# EPEL-8 Packaging Procedures

## Introduction

When a new Red Hat Enterprise Linux occurs, one of the steps to get

EPEL going for it is branching of various packages into new

namespace. The EPEL Steering Committee does not mass branch all

existing packages into the namespace because it has caused multiple

problems:

1. The package maintainers did not want to support the package in the

newer version of EPEL. Package maintainers may only want to support

certain versions of Enterprise Linux or may want to wait until their

favourite derivative appears.

2. The package does not work in the latest version of RHEL. With

multiple years between releases, software which worked on Fedora 18

which would branch to EPEL-7 may not exist anymore with Fedora 28 and

EPEL-8 would need a completely different version.

## Consumer request for packages

People who are interested in getting packages into EPEL should contact

the package maintainer through

[bugzilla](https://bugzilla.redhat.com/). This allows for the requests

to be tracked and if the primary maintainer is not interested in

branching to EPEL, other ones can step in and do so.

## EPEL Next

EPEL packages are built against RHEL.  EPEL Next is an additional repository

that allows package maintainers to alternatively build against CentOS Stream.

This is sometimes necessary when CentOS Stream contains an upcoming RHEL

library rebase, or if an EPEL package has a minimum version build requirement

that is already in CentOS Stream but not yet in RHEL.  EPEL Next has its own

distgit branches, koji build targets, and bodhi releases.

EPEL Next packages have `.next` appended to the disttag (e.g. a disttag of

`.el8.next` for epel8-next) to provide an upgrade path from an EPEL package

that was built from the same distgit commit.  A package maintainer can rebuild

the same commit for both EPEL and EPEL Next and get two different NVRs in koji.

Within six months, the build requirement necessitating building in EPEL Next

should be in RHEL, and at that time the package maintainer can do a normal

release bump commit in the EPEL branch and get a newer NVR than both the

previous EPEL and EPEL Next packages.

To get started with EPEL Next, request the corresponding branch for the EPEL

release you are targeting, e.g. request an epel8-next branch to rebuild an

epel8 package against CentOS Stream 8.  Once the branch is created you can

merge commits from other branches and submit a build just like you would for

other EPEL or Fedora branches.

## EPEL Playground

EPEL Playground was shut down in January 2022

EPEL 8 Playground was a place that developers and maintainers could 

"play around" with updated, or changed packages in epel. EPEL Playground

never really worked out and ended up being more burden than helpful.

If developers or maintainers want something similar to EPEL Playground 

we recommend Fedora COPR, which has availability for EPEL builds.

## Developer request for branching multiple packages

Branching is handled the same way as requesting a branch using `fedpkg

request-branch`. A maintainer can request an epel8 branch using

`fedpkg request-branch epel8` which will create a ticket in

https://pagure.io/releng/fedora-scm-requests/issues and Release

Engineering will process these requests.

To branch multiple packages please use this or a variant of this

script:

```

#!/usr/bin/sh

# Reminder to get an updated pagure token for releng tickets

# Usage: epel-8.sh foo bar goo blah blech

if [ $# -lt 1 ]

then

    echo "At least one package name should be provided"

else

    TMPDIR=`mktemp -d /tmp/epel8.XXXXXX`

    pushd "$TMPDIR"

    for pkg in "$@"

    do

        fedpkg clone "$pkg"

        pushd "$pkg"

        fedpkg request-branch epel8

	    fedpkg request-branch epel8-playground

        popd

    done

    rm -rfv "$TMPDIR"

fi

```

Releng will then work through the tickets in the system which is

adding branches to the PDC and src.fedoraproject.org.

## Known Issues

1. /usr/bin/python does not exist. Choose ``/usr/bin/python3`` or

``/usr/bin/python2`` and patch appropriately.

2. ``python2-sphinx`` is not shipped. Most packages should work with

python3-sphinx, and if it doesn't please open a bug. The python team

has been good about making fixes for this.

3. When branching python packages, be aware that python in EL-8 is

python36 and not the version currently in rawhide. This has come up

with a couple of test packages where they assumed python37 or later.

4. ``systemd-rpm-macros`` is not a separate packages. If needed, used

``BuildRequires: systemd``

5. While EL-8 comes with platform-python, it should NOT be used in

``Requires:`` unless absolutely neccessary. python3 should be used

instead. (Exceptions can be made but will be rare and need

justification.)

**Accepted Exceptions:**

* Use python3.6dist(coverage) instead of python3-coverage. This

  package is not shipped but is needed in %check code.

6. Sometimes RHEL8 only has a python3 package for a dependency you

need for your build. (Example: python-bleach requires

python2-html5lib, but RHEL8 provides only python3-html5lib). For

EPEL-8.0 we only suggest one choice:

* Choose not to have the python2 part of your package and patch

  whatever to use python3.

7. Python2 packages are discouraged. RHEL-8 will contain python2.7

until probably the end of life of RHEL-7. However support upstream

will only be minimal. When modularity occurs, we suggest that you make

whatever python2 packages modules which can be pulled out when

RHEL-8.N no longer has python2.

8. While a RHEL src.rpm might produce a -devel package, it may not

currently be in the build repository. When running into this please

open a ticket with https://pagure.io/epel/new_issue for us to put in a

request for it to be added to Red Hat's Code Ready Builder. After

modularity is enabled, changes to what is done will be needed.

9. EPEL-8.0 may not work with the RHEL-8.1 beta. There seem to be

changes in dnf and zchunk which we have not worked out. This line will

be updated.

## Definitions

1. Package maintainer. Person who has accepted responsibility to

package and maintain software in the Fedora Project ecosystem. The

main packager is usually someone focused on Fedora Linux, and

secondary packagers may be focused on particular use cases like EPEL.

2. Consumer. A person who has subscribed to EPEL for packages but is

not a maintainer.

3. PDC. Product Definition Center. A tool to help list the lifetime

and permissions that a product has so that branching and updates can

be better managed.