Simple Package Modification

The simplest package modification is for someone to access the code via anonymous CVS and produce a patch to put into Bugzilla. This can be done on SME 8 by installing only cvs as follows.

Setting up your build server

This How-to is based on SME8, and that you have your development SME8 server fully updated and up and running. This can be a dedicated machine or a virtual machine. Special instructions for 32 and 64 bit architecture??

Install CVS

SME Server uses CVS for maintaining code and packages. By default, CVS is not installed on SME8 (not required for normal SME Server operation). To install CVS on SME8 issue the following command:

yum install cvs

Create a new 'builder' user

We will create a new user account that we use for our building purposes. The new user account can be created, as usual, through the server-manager, In this How-To we will have named our new user account 'builder'

Grant shell access

The 'builder' account needs to be able to login and have shell access. For this you will need to grant permissions. Type the following commands from the root account:

chsh -s /bin/bash builder
db accounts setprop builder Shell /bin/bash

After issuing the above commands, the user 'builder' should be able to login on the console. Please login as user 'builder', for the the rest of the instructions assume you are loged in as user 'builder'

Create a development directory

The user 'builder needs a dedicated development directory. In this How-To we will use ~/home/smeserver. To create the directory ~/home/smeserver please issue the following command as user 'builder':

mkdir ~/home/smeserver
cd ~/home/smeserver

This is all what is required to setup your server to be able to start working on patches and packages

Retrieve code

Getting the source code

In this How-To we want to work on the package 'e-smith-base'. We first need to download (with CVS this is called retrieving) the code for 'e-smith-base' from the SME Server CVS repository. For this issue the following command:

cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@smeserver.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/smeserver checkout -P e-smith-base

Next to a selective retrieve as per above, you can also retrieve the whole CVS tree.

cd ~/home/smeserver
cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@smeserver.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/smeserver co -P rpms 

You can now retrieve one of the packages from SourceForge. In this case, we want to modify the e-smith-base package for SME8, so let's retrieve it from SourceForge: First change to the work directory:

cd ~/home/smeserver/rpms/e-smith-base/sme8

Then we have to prepare a tree. Issue the following commands:

cvs  update -dPA
make clean        
make prep

Please ignore if 'make clean' returns an error about a missing *.tgz package

We want to save a copy of the original files:

cp -R e-smith-base-5.2.0 e-smith-base-5.2.0.old

Make changes

Edit the source code

Now make the changes needed to the files in e-smith-base-5.2.0.

We need to have an example!

Create a patch

When we have finished our editing the source code (see above example), we can create a patch. (a file that contains the differences between the original file and the file we have been working on). To create the patch issue the following command:

diff -urN e-smith-base-5.2.0.old e-smith-base-5.2.0 > e-smith-base-5.2.0-test.patch

Test the patch

To see if our changes work correctly as intended, we will make a build of the new package to test. First we will update the spec file (explain spec file in 1 line)

Edit the file e-smith-base.spec

 #increase the release version
 %define release 68

 #add the patch to the existing patchlist:
 Patch2: e-smith-base-5.2.0-test.patch

 #update the changelog section, including the bug number
 * Wed Jan 23 2013 John Doe <jdoe@foo.net> Patch 68
 - just a test to see if I can do this [123]

 #add patch version to the %setup section
 %patch55 -p1

• CHECK: that the changelog version really matches the RPM version.
• CHECK: Is the spec file correct, look at the changes

Applying the patch

To apply the new patch on the CVS tree/code issue the following command:

cvs diff e-smith-base.spec

• Have you updated the release? Is that new release in the changelog?
• Have you included the patch, Patch55: e-smith-proftpd-2.2.0-persistent_passwd.patch
• Is the changelog correct

* Tue Jan 22 2013 Ian Wells <esmith@wellsi.com> 2.2.0-4.sme
- Remove previous change [SME: 7129]

• There must be a bugzilla number in this format [SME: 7129]
• Is the date really correct? Both day and date.
• The version should follow after the email address

CHECK: what would be committed

Update CVS

CVS needs to be updated. Issue the following command:

cvs update

* M modified, will be committed
* U file has been updated since you last checked it out
* A added, will be added on commit
* D deleted, will be deleted on commit
* ? egregious file not part of CVS record for this dir

CHECK: has the patch files been added? cvs add e-smith-quota-2.0.0-badlyformattedie8.patch

CHECK: are the files UNIX or do they have DOS endings (bad)

Build a test RPM

Build the rpm locally to test, (note, this deletes the working tree!<-- Please explain)

make local

A new RPM e-smith-base-5.2.0-68.el5.sme.x86_64.rpm will be created which you can test.

Once the patch works, attach the patch to the bugzilla entry. That is all what it takes to create a patch.

This simple package modification ends here. The next section is intended for developers who have CVS commit and build access. The developers will also check your patches and apply them to the CVS tree for you.

Committing the patch

If you have CVS commit access

Once you are satisfied and want to submit the package to the build server commit your changes. (Please use descriptive comments so that other developers are aware of what is happening. Comments will appear on the subject line of the commit email that get send to the other developers.) cvs commit -m 'your descriptive commit message here' cvs commit -m <-- copy this then add changelog line

If you have CVS build access

Build it (from either the sme7 or sme8 dir):

make tag
make build