If you are interested in openSUSE, sooner or later you will probably learn how packages and specfiles work. But packaging is not static knowledge that you learn once and are good to go. The rules change over time, new macros are created and old ones are erased from history, new file paths are used and the old ones are forgotten. So how can one keep up with these changes?

In this article, we will serve you with all recent news and important changes in openSUSE packaging on a silver platter. Whether you are a pro package maintainer or just a casual packager who wants to catch up, you will definitely find something you didn’t know here. We promise.

Table of contents

• openSUSE macros
  • %_libexecdir
  • systemd macros
  • Cross-distribution macros
  • Deprecated macros
    • Database/cache updating macros
    • %make_jobs
• Paths and Tags
  • Configuration files in /etc and /usr/etc
  • Group: tag
• News in RPM
  • File Triggers
  • %autopatch and %autosetup
  • %patchlist and %sourcelist
  • %elif
  • Boolean dependencies
  • %license
• OBS
  • New osc options
    • osc maintained –version
    • osc request –incoming
    • osc browse
    • Delete requests for entire projects
    • Real names in changelogs
    • rdiff and diff enhancements
    • osc blame
    • osc comment
    • Examining workers and constraints
      • osc checkconstraints
      • osc workerinfo
  • Multibuild
• Oldies
  • PreReq → Requires(pre)
  • /var/run → /run
  • /usr Merge
  • SysV is dead
• Automatic tools for cleaning
  • spec-cleaner
  • rpmlint
• Acknowledgment

openSUSE macros

%_libexecdir

TL;DR

• %_libexecdir macro expands to /usr/libexec now (not /usr/lib)

We will start with the most recent change, which is the %_libexecdir macro. In the past, it was a standard practice to store binaries that are not intended to be executed directly by users or shell scripts in the /usr/lib directory. This has been changed with a release of FHS 3.0 that now defines that applications should store these internal binaries in the /usr/libexec directory.

In openSUSE, the first discussions about changing the %_libexecdir macro from /usr/lib to /usr/libexec appeared in fall 2019 but it took several months for all affected packages to be fixed and the change to be adopted. It was fully merged in TW 0825 in August 2020.

Please note, openSUSE Leap distributions, including upcoming Leap 15.3, still expand %_libexecdir to the old /usr/lib.

systemd macros

TL;DR

• Use %{?systemd_ordering} instead of %{?systemd_requires}
• Use pkgconfig(libsystemd) instead of pkgconfig(systemd-devel)
• BuildRequires: systemd-rpm-macros is not needed

In the past, you’ve been told that if your package uses systemd, you should just add the following lines to your spec file and you are good to go:

BuildRequires: systemd-rpm-macros
%{?systemd_requires}

Times are changing, though, and modern times require a bit of a different approach, especially if you want your package to be ready for inclusion inside a container. To explain it, we need to know what the %{?systemd_requires} macro looks like:

$ rpm --eval %{?systemd_requires}

Requires(pre): systemd 
Requires(post): systemd 
Requires(preun): systemd 
Requires(postun): systemd 

This creates a hard dependency on systemd. In the case of containers, this can be counterproductive as we don’t want to force systemd to be included when it’s not needed. That’s why the %{?systemd_ordering} macro started being used instead:

$ rpm --eval %{?systemd_ordering}

OrderWithRequires(post): systemd 
OrderWithRequires(preun): systemd 
OrderWithRequires(postun): systemd 

OrderWithRequires is similar to the Requires tag but it doesn’t generate actual dependencies. It just supplies ordering hints for calculating the transaction order, but only if the package is present in the same transaction. In the case of systemd it means that if you need systemd to be installed early in the transaction (e.g. creating an installation), this will ensure that it’s ordered early.

Unless you need to explicitly call the systemctl command from the specfile (which you probably don’t because of the %service_* macros that can deal with it), you shouldn’t use %{?systemd_requires} anymore.

Also note, that systemd-rpm-macros has been required by the rpm package for some time, so it’s not necessary to explicitly require it. You can safely omit it unless you are afraid that rpm will drop it in the future, which is highly unlikely.

The last is the BuildRequires, this is needed in cases where your package needs to link against systemd libraries. In this case, you should use:

BuildRequires: pkgconfig(libsystemd)

instead of the older

BuildRequires: pkgconfig(systemd-devel)

as the new variant can help to shorten the build chain in OBS.

Cross-distribution macros

TL;DR

• %leap_version macro is deprecated
• See this table for all distribution macros and their values for specific distros

Commonly, you want to build your package for multiple target distributions. But if you want to support both bleeding-edge Tumbleweed and Leap or SLE, you need to adjust your specfile accordingly. That is why you need to know the distribution version macros.

The best source of information is the table on the openSUSE wiki that will show you the values of these distribution macros for every SLE/openSUSE version. If you want examples on how to identify a specific distro, see this table.

The biggest change between Leap 42 (SLE-12) and Leap 15 (SLE-15) is that %leap_version macro is deprecated. If you want to address e.g. openSUSE Leap 15.2, you should use:

%if 0%{?sle_version} == 150200 && 0%{?is_opensuse}

As you can see, to distinguish specific Leap minor versions, the %sle_version macro is used. The value of %sle_version is %nil in Tumbleweed as it’s not based on SLE.

If you want to identify SLE-15-SP2, you just negate the %is_opensuse macro:

%if 0%{?sle_version} == 150200 && !0%{?is_opensuse}

The current Tumbleweed release (which is changing, obviously) can be identified via:

%if 0%{?suse_version} > 1500

In general, if you want to show the value of these macros on your system, you can do it via rpm --eval macro:

$ rpm --eval %suse_version 
1550

Deprecated macros

TL;DR

These macros are deprecated

• %install_info / %install_info_delete
• %desktop_database_post / %desktop_database_postun
• %icon_theme_cache_post / %icon_theme_cache_postun
• %glib2_gsettings_schema
• %make_jobs (is now known as %cmake_build or %make_build)

If you have been interested in packaging for some time, you probably learned a lot of macros. The bad thing is that some of them shouldn’t be used anymore. In this section, we will cover the most common of them.

Database/cache updating macros

The biggest group of deprecated macros is probably those that called commands for updating databases and caches when new files appeared in specific directory:

• %install_info / %install_info_delete
  • update info/dir entries
• %desktop_database_post / %desktop_database_postun
  • update desktop database cache when .desktop files is added/removed to/from /usr/share/applications
• %icon_theme_cache_post / %icon_theme_cache_postun
  • update the icon cache when icon is added to /usr/share/icons
• %glib2_gsettings_schema
  • compile schemas installed to /usr/share/glib-2.0/schemas

For example, in the past whenever you installed a new .desktop file in your package, you should have called:

%post
%desktop_database_post

%postun
%desktop_database_postun

Since 2017, these macros have started being replaced with file triggers, which is a new feature of RPM 4.13. See File triggers section for more info.

%make_jobs

The %make_jobs macro was initially used in cmake packaging, but was later adopted in a number of other packages, confusingly sometimes with a slightly different definition. To make matters more confusing it also ended up being more complex than the expected /usr/bin/make -jX. Because of this and to bring the macro more inline with other macros such as meson’s, %make_jobs has been replaced with %cmake_build when using cmake and %make_build for all other usages.

In the past, you called: %cmake, %make_jobs, and %cmake_install.

Now it’s more coherent and you call: %cmake, %cmake_build, and %cmake_install when using cmake and just replace %make_jobs with %make_build in other cases.

For completeness, we will add that the naming is also nicely aligned with the meson and automake macros, that are:

%meson, %meson_build, and %meson_install

or

%configure, %make_build, and %make_install.

The %make_jobs macro is still provided by KDE Framework kf5-filesystem package and is used by about 250 Factory packages, but its use is being phased out.

Paths and Tags

Configuration files in /etc and /usr/etc

TL;DR

• /usr/etc will be the new directory for the distribution provided configuration files
• /etc directory will contain configuration files changed by an administrator

Historically, configuration files were always installed in the /etc directory. Then if you edited this configuration file and updated the package, you often ended up with .rpmsave or .rpmnew extra files that you had to solve manually.

Due to this suboptimal situation and mainly because of the need to fulfill new requirements of transactional updates (atomic updates), the handling of configuration files had to be changed.

The new solution is to separate distribution provided configuration (/usr/etc) that is not modifiable and host-specific configuration changed by admins (/etc).

This change of course requires a lot of work. First, the applications per se need to be adjusted to read the configuration from multiple locations rather than just good old /etc and there are of course a lot of packaging changes needed as well. There are 3 variants of how to implement the change within packaging and you as a packager should choose one that fits the best for your package.

Also, there is a new RPM macro that refers to the /usr/etc location:

%_distconfdir  /usr/etc

Group: tag

TL;DR

• Group: tag is optional now

Maybe you noticed a wild discussion about removing Group: tag that hit the opensuse-factory mailing list in Fall 2019. It aroused emotions to such an extent that the openSUSE Board had to step in and helped to resolve this conflict.

They decided that including groups in spec files should be optional with the final decision resting with the maintainer.

News in RPM

RPM minor version updates are released approximately once every two years and they always bring lots of interesting news that will make packaging even easier. Sometimes it’s a little harder to put some of these changes into practice as it can mean a lot of work or hundreds of packages or dealing with backward compatibility issues. This is why you should find more information about their current adoption status in openSUSE before you use new features in your packages.

Current SUSE and openSUSE status of rpm package is as follows:

The following paragraphs present a couple of the most interesting features introduced in recent RPM versions.

File Triggers

TL;DR

• File trigger is a scriptlet that gets executed whenever a package installs/removes a file in a specific location
• Used e.g. in Factory for texinfo, glib schemas, mime, icons, and desktop files, so your package doesn’t have to call database/cache updating macros anymore
• Currently (Nov, 2020), zypper doesn’t handle transfiletrigger properly.

RPM 4.13 introduced file triggers, rpm scriptlets that get executed whenever a package installs or removes a file in a specific location (and also if a package with the trigger gets installed/removed).

The main advantage of this concept is that a single package introduces a file trigger and it is then automatically applied to all newly installed/reinstalled packages. So, instead of each package carrying a macro for certain post-processing, the code resides in the package implementing the file trigger and is transparently run everywhere.

The trigger types are:

• filetrigger{in, un, postun}
• transfiletrigger{in, un, postun}

The *in/*un/*postun scriptlets are executed similarly to regular rpm scriptlets, before package installation/uninstallation/after uninstallation, depending on the variant.

The trans* variants get executed once per transaction, after all the packages with files matching the trigger get processed.

Example (Factory shared-mime-info):

%filetriggerin -- %{_datadir}/mime                                                                                                                                              
export PKGSYSTEM_ENABLE_FSYNC=0
%{_bindir}/update-mime-database "%{_datadir}/mime"

This file trigger will update the mime database right after the installation of a package that contains a file under /usr/share/mime. The file trigger will be executed once for each package (no matter how many files in the package match).

File triggers can easily replace database/cache updating macros (like e.g. %icon_theme_cache_post). This approach has been used in Factory since 2017. File triggers are used for processing icons, mime and desktop files, glib schemas, and others.

You probably haven’t noticed this change at all, as in general having these database/cache updating macros in your specfile doesn’t harm anything now. The change has been made in corresponding packages (texinfo, shared-mime-info, desktop-file-utils, glib2) by adding a file trigger while all these old macros are now expanded to command without action. So you can safely remove them from your specfiles.

! IMPORTANT ! Currently (Nov, 2020), zypper doesn’t handle transfiletrigger properly. If there is a %transfiletrigger and a %post scriptlet in the transaction, then zypper will only call the scriptlet and not your %transfiletrigger. See more information in Bug#1041742.

%autopatch and %autosetup

TL;DR

• Use %autopatch to automatically apply all patches in the spec file
• Use %autosetup to automatically run %setup and %autopatch

The old and classic way to apply patches was:

Patch1:     	openssl-1.1.0-no-html.patch
Patch2:     	openssl-truststore.patch
Patch3:     	openssl-pkgconfig.patch

%prep
%setup -q
%patch1 -p1
%patch2 -p1
%patch3 -p1

With the recent RPM, you can use %autosetup and %autopatch macros to automate source unpacking and patch application. There is no need to specify each patch by name.

