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• build depend on dh-python
• build-depend on python3 (Python application) or python3-all (Python module) or python3-all-dev
(Python extension),
• if necessary, describe supported Python 3 versions via X-Python3-Version field in debian/control,
• build module/application using its standard build system (pybuild wrapper recommended, see pybuild.1
for more details), remember to build extensions for all supported Python 3 versions (loop over
py3versions-vr),
• install files to the standard locations, add --install-layout=deb to setup.py's install command if
your package is using distutils,
• add python3 to dh's --with option, or:
• include/usr/share/cdbs/1/class/python-distutils.mk in debian/rules and depend on cdbs(>=0.4.90),
or:
• call dh_python3 in the binary-* target,
• add ${python3:Depends} to Depends
NOTESdependencies
dh_python3 tries to translate Python dependencies from Requires-Dist entries in dist-info or requires.txt
contents in egg-info to Debian dependencies. In many cases, this works without any additional
configuration because dh_python3 comes with a build-in mapping of Python module names to Debian packages
that is periodically regenerated from the Debian archive. By default, the version information in the
Python dependencies is discarded. If you want dh_python3 to generate more strict dependencies (e.g. to
avoid ABI problems), or if the automatic mapping does not work correctly for your package, you have to
provide dh_python3 with additional rules for the translation of Python module to Debian package
dependencies.
For a package python3-foo that depends on a package python3-bar, there are two files that may provide
such rules:
1. If the python3-foo source package ships with a debian/py3dist-overrides file, this file is used by
dh_python3 during the build of python3-foo.
2. If the python3-bar source package ships with a debian/python3-bar.pydist file (and uses dh_python3),
this file will be included in the binary package as /usr/share/python3/dist/python3-bar. During the
build of python3-foo, dh_python3 will then find and use the file.
Both files have the same format described in /usr/share/doc/dh-python/README.PyDist. If all you want is
to generate versioned dependencies (and assuming that the python3-bar package provides the pybar Python
module), in most cases it will be sufficient to put the line pybarpython3-bar;PEP440 into either of the
above files.
privatedirs/usr/share/foo, /usr/share/games/foo, /usr/lib/foo and /usr/lib/games/foo private directories are scanned
for Python files by default (where foo is binary package name). If your package ships Python files in
some other directory, add another dh_python3 call in debian/rules with directory name as an argument -
you can use different set of options in this call. If you need to change options (f.e. a list of
supported Python 3 versions) for a private directory that is checked by default, invoke dh_python3 with
--skip-private option and add another call with a path to this directory and new options.
debugpackages
In binary packages which name ends with -dbg, all files in /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/ directory that
have extensions different than so or h are removed by default. Use --no-dbg-cleaning option to disable
this feature.
pyinstallfiles
Files listed in debian/pkg.pyinstall file will be installed as public modules (i.e. into
.../dist-packages/ directory) for all requested Python versions.
Syntax: path/to/file[NAMESPACE][VERSION_RANGE]
debian directory is automatically removed from the path, so you can place your files in debian/ directory
and install them from this location (if you want to install them in "debian" namespace, set NAMESPACE to
debian). If NAMESPACE is set, all listed files will be installed in .../dist-packages/NAMESPACE/
directory.
Examples:
• foo.py installs .../dist-packages/foo.py for all supported Python versions
• foo/bar.py3.3- installs .../dist-packages/foo/bar.py for versions >= 3.3
• foo/bar.pyspam installs .../dist-packages/spam/bar.py
• debian/*.pyspam.egg3.2 installs .../python3.2/dist-packages/spam/egg/*.py files
pyremovefiles
If you want to remove some public modules (i.e. files in .../dist-packages/ directory) installed by build
system (from all supported Python versions or only from a subset of these versions), add them to
debian/pkg.pyremove file.
Examples:
• *.pth removes .pth files from .../dist-packages/
• bar/baz.py3.2 removes .../python3.2/dist-packages/bar/baz.py
bcepfiles
Byte-compilation exception patterns can be described in these files. Use it if you want py3compile to
skip specific files. This is the only way to skip .py files in …/dist-packages/ directory (as --exclude
passed to py3compile in postinst is not used in rtupdate scripts and thus this option cannot be used for
non-private modules).
re|-3.6|/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/jinja2|.*/async(foo|bar).py will skip byte-compilation of
asyncfoo.py and asyncbar.py in /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/jinja2/ directory for each interpreter that
doesn't support async keyword (introduced in Python 3.6).
If you want to skip byte-compilation in a subdirectory for all interpreters, use:
dir|-4.0|/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/foo/tests/. VERSION_RANGE (-4.0 in the example) is described in
README.PyDist file.
debian/python3-foo.bcep file from source package will be included in the binary package as
/usr/share/python3/bcep/python3-foo.bcepoverridingsupported/defaultPythonversions
If you want to override system's list of supported Python versions or the default one (f.e. to build a
package that includes symlinks for older version of Python or compile .py files only for given
interpreter version), you can do that via DEBPYTHON3_SUPPORTED and/or DEBPYTHON3_DEFAULT env. variables.
Example: 3.2,3.3 limits the list of supported Python versions to Python 3.2 and Python 3.3.