Helpful resources for RPM building

rpm-guide.rst

RPM Building for Dummies

RPM building is a little complicated, but here's a variety of resources and snippets for making things easier.

Links

• Overall RPM guide: <https://rpm-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/rpm-guide.html>
• Macros and shorthand in spec files: <http://ftp.rpm.org/max-rpm/s1-rpm-inside-macros.html>
• SUSE Introduction to RPM packaging: <https://www.suse.com/documentation/suse-best-practices/singlehtml/sbp-rpm-packaging/sbp-rpm-packaging.html>

Commands

Packages to install to get your development environment happy:

yum install -y rpm-build rpmdevtools yum-utils

Set up the RPM development tree in a VM or machine:

rpmdev-setuptree

Start a new specfile and follow the prompts:

rpmdev-newspec

Download all sources within a specfile:

spectool -g -R name.spec

Install the build dependencies within a specfile:

yum-builddep -y name.spec

Build an RPM using a specfile:

rpmbuild -ba name.spec

Check a specfile for problems (requires rpmlint installation):

rpmlint name.spec

Worked examples

• https://github.com/jcu-eresearch/sregex-build
• https://github.com/jcu-eresearch/nginx-custom-build (deprecated, but still useful ideas)