%autopatch applies all patches from the spec. The disadvantage is that it’s not natively usable with conditional patches or patches with differing fuzz levels.

Example (Factory openssl-1_1.spec):

Patch1:     	openssl-1.1.0-no-html.patch
Patch2:     	openssl-truststore.patch
Patch3:     	openssl-pkgconfig.patch

%prep
%setup -q
%autopatch -p1 

The -p option controls the patch level passed to the patch program.

The most powerful is the %autosetup macro that combines %setup and %autopatch so that it can unpack the tarball and apply the patchset in one command.

%autosetup accepts virtually the same arguments as %setup except for:

• -v for verbose source unpacking, the quiet mode is the default, so -q is not applicable
• -N disables automatic patch application. The patches can be later applied manually using %patch or with %autopatch. It comes in handy in cases where some kind of preprocessing is needed on the upstream sources before applying the patches.
• -S specifies a VCS to use in the build directory. Supported are for example git, hg, or quilt. The default is patch, where the patches are simply applied in the directory using patch. Setting git will create a git repository within the build directory with each patch represented as a git commit, which can be useful e.g. for bisecting the patches

So the simplest patch application using %autosetup will look like this.

Example (Factory openssl-1_1):

Patch1:     	openssl-1.1.0-no-html.patch
Patch2:     	openssl-truststore.patch
Patch3:     	openssl-pkgconfig.patch

%prep
%autosetup -p1

%patchlist and %sourcelist

TL;DR

• Use %patchlist section directive for marking a plain list of patches
• Use %sourcelist section directive for marking a plain list of sources
• Then use %autosetup instead of %setup and %patch<number>

These are new spec file sections for declaring patches and sources with minimal boilerplate. They’re intended to be used in conjunction with %autopatch or %autosetup.

Example - normal way (Factory openssl-1_1):

Source:     	https://www.%{_rname}.org/source/%{_rname}-%{version}.tar.gz
Source2:    	baselibs.conf
Source3:    	https://www.%{_rname}.org/source/%{_rname}-%{version}.tar.gz.asc
Source4:    	%{_rname}.keyring
Source5:    	showciphers.c

Patch1:     	openssl-1.1.0-no-html.patch
Patch2:     	openssl-truststore.patch
Patch3:     	openssl-pkgconfig.patch

%prep
%autosetup -p1

The files need to be tagged with numbers, so adding a patch in the middle of a series requires renumbering all the consecutive tags.

Example - with %sourcelist/%patchlist:

%sourcelist
https://www.%{_rname}.org/source/%{_rname}-%{version}.tar.gz
baselibs.conf
https://www.%{_rname}.org/source/%{_rname}-%{version}.tar.gz.asc
%{_rname}.keyring
showciphers.c

%patchlist
openssl-1.1.0-no-html.patch
openssl-truststore.patch
openssl-pkgconfig.patch

%prep
%autosetup -p1

Here the source files don’t need any tagging. The patches are then applied by %autopatch in the same order as listed in the section. The disadvantage is that it’s not possible to refer to the sources by %{SOURCE} macros or to apply the patches conditionally.

%elif

TL;DR

• RPM now supports %elif, %elifos and %elifarch

After 22 years of development, RPM 4.15 finally implemented %elif. It’s now possible to simplify conditions which were only possible with another %if and %else pair.

Example Using %if and %else only (Java:packages/ant):

%if %{with junit}                                                                                                                                                               	 
%description 
This package contains optional JUnit tasks for Apache Ant.

%else
  %if %{with junit5}

%description
This package contains optional JUnit5 tasks for Apache Ant.

  %else

%description
Apache Ant is a Java-based build tool.

  %endif
%endif

Example Using %elif:

%if %{with junit}                                                                                                                                                               	 
%description
This package contains optional JUnit tasks for Apache Ant.

%elif %{with junit5}

%description
This package contains optional JUnit5 tasks for Apache Ant.

%else

%description
Apache Ant is a Java-based build tool.

%endif

The else if versions were implemented also for %ifos (%elifos) and %ifarch (%elifarch).

Boolean dependencies

TL;DR

• Factory now supports boolean dependency operators that allow rich dependencies
• Example: Requires: (sles-release or openSUSE-release)

RPM 4.13 introduced support for boolean dependencies (also called “rich dependencies”). These expressions are usable in all dependency tags except Provides. This includes Requires, Recommends, Suggests, Supplements, Enhances, and Conflicts. Boolean expressions are always enclosed with parentheses. The dependency string can contain package names, comparison, and version description.

How does it help? It greatly simplifies conditional dependencies.

Practical example:

Your package needs either of two packages pack1 or pack2 to work. Until recently, there wasn’t an elegant way to express this kind of dependency in RPM.

The idiomatic way was to introduce a new capability, which both pack1 and pack2 would provide, and which can then be required from your package.

Both pack1 and pack2 packages would need adding:

Provides:    pack-capability 	

And your package would require this capability:

Requires:    pack-capability 	

So in order to require one of a set of packages, you had to modify each of them to introduce the new capability. That was a lot of extra effort and might not have always been possible.

Nowadays, using boolean dependencies, you can just simply add

Requires:    (pack1 or pack2)                                                                                                                                                        

to your package and everything will work as expected, no need to touch any other package.

The following boolean operators were introduced in RPM 4.13. Any set of available packages can match the requirements.

• and
  • all operands must be met
  • Conflicts: (pack1 >= 1.1 and pack2)
• or
  • one of the operands must be met
  • Requires: (sles-release or openSUSE-release)
  • The package requires (at least one of) sles-release, openSUSE-release
• if
  • the first operand must be met if the second is fulfilled
  • Requires: (grub2-snapper-plugin if snapper)
• if-else
  • same as if above, plus requires the third operand to be met if the second one isn’t fulfilled
  • Requires: (subpack1 if pack1 else pack2)

RPM 4.14 added operators that work on single packages. Unlike the operators above, there must be a single package that fulfills all the operands

• with
  • similar to and, both conditions need to be met
  • BuildRequires: (python3-prometheus_client >= 0.4.0 with python3-prometheus_client < 0.9.0)
  • The python3-prometheus_client must be in the range <0.4.0, 0.9.0)
• without
  • the first operand needs to be met, the second must not
  • Conflicts: (python2 without python2_split_startup)
• unless
  • the first operand must be met if the second is not
  • Conflicts: (pack1 unless pack2)
• unless-else
  • same as unless above, plus requires the third operand to be met if the second isn’t fulfilled
  • Conflicts: (pack1 unless pack2 else pack3)

The operands can be nested. They need to be surrounded by parentheses, except for chains of and or or operators.

Examples:

Recommends: (gdm or lightdm or sddm)
Requires: ((pack1) or (pack2 without func2))

Until recently, Factory only allowed boolean dependencies in Recommends/Suggests (aka soft dependencies), as it would have otherwise caused issues when doing zypper dup from older distros. Now all operators above are supported.

%license

TL;DR

• Pack license files via %license directive, not %doc

A %license directive was added to RPM in 4.11.0 (2013) but openSUSE and other distributions adopted it later, in 2016. The main reason for it is to allow easy separation of licenses from normal documentation. Before this directive, license texts used to be marked with the %doc directive, that managed copying of the license to the %_defaultdocdir (/usr/share/doc/packages). With %license, it’s nicely separated as is copied to %_defaultlicensedir (/usr/share/licenses).

That’s also useful for limited systems (e.g. containers), which are built without doc files, but still need to ship package licenses for legal reasons.

Example:

%files
%license LICENSE COPYING
%doc NEWS README.SUSE

The license files are annotated in the rpm, which allows a search for the license files of a specific package:

$ rpm -qL sudo
/usr/share/licenses/sudo/LICENSE

OBS

New osc options

The osc command-line tool received several new features as well. Let’s have a quick look at the most interesting changes.

osc maintained –version

New --version option prints versions of the maintained package in each codestream, which is very useful e.g. when you want to find out which codestreams are affected by a specific issue. The only problem is that it’s not very reliable yet - sometimes it prints just “unknown”.

$ osc maintained --version sudo
openSUSE:Leap:15.1:Update/sudo (version: unknown)
openSUSE:Leap:15.2:Update/sudo (version: 1.8.22)

osc request –incoming

New --incoming option for request command shows only requests/reviews where the project is the target.

Example List all incoming request in the new or review state for Base:System project:

$ osc request list Base:System --incoming -s new,review

osc browse

Sometimes it’s just easier to watch the build status or build log in OBS GUI than via osc. With this new option, you can easily open specific packages in your browser. Just run:

$ osc browse [PROJECT [PACKAGE]

If you run it without any parameters, it will open the package in your current working directory.

Delete requests for entire projects

This is not something you want to call every day. But if you need to delete the entire project with all packages inside, you can just call:

$ osc deletereq PROJECT --all

Real names in changelogs

This is a change you probably noticed. If you create a changelog entry via osc vc, it adds not just your email to the changelog entry header but also your full name.

rdiff and diff enhancements

Also, the rdiff subcommand comes with new options. Probably the most useful is rdiff --issues-only that instead of printing the whole diff, shows just a list of fixed (mentioned really) issues (bugs, CVEs, Jiras):

Example osc rdiff --issues-only:

# osc rdiff -c 124 --issues-only openSUSE:Factory/gnutls      
CVE-2020-13777
boo#1171565
boo#1172461
boo#1172506
boo#1172663

More new options were added for the osc diff command. The first is --unexpand that performs a local diff, ignoring linked package sources. The second is diff --meta that performs a diff only on meta files.

osc blame

osc finally comes with a blame command that you probably know from git. It shows who last modified each line of a tracked file.

It uses the same invocation as osc cat:

$ osc blame <file>
$ osc blame <project> <package> <file>

The drawback is that it shows the user who checked in the revision, such as the person who accepted the submission, not its actual author. But it also shows the revision number in the first column, so you can easily show the specific revision with the original author.

Example:

# osc blame openssl-fips-DH_selftest_shared_secret_KAT.patch
[...]
   2 (jsikes       2020-09-17 10:51:27    62) +
   5 (jsikes       2020-09-22 19:07:01    63) +    if ((len = DH_compute_key(shared_secret, dh->pub_key, dh)) == -1)
   2 (jsikes       2020-09-17 10:51:27    64) +        goto err;
   2 (jsikes       2020-09-17 10:51:27    65) +
[...]

Let’s say we’re interested in line 63, where DH_compute_key() is called. It was last changed in revision 5, so we’ll examine that revision:

> osc log -r 5
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
r5 | jsikes | 2020-09-22 17:07:01 | 16a582f1397aa14674261a54c74056ce | unknown | rq227064

Fix a porting bug in openssl-fips-DH_selftest_shared_secret_KAT.patch
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

The change was created by request 227064, so we can finally find the author of the actual code:

$ osc rq show -b 227064
227064  State:accepted   By:jsikes       When:2020-09-22T17:07:07
        submit:          
        From: Request created: vitezslav_cizek -> Request got accepted: jsikes
        Descr: Fix a porting bug in openssl-fips-
               DH_selftest_shared_secret_KAT.patch

You can also blame the meta files and show the author of each line of the meta file, where it shows the author, as the metadata is edited directly.

$ osc meta pkg <project> <package> --blame

Please note that it works on project and package metadata but it doesn’t work on attributes.

osc comment

osc allows you to work with comments on projects, packages, and requests from the command line. That’s particularly useful for writing bots and other automatic handling.

• osc comment list
  • Prints comments for a project, package, or a request.
• osc comment create
  • Adds a new top-level comment, or using the -p option, a reply to an existing one.
• osc comment delete
  • Removes a comment with the given ID.

Examining workers and constraints

osc checkconstraints

When you have a package that has special build constraints, you might be curious about how many OBS workers are able to build it. osc checkconstraints does exactly that.

