dh-autoreconf7
Debhelper add-on to run autoreconf during build
Overview
The dh-autoreconf package provides a sequence addon for debhelper 7 and is enabled by default since compatibility level 10. For earlier compatibility levels it can be enabled in the following way:
#!/usr/bin/make -f%:dh $@ --with autoreconf
This will call dh_autoreconf prior to dh_auto_configure and will call dh_autoreconf_clean before dh_clean.
For more information on how to control the autoreconf process or how to other possible options, read the dh_autoreconf(1) and dh_autoreconf_clean(1) manual pages.
CDBS integration
This package also provides /usr/share/cdbs/1/rules/autoreconf.mk for packages using CDBS. The variable "DEB_DH_AUTORECONF_ARGS" can be used to pass extra arguments to dh_autoreconf, and the variable "DEB_DH_AUTORECONF_CLEAN_ARGS" to pass arguments to dh_autoreconf_clean. See their manual pages for information on available arguments.
Tips and examples
Patching ltmain.sh for as-needed linker flags
You can add support for -Wl,--as-needed to ltmain.sh (at least for those ltmain.sh scripts changed during autoreconf) by passing the argument --as-needed to dh_autoreconf, as demonstrated in the following example:
override_dh_autoreconf:dh_autoreconf --as-needed
and for CDBS, by adding it to the correct variable such as:
DEB_DH_AUTORECONF_ARGS = --as-neededFor more information about this feature, see dh_autoreconf(1)
Running multiple commands with dh_autoreconf
Please note that you may run dh_autoreconf only once. If you need to run multiple commands, you can put the commands into a script or your debian/rules file and then pass the name of your script to dh_autoreconf. For example, if your script is called debian/autogen.sh, you can put the following into your debian/rules if you use dh:
override_dh_autoreconf:dh_autoreconf debian/autogen.sh
Or, if you use CDBS:
DEB_DH_AUTORECONF_ARGS += debian/autogen.shCaveats
dh_autoreconf is mostly a superset of the dh_update_autotools_config debhelper command included in debhelper since version 9.20160115. When using the dh sequencer, dh_update_autotools_config is run before dh_autoreconf and updates the config.guess and config.sub files. This is required in cases where autoreconf does not update config.guess and config.sub itself.
From time to time, there might be a short breakage for those using automatic ltmain.sh patching, when the patch no longer applies to the ltmain.sh.
You can only run dh_autoreconf once. Future versions may be able to be run multiple times, but this requires slightly more planning.
Releases
8 releases since Debian 6.0 (Squeeze); the text changed 5 times.