cleaner archlinux makepkg

tl;dr makepkg ofte requires to install dependencies ("polluting the system with eversomore packages") this is a way to do this in a container to keep the system "cleaner".

In archlinux packages can be made via PKGBUILD using the makepkg command. This is a great to build modified packages existing in the arch linux package repos (i.e. via ABS arch build system) and also AUR (arch user repos) However a often the this leads to a situation where for building the package further dependencies are required

[alex@thinkbox tmp]$ mkdir abs
[alex@thinkbox tmp]$ cd abs
[alex@thinkbox abs]$ git clone https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/squid
Cloning into 'squid'...
warning: redirecting to https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/squid.git/
remote: Enumerating objects: 593, done.
remote: Counting objects: 100% (79/79), done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (69/69), done.
remote: Total 593 (delta 48), reused 9 (delta 9), pack-reused 514 (from 1)
Receiving objects: 100% (593/593), 89.66 KiB | 2.24 MiB/s, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (292/292), done.
[alex@thinkbox abs]$ cd squid/
[alex@thinkbox squid]$ makepkg
==> ERROR: Cannot find the debugedit binary required for including source files in debug packages.
[alex@thinkbox squid]$

It becomes necessary to install the required dependencies (something that can be done via the --syncdeps flag to makepkg

-s, --syncdeps
Install missing dependencies using pacman. When build-time or run-time dependencies are not found, pacman will try to resolve them. If successful, the missing packages will be downloaded and installed.

which however requires the user to be

1. allowed to install packages
2. accepting/willing to have those new packages installed and potentially bloating the system.

while 2. can be mitigated by removing the instlled packages after the build if desired, i.e. by cleaning up, it yet would be nice to not even have to (even temporarily) installed packages for the only purpose being to be able to build a package. This is paritcular true for makedepends packages which are required only for the build of the package anyway.

What does this repo provide then?

It provides a container setup, a docker/podman compose setup to makepkg build archlinux without polluting your system

How to use

1. if needed install docker-compose (ideally in a rootless way)
2. run docker compose run makepkg https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/<packagename>
3. select if you desire to step in to modify some of the code/build before the build
4. build is run
5. build is done and resulting package can be found in ./packages.build/<packagename>.git/...

example the package unzip

1. compose already setup

[alex@thinkbox docker-makepkg]$ pacman -Q | grep compose
docker-compose 2.27.1-1
podman-compose 1.1.0-2
[alex@thinkbox docker-makepkg]$ type docker-compose
docker-compose is /usr/bin/docker-compose

2. using this repo to build using a container

[alex@thinkbox docker-makepkg]$ docker compose run makepkg https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/unzip.git
args are https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/unzip.git
/packages.build
Cloning into 'unzip.git'...
remote: Enumerating objects: 132, done.
remote: Counting objects: 100% (54/54), done.
remote: Compressing objects: 100% (34/34), done.
remote: Total 132 (delta 39), reused 20 (delta 20), pack-reused 78 (from 1)
Receiving objects: 100% (132/132), 44.88 KiB | 1.18 MiB/s, done.
Resolving deltas: 100% (39/39), done.
modify stuff prior to build?[y/N]==> 

3. determine if that you do not need to do anything (default after 3 seconds)
4. build is run with all required depdencies installed (within the container)
5. as a result we end up with the packages for unzip

[alex@thinkbox docker-makepkg]$ ls -l packages.build/unzip.git/*pkg*tar*
-rw-r--r-- 1 alex alex 145806 Jun 17 06:45 packages.build/unzip.git/unzip-6.0-21-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
-rw-r--r-- 1 alex alex 481896 Jun 17 06:45 packages.build/unzip.git/unzip-debug-6.0-21-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst

Voila we could now install this very package via sudo pacman -U packages.build/unzip.git/unzip-6.0-21-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst