>>>      error in the port.
>>
>> This is not clear either.
>> I my port I have:
>>
>> PLIST_FILES=    bin/xearth \
>>                 lib/X11/xearth/freebsd.committers.markers \
>>                 lib/X11/xearth/freebsd.ftp.markers
>> PLIST_DIRS=     lib/X11/xearth
>>
>> I don't have pkg-plist at all.
>> What do I need to change?
>>
>>>If you have an instruction in you port to install a file from the build
>>>area into the filesystem under ${PREFIX} =3D /usr/local then you need to
>>>change it to install to ${STAGEDIR}${PREFIX}/whatever.  Note: this only
>>>applies to the *install* parts: when building the package, you should
>>>configure it for the eventual final install location under /usr/local.
>>
>> Does this look right:
>>
>> do-install:
>>         @${INSTALL_PROGRAM} ${WRKSRC}/xearth ${STAGEDIR}${PREFIX}/bin
>>         @${INSTALL_MAN} ${WRKSRC}/xearth.man ${MANPREFIX}/man/man1/xearth.1
>>         @${MKDIR} ${STAGEDIR}${PREFIX}/lib/X11/xearth
>> # Copy the list of FreeBSD sites & committers locations
>> .for marker in freebsd.committers.markers freebsd.ftp.markers
>>         @${INSTALL_DATA} ${FILESDIR}/${marker} ${STAGEDIR}${PREFIX}/lib/X11/xearth
>> .endfor
>>
>> Many thanks
>>
>> Anton
>>
>
>Set DISTDIR  in make.conf to for example /home/memyself/distfiles and
>move the existing distfiles there. There's no reasonable default for
>DISTDIR I think if it's assumed that fetch operates as non-root.
>
>-Kimmo

sure, I can do /tmp/distfiles too.
But that doesn't help with all the other failing targets.
Then I might as well "chown -R user:group /usr/ports"
and update the ports tree as an unprivileged user too.
HOwever, security would suffer, I think.
And, anyway, this would be a major change.
If this were the case, it should be much
better documented, I think.

Thanks

Anton