It can either print the list of matching workers

$ osc checkconstraints LibreOffice:Factory libreoffice openSUSE_Tumbleweed x86_64
Worker     	 
------     	 
x86_64:cloud137:1
x86_64:cloud138:1
x86_64:goat01:1
x86_64:goat01:2
[...]

or even a per-repo summary (when called from a package checkout):

$ osc checkconstraints
Repository            	Arch                  	Worker
----------            	----                  	------
openSUSE_Tumbleweed   	x86_64                	94
openSUSE_Factory_zSystems  s390x                   	18
[...]

osc workerinfo

This command prints out detailed information about the worker’s hardware, which can be useful when searching for proper build constraints.

Example:

$ osc workerinfo x86_64:goat01:1

It will print lamb51's kernel version, CPU flags, amount of CPUs, and available memory and disk space.

Multibuild

TL;DR

• Multibuild is an OBS feature that allows you to build the same spec file with different flavors (e.g. once with GUI and then without GUI)

multibuild is an OBS feature introduced in OBS 2.8 (2017) that offers the ability to build the same source in the same repo with different flavors. Such a spec file is easier to maintain than separate spec files for each flavor.

The flavors are defined in a _multibuild xml file in the package source directory. In addition to the normal package, each of the specified flavors will be built for each repository and architecture.

Example of a _multibuild file (from Factory python-pbr):

<multibuild>
  <package>test</package>
</multibuild>

Here OBS will build the regular python-pbr package and additionally the test flavored RPM. Users can then distinguish the different flavors in spec using and perform corresponding actions (adjusting BuildRequires, package names/descriptions, turning on additional build switches, etc.).

Here we can see, that an additional flavor is getting built:

$ osc r -r standard -a x86_64
standard         	x86_64 	python-pbr                 	succeeded
standard         	x86_64 	python-pbr:test            	succeeded

Example of spec file usage (python-pbr again):

%global flavor @BUILD_FLAVOR@%{nil}
%if "%{flavor}" == "test"
%define psuffix -test
%bcond_without test
%else
%define psuffix %{nil}
%bcond_with test
%endif
Name:       	python-pbr%{psuffix}

First, the spec defines a flavor macro as the value it got from OBS. Then it branches the spec depending on the flavor value. It sets a name suffix for the test flavor and defines a build conditional for easier further handling in the build and install sections.

If you need inspiration for your package, you can have a look at the following packages:

python39, libssh, python-pbr, or glibc.

Oldies

TL;DR

• PreReq is now Requires(pre)
• Use /run, not /var/run
• /bin, /sbin, /lib and /lib64 were merged into their counterpart directories under /usr
• SysV is dead, use systemd

We realize that the changes described below are very, very, VERY old. But we put this section here anyway as we are still seeing it in some spec files from time to time. So let’s take it quickly.

PreReq → Requires(pre)

PreReq is not used anymore, it was deprecated and remapped to Requires(pre) in RPM 4.8.0 (2010).

/var/run → /run

Since openSUSE 12.2 (2012), /run directory was top-leveled as it was agreed across the distributions, that it doesn’t belong under /var. It’s still symlinked for backward compatibility but you should definitely use /run (%_rundir macro).

/usr Merge

/usr Merge was a big step in the history of all Linux distributions that helped to improve compatibility with other Unixes/Linuxes, GNU build systems or general upstream development.

In short, it aimed to merge and move content from /bin, /sbin, /lib and /lib64 into their counterpart directories under /usr (and creating backward compatibility symbolic links of course). In openSUSE it happened around 2012.

SysV is dead

The only excuse for missing the fact that SysV is dead is just that you’ve been in cryogenic hibernation for the last 10 years. If yes, then it’s the year 2020 and since openSUSE 12.3 (2013) we use systemd.

Automatic tools for cleaning

TL;DR

• Call spec-cleaner -i mypackage.spec to clean your specfile according to the openSUSE style guide.
• Call rpmlint mypackage.rpm or inspect the rpmlint report generated after the OBS build for common packaging errors/warnings.

If you read as far as here, you are probably a bit overwhelmed with all these new things in packaging. Maybe you ask yourself how you should remember all of it or more importantly, how you should keep all your maintained packages consistent with all these changes. We have good news for you. There are automated tools for it.

spec-cleaner

spec-cleaner is a tool that cleans the RPM spec file according to the style guide. It can put the lines in the right order, transform hardcoded paths with the correct macros, and mainly replace all old macros with new ones. And it can do much more.

It’s also very easy to use it, just call

$ spec-cleaner -i mypackage.spec

for applying all changes inline directly to your spec file.

If you just want to watch the diff of the changes that spec-cleaner would make, call:

$ spec-cleaner -d mypackage.spec 

rpmlint

Another tool that will help you keep your package in a good shape is rpmlint. It checks common errors in RPM packages and specfiles. It can find file duplicates, check that binaries are in the proper location, keep an eye on correct libraries, systemd, tmpfiles packaging and much more. Inspecting your package from top to bottom, it reports any error or warning.

rpmlint runs automatically during the OBS build so it can fail the whole build if there are serious problems. It works as a tool for enforcing specific standards in packages built within OBS. If you want to run it on your own, call:

$ rpmlint mypackage.rpm

Both spec-cleaner and rpmlint implement the new packaging changes and new rules as soon as possible. But it’s possible that maintainers may miss something. In that case, feel free to report it as an issue on their github.

Acknowledgment

Thanks, Simon Lees, Tomáš Chvátal, and Dominique Leuenberger for suggestions, corrections, and proofreading.

For years openSUSE has meant more than one distribution. With the recent addition of Kubic and MicroOS to the Leap & Tumbleweed family, different package sets, release models and workflows can be difficult to keep tabs on. openSUSE’s ecosystem is in full blossom, but even jungles sometimes need a clearing.

This is why a group of volunteers has taken up the task of improving the learning experience for all users – regardless of their experience and expertise. For new users, we want to make sure they can identify what best fits their needs, get the right tools and seamlessly take over from the post-installation screen. For experienced users, we want to provide them with detailed documentation that is easy to update, so that their experience and expertise can benefit others.

We believe that from engineers to end-users, everyone deserves to have confidence not only in their OS, but in the way they’re using it. A chain of trust like this is made of a user-friendly documentation where technical details are balanced with evidence-based good practices.

It is with this goal in sight that we are calling the community for more volunteers. We are already set on course but the journey will be quicker – and funnier – with you. Any help is welcome, especially for:

• writing, editing and peer-reviewing: We would be delighted to benefit from more knowledgeable people to help us refresh, deepen and harmonize openSUSE’s wikis and other documentation platforms

• video editing: Our video staff is looking for people interested in producing video contents and / or willing to script and record video tutorials in English

• testing: We need more people to help us test out already known work-flows and settings on new hardware, see if what used to be recommended still should be.

So now you can’t say you didn’t know. Do reach out and come with us shape the future of the openSUSE learning experience! You can find us on the following platforms:

• Telegram group: https://t.me/opensuse_docs

• IRC bridge: https://matrix.to/#/#docs:opensuse.org

• Discord bridge: https://disboard.org/fr/server/366985425371398146 then Contributing > docs

• mailing list: https://lists.opensuse.org/opensuse-doc/

Last but not least: this is part of a collective effort so we are happy to relay to you that get.opensuse.org – the future entry-point to the openSUSE web platforms – is also looking for volunteers. Their goal is to deploy by November and they are still looking for committers to the repo at GitHub as well as translators. Translation tasks can be picked up at http://l10n.opensuse.org. Everyone interested is welcome to get in touch with Stasiek Michalski for details.

Looking forward to meeting you!

El mundo de los plasmoides es muy variado, siendo mis favoritos aquellos que combinan ofrecer información extra con poner al servicio del usuario funcionalidades. De esta forma, me complace presentaros Display Screen Profile Switcher, el plasmoide de KDE número de 160 de la serie que nos informa sobre qué configuración hemos seleccionado para el monitor externo y nos permite cambiarlo con un simple click.

Display Screen Profile Switcher – Plasmoides de KDE (160)

Cada vez es más habitual conectar nuestros portátiles a todo tipo de pantallas externas: proyectores, televisores, monitores complementarios, etc. Eso requiere que nuestro sistema reconozca esa pantalla y que nos deje seleccionar el tipo de configuración deseada.

Afortunadamente los sistemas operativos GNU/Linux han adelantado mucho respecto a este aspecto, teniendo el escritorio Plasma de la Comunidad KDE incluso teclas de acceso rápido e información en pantalla para realizar estas acciones.

No obstante, nunca está de más tener otras opciones que se ajusten a otro tipo de usuario. Hoy os presento, Display Screen Profile Switcher una creación de MAKG que nos proporciona un applet para el escritorio Plasma para cambiar la configuración de la pantalla.

En otras palabras, podemos cambiar fácilmente entre configuraciones de monitor simple y doble o cambiar la pantalla a TV a voluntad.

Su funcionamiento es muy sencillo:

1. Abrir la configuración del plasmoide.
2. Haz clic en «Crear perfil de la configuración actual», edita su nombre
3. Ir a la configuración de la pantalla de KDE en la configuración del sistema y cambiar la configuración del monitor
4. Volver a la configuración del plasmoide y añadir otro perfil
5. Ahora puedes cambiar entre los perfiles haciendo clic en sus nombres

Y como siempre digo, si os gusta el plasmoide podéis “pagarlo” de muchas formas en la nueva página de KDE Store, que estoy seguro que el desarrollador lo agradecerá: puntúale positivamente, hazle un comentario en la página o realiza una donación. Ayudar al desarrollo del Software Libre también se hace simplemente dando las gracias, ayuda mucho más de lo que os podéis imaginar, recordad la campaña I love Free Software Day 2017 de la Free Software Foundation donde se nos recordaba esta forma tan sencilla de colaborar con el gran proyecto del Software Libre y que en el blog dedicamos un artículo.

Más información: KDE Store

¿Qué son los plasmoides?

Para los no iniciados en el blog, quizás la palabra plasmoide le suene un poco rara pero no es mas que el nombre que reciben los widgets para el escritorio Plasma de KDE.

En otras palabras, los plasmoides no son más que pequeñas aplicaciones que puestas sobre el escritorio o sobre una de las barras de tareas del mismo aumentan las funcionalidades del mismo o simplemente lo decoran.

Finalizado el verano y ya tenemos disponible el vigésimo número de la revista digital SoloLinux la cual, como siempre, podéis leer online o descargar para poder disfrutar en vuestro lugar de vacaciones si tenéis una conexión de internet limitada.

Disponible el vigésimo número de la revista digital SoloLinux

La introducción es repetitiva, pero es que es interesante hacer un poco de historia. Hubo un tiempo en que las revistas sobre Linux digitales estuvieron de moda. Tenemos todavía publicándose Atix y Full Circle Magazine (en inglés, gracias Vampiro Nocturno), pero antes teníamos a Linux+, Papirux, Begins o TuxInfo, por citar algunas discontinuadas.

Desde hace un tiempo una revista digital SoloLinux tiene su entrada mensual en el blog, tener todas las alternativas posibles para compartir conocimiento es algo que caracteriza al Conocimiento Libre

«Parece que cada mes los días pasan más rápido, será porque nos vamos adaptando a la nueva situación mundial, no lo sé. Lo único que puedo afirmar, es que hoy día 1 de septiembre del 2020 sale el nuevo número de la revista, y ya es el 20..«

Más información: Revista Sololinux N20

Así que, ya tenemos disponible el vigésimo número de la revistas digital SoloLinux, el cual llega cargado de contenidos y con el siguiente índice.

La revista puede ser descargada o simplemente visualizarla en línea, ya que se cuelga en diferente servicios como Calameo. A continuación os dejo los enlaces de descarga y visualización directa de todos los números publicados hasta la fecha.

Por cierto, ¡en la página 38 podréis ver el primer anuncio de Akademy-es 2020!

Además, recordar que desde el número anterior se ha abierto el canal oficial sololinux.es de Telegram: https://t.me/sololinux_es

Evidentemente, este proyecto no se centra en exclusivo a los contenidos de su web y está abierto a colaboraciones de todo tipo. De esta forma si estas interesado en insertar publicidad en nuestra revista, o quieres que publiquemos algún articulo que hayas escrito tu mismo, puedes contactar con «Adrián» por correo electrónico: adrian @ sololinux. com

Muchos ánimos en este proyecto que ya parecer estar consolidad y que que facilita la difusión del Software Libre de una forma que ya no es tan habitual en estos tiempos pero que es igual de válida y necesaria en algunas ocasiones.

