Reproducible Build Manager (rbm) is a tool that helps you create and build packages for multiple linux distributions, and automate the parts that can be automated. It includes options to run the build in a defined environement to allow reproducing the build.

It can be used to create rpm, debian and other types of packages.

Who wants to use rbm ?

There are different use cases for rbm :

easy package creation

You have multiple people in your team working on the developement of your software, and you want them all to be able to build a package from any git or mercurial revision using a simple command.

continuous integration

Automatically build packages for the latest version of you software available in your git or mercurial repository.

multi distro packaging

You want to create packages for your software for different distributions.

regular package maintainance

You maintain a lot of packages for software available in git or mercurial repositories, and you want to avoid the boring tasks of manually creating / downloading tarballs, checking signatures, updating package versions and want to automate as much as possible.

Main features

tarball creation

Create tarballs for your software using a simple command and a git or mercurial revision.

automatic verification of gpg signatures

If your git commits or git tags are gpg signed, the signature can be automatically checked using a specified keyring.

package creation

Create binary or source packages from any git or mercurial revision using a simple command.

remote builds

Build your software on a remote server with ssh, or in a local chroot using a different OS. For instance if you are using rbm on an rpm based distribution, this allows you to build debian packages from the same workspace, using a Debian chroot.

customizable

Almost everything rbm do can be changed using some optional settings, globally, or for some selected projects or OSs.

simple configuration

The configuration is done using simple YAML files.

a flexible configuration system

All settings can be set globally, per workspace, project, or target operating system.

a dynamic configuration system

All configuration settings are templates. You can reuse other configuration settings, or the output of some commands in those settings. For instance, the version number of your software can be set using a command to grep the README file in your sources tree.

extensible in perl

While the configuration is usually done in simple YAML, you can also in the same configuration file use perl to define any of the options. Those options can be defined by a perl function that will be executed when the option is queried, and whose return value will be used as the option value.

Documentation

All documentation is also available as man pages.

rbm commands :

Download and installation

The recommanded way to use rbm to build your project is to use it as a git submodule so you can pick the commit to use.

Examples

You can look at the Tor Browser build repository for an example of how it can be used.

License

rbm is public domain or CC0. Click here for legal code.

Contact

You can email me for any question about rbm.

TODO

There is a list of things that are already planned for future versions of rbm. You can see it on this page.

You can also view the changelog here.