Packer is a tool that helps in the creation of packages.
Packages are a great convenience for gurus and new users alike. Thus, users may be less inclined to use software that is not packaged.
This is unfortunate for GNU/Linux software developers since packaging software is a huge pain, especially given the huge variety of packaging formats.
Packer helps to automate this process. Using a text-based wizard, packer can collect all the information regarding a program needed to create a package.
Then, a simple command is all it takes to create a debian directory (used to build debian packages), RPM SPEC files (for Mandriva, SuSE, and Fedora/Red Hat), and autopackages spec files (autopackage is a system for creating distribution-neutral installers with dependency handling).
These files are of a similar quality to hand-crafted ones. Packer can also automatically build the packages themselves if requested.
Usage:
Running packer with no options will start the packer wizard. It will populate the packer directory based on your answer's to the its questions.
It is always possible to relaunch the wizard to make modifications to the package if there were problems with the information originally entered or if a new version of the program being packaged is released.
Running packer with options will create binary and source packages from the information in the packer directory. You may call packer -h to find out the availible options.
What's New in This Release:
· Removed dependency on dynamic content on packages.debian.org (ie it works again)
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