Hoy toca entrada recurrente ya que llegamos a la actualización mensual de rigor que demuestra que los desarrolladores de KDE no dejan de trabajar. Así que se congratulan en anunciar la actualización de octubre del 2020 de KDE Frameworks.  Con esta se llega a la versión 5.75, un suma y sigue de compromiso y constancia que no parece que tenga un final cercano.

Actualización de octubre del 2020 de KDE Frameworks

A pesar de que para los usuarios corrientes esta noticia sea algo confusa ya que no se trata de realzar una nueva aplicación ni de una nueva gran funcionalidad del escritorio, el desarrollo de KDE Frameworks tiene repercusiones directas en él a medio y largo plazo.

La razón de esta afirmación es que KDE Frameworks es básicamente la base de trabajo de los desarrolladores para realizar sus aplicaciones, es como el papel y las herramientas de dibujo para un artista: cuanto mejor sea el papel y mejores pinceles tenga, la creación de una artista será mejor.

De esta forma, las mejoras en KDE Frameworks facilitan el desarrollo del Software de la Comunidad KDE, haciendo que su funcionamiento, su estabilidad y su integración sea la mejor posible.

El pasado sábado 10 de octubre de 2020 fue lanzado KDE Frameworks 5.75, la nueva revisión del entorno de programación sobre el que se asienta Plasma 5, el escritorio GNU/Linux de la Comunidad KDE, y las aplicaciones que se crean con para él.

Hay que recordar que los desarrolladores de KDE decidieron lanzar actualizaciones mensuales de este proyecto y lo están cumpliendo con puntualmente. La idea es ofrecer pocas pero consolidadas novedades, a la vez que se mantiene el proyecto evolucionando y siempre adaptándose al vertiginoso mundo del Software Libre.

Una gran noticia para la Comunidad KDE que demuestra la evolución continua del proyecto que continua ganando prestigio en el mundo de los entornos de trabajo Libres.

Más información: KDE

¿Qué es KDE Frameworks?

Para los que no lo sepan, KDE Frameworks añade más de 70 librerías a Qt que proporcionan una gran variedad de funcionalidades necesarias y comunes, precisadas por los desarrolladores, testeadas por aplicaciones especí­ficas y publicadas bajo licencias flexibles. Como he comentado, este entorno de programación es la base para el desarrollo tanto de las nuevas aplicaciones KDE y del escritorio Plasma 5.

Aquí podéis encontrar un listado con todos estos frameworks y la serie de artículos que dedico a KDE Frameworks en el blog,

Recuerda que puedes ver una introducción a Frameworks 5.0 en su anuncio de lanzamiento.

openSUSE dan LibreOffice menggabungkan konferensi tahunannya pada tahun 2020. Konferensi bersama ini digabungkan untuk merayakan 10 tahun Proyek LibreOffice dan 15 tahun Proyek openSUSE. Acara semula akan diselenggarakan di Nuremberg, Jerman. Namun karena situasi pandemi, acara bergeser menjadi sebuah acara daring yang akan berlokasi di https://oslo.gonogo.live. Pendaftaran di https://oslo.gonogo.live diperlukan untuk berpartisipasi dalam acara ini. Tanggal konferensi telah dijadwalkan ulang menjadi 15 – 17 Oktober 2020. Konferensi ini adalah acara komunitas yang bebas dan terbuka. Jadwal lengkap konferensi dapat dilihat pada tautan https://events.opensuse.org/conferences/oSLO/schedule. Harap perhatikan bahwa waktu yang tertera adalah UTC.

Beberapa pembicara dari Indonesia turut meramaikan openSUSE + LibreOffice Virtual Conference tahun ini, antara lain:

1. Kuliax: Is GNU/Linux distribution for higher education still relevant? oleh Iwan Setiawan
2. Podman on Kubernetes Cluster Production Grade – Kubernetes on Hard Way oleh Estu Fardani
3. Building Upstream Contribution in Local FOSS Community – Based on openSUSE and LibreOffice Community in Indonesia oleh Kukuh Syafaat
4. IT Risk Management Based on ISO 31000 and OWASP Framework using OSINT (Case Study: Election Commission of X City) oleh Anak Agung Bagus Arya Wiradarma

Tumbleweed es una distribución “Rolling Release” de actualización contínua. Aquí puedes estar al tanto de las últimas novedades.

openSUSE Tumbleweed es la versión “rolling release” o de actualización continua de la distribución de GNU/Linux openSUSE.

Hagamos un repaso a las novedades que han llegado hasta los repositorios estas semanas.

El anuncio original lo puedes leer en el blog de Dominique Leuenberger, publicado bajo licencia CC-by-sa, en este enlace:

• http://dominique.leuenberger.net/blog/2020/10/opensuse-tumbleweed-review-of-the-week-2020-41/

Después de un largo periodo de integración, finalmente se ha incluido glibc 2.32 durante esta semana 41. Pero ha habido más actualizaciones en las 4 snapshots publicadas (1002, 1004, 1005, y 1007).

Los cambios más notables:

• systemd 246.6
• virt-manager 3.1.0
• Mozilla Thunderbird 78.3.1
• Linux kernel 5.8.12
• glibc 2.32
• SELinux 3.1
• bison 3.7.2
• gettext 0.21

Pero muchas otras actualizaciones esperan para ser incluidas en próximas snapshots. Por ejemplo:

• Mozilla Firefox 81.0.1
• GNOME 3.36.7
• GNOME 3.38.1
• Mesa 20.2
• openssl 1.1.1h
• KDE Plasma 5.20
• openssl 3.0
• RPM 4.16

Si quieres estar a la última con software actualizado y probado utiliza openSUSE Tumbleweed la opción rolling release de la distribución de GNU/Linux openSUSE.

Mantente actualizado y ya sabes: Have a lot of fun!!

Enlaces de interés

• • • ¿Por qué deberías utilizar openSUSE Tumbleweed?
    • zypper dup en Tumbleweed hace todo el trabajo al actualizar
    • ¿Cual es el mejor comando para actualizar Tumbleweed?
    • Comprueba la valoración de las “snapshots” de Tumbleweed
    • ¿Qué es el test openQA?
    • http://download.opensuse.org/tumbleweed/iso/
    • https://es.opensuse.org/Portal:Tumbleweed

——————————–

Dear Tumbleweed users and hackers,

After a lengthy integration period, we have finally merged glibc 2.32 during week 41. Of course, this is not all that happened in the 4 published snapshots (1002, 1004, 1005, and 1007).

The most noteworthy changes were:

• systemd 246.6
• virt-manager 3.1.0
• Mozilla Thunderbird 78.3.1
• Linux kernel 5.8.12
• glibc 2.32
• SELinux 3.1
• bison 3.7.2
• gettext 0.21

With these changes merged, a bit of the backlog has been worked off and the staging projects are a bit relaxed – but not for long: new changes are already in the pipeline. Currently, these things are being worked on:

• Mozilla Firefox 81.0.1
• GNOME 3.36.7 (short-term)
• GNOME 3.38.1 (we still lack mozjs78)
• Mesa 20.2 (Some transparency loss needs to be investigated on Plasma)
• openssl 1.1.1h (1 build fail left, neon (gh#notroj/neon#38)
• KDE Plasma 5.20 (currently beta being tested)
• openssl 3.0 (long-term; no progress in the last few weeks)
• RPM 4.16: quite a bit of build failures detected in the first run. A typical error seen is “%if %_lib == lib64” no longer being valid. Bareword comparison is being blocked and the values need to be quoted.

Hace tiempo que no hablo de relojes en el blog, y es que hace tiempo que los miembros de la Comunidad KDE no nos ofrecen ninguna novedad destacables. No obstante hoy me complace presentaros Aesthetic Clock, el plasmoide de KDE número de 159 de la serie, un reloj que combina una parte digital con otra analógica, lo que lo convierte en una excelente alternativa para nuestro entorno de trabajo.

Aesthetic Clock – Plasmoides de KDE (159)

Por otra parte, es ideal para que los niños pequeños puedan comprobar que saben leer la hora de las dos formas… eso si, necesitaría un par de retoques como añadir la opción de poner los números al círculo.

Además, en la parte inferior nos ofrece la fecha, con lo cual se convierte en un buen reloj para nuestro escritorio.

Aesthetic Clock está inspirado en Clock Widgets de Dinesh Khairate que se puede ver en Dribble.

Y como siempre digo, si os gusta el plasmoide podéis “pagarlo” de muchas formas en la nueva página de KDE Store, que estoy seguro que el desarrollador lo agradecerá: puntúale positivamente, hazle un comentario en la página o realiza una donación. Ayudar al desarrollo del Software Libre también se hace simplemente dando las gracias, ayuda mucho más de lo que os podéis imaginar, recordad la campaña I love Free Software Day 2017 de la Free Software Foundation donde se nos recordaba esta forma tan sencilla de colaborar con el gran proyecto del Software Libre y que en el blog dedicamos un artículo.

Más información: KDE Store

¿Qué son los plasmoides?

Para los no iniciados en el blog, quizás la palabra plasmoide le suene un poco rara pero no es mas que el nombre que reciben los widgets para el escritorio Plasma de KDE.

En otras palabras, los plasmoides no son más que pequeñas aplicaciones que puestas sobre el escritorio o sobre una de las barras de tareas del mismo aumentan las funcionalidades del mismo o simplemente lo decoran.

Pixel Wheels es un clásico juego retro de carreras de coches publicado bajo una licencia de software libre, para disfrutar en PC o dispositivo móvil

También dentro del software libre hay tiempo para distraerse y jugar un poco. De eso quiero escribir hoy, de un juego de carreras de coches llamado Pixel Wheels al que recientemente me he “enganchado”.

Dentro de la comunidad de GNU/Linux y de software libre, es bien conocido el juego Super Tux Kart, un juego de coches con mascotas de proyectos de software libre como protagonistas e intrépidas conductoras a toda velocidad por circuitos vertiginosos.

Pixel Wheels es más modesto en cuanto a gráficos, pero igual de “adictivo” en cuanto a “engancharse” por hacer el mejor tiempo, conseguir la mejor posición o dominar los distintos circuitos.

Hace unos días instalé Pixel Wheels desde f-droid, el repositorio de aplicaciones de software libre para Android, y poco a poco, cuando tengo tiempo libre (que últimamente no es mucho) lo paso echando carreras…

La dinámica es sencilla. Escoges un coche de los disponibles, y seleccionas disputar una carrera o celebrar un campeonato con otros contrincantes. Ves tu coche y el circuito a vista de pájaro. El coche acelera solo y tu debes manejar a derecha e izquierda y también la opción de disparar.

Al igual que en Super Tux Kart, durante el trayecto hay diferentes cajas con sorpresas y bonos. Que si unos misiles, que si una ametralladora, una bomba… con la que interferir a los contrincantes para poder alcanzar la meta en primer lugar.

Una vez instalado, a medida que vamos jugando y practicando, vamos liberando logros. Y así aparecen nuevos coches, nuevos circuitos… y más sorpresas que todavía no he logrado!

Según el desarrollador, el juego está muy lejos de estar terminado. Pero si es totalmente funcional. En cada nueva versión, el desarrollador, va mejorando gráficos, añadiendo nuevos coches y mejorando el juego en otros aspectos.

El desarrollo de la aplicación se hace en GitHub, así que si quieres participar, mejorar, o simplemente leer el código puedes hacerlo.

Reconozco que no soy muy de jugar. Nunca tuve consolas, ni me atrajeron mucho. Pero este juego, que he descubierto hace unos días me ha gustado y es un buen pasatiempo que termina enganchando por su simplicidad de juego, pero su “tensión” durante las carreras.

Por mi parte te invito a descargarlo desde f-droid y probarlo a ver si a ti también te hace más llevaderas los tiempos muertos de esperas… y ten cuidado que engancha!!

Enlaces de interés

• https://agateau.com/projects/pixelwheels/
• https://agateau.itch.io/pixelwheels
• https://f-droid.org/es/packages/com.agateau.tinywheels.android/
• https://github.com/agateau/pixelwheels