Other Help Topics :: Quick And Dirty .dsl Packages

At the request of another member I will tell how I make my .dsl packages. I will be using the example of the xchat dsl that i made. This is how I made that package.

IF YOU JUST WANT THE BASICS SEE THE SECOND POST >>

First decide what you want. Somebody wanted a xchat package so I decided to make that.

1) Enable Apt-Get. It is under App -> Tools -> Enable Apt.
Let that run and now dpkg and Apt-get will work.

2) Now if you want to play it safe and use "woody" packages then you can skip this step. If you want newer and closser to the the current packages you will need to change the apt sources.
A) Open Xterminal and then type

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sudo su

to become root.
B) type

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scite /etc/apt/sources.list

C) remove the # from the line 1 & 3 and add one to line 2
D) save the file and close scite

3) At the terminal type

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apt-get update

4) Now after that type

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apt-get -d install <program you want (eg. xchat)>

That "-d" tells the computer to download the packages and NOT to install the packages.

5) create a directory in your home directory (/home/damnsmall for most) based on the program to be installed (/home/damnsmall/xchat in this example)

6) In the terminal type

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mc[/CODE] to launch midnight commander

7) When the left side is active navigate to /var/cache/apt/archives and on the right go to the folder you made in step 5

8) copy the main program .deb into the folder. (ex. xchat---.deb)

9) run [CODE] dpkg --extract <prog>*.deb ./<prg>

The first <prog> is the name of the package. The * wildcard will take care of that complex verson number. The second ./<prg> argument is the folder that contains the program. abreviate the name just so you can keep the extrated programs seperate (will explain later).

10) Now using midnight commander navigate into the created folder. you will probably see there is a 'usr' and mabye some others. These folder(s) are the same as the linux root tree. 'usr' = /usr 'usr/lib" = /usr/lib. get the picture? Find the program and locate the program executable (probably in the 'usr/bin' directory) and highlight and hit enter to run it from MC.

11) look at the error message. I might say something like

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Error: libabcd123.so.1 not found. Program could not run

This means that the program needs this file and we need to find it. Look in the .deb package for something like "libABcd123-1.2.5-16.deb" that is similar to the package missing.
If you cant find it open up glinks-h and surf to your favorite search engine (www.google.com/linux might be a good bet) and look for the file missing. that might give you some insight in to the package it is included in. Once you found it repeat steps 7 - 11 with each error that pops up. However!, copy the dependecy into the real file system folder (if the extracts creates 'usr'/lib' copy the file to the /usr/lib directory. '/usr/lib'
is your best be on where to put the needed files.

12) If you are reading this after doing 7 - 11 about 15 times and have got a working program, congratulation! your program is almost ready to go.
If you are reading this thinking "No way. Not going to all of that work!" Can't help there.
If you are to this point and nothing works . Put a post in the myDSL forums and someone may have an answer. (most likely you will need to copy everything out of the dependencies except the documentation {wasted space, imho.] like there is an 'etc' foler in the extract you will need to copy those contents to the /etc folder)

13) Now on to packaging the program >>>

Creating the actual DSL file

Ok now that you have figured out the files needed and the program is running (or you skiped the first post) You can now create a .dsl package.

1) In the home directory (/home/damnsmall for expample) create a folder by the name of your package and add dsl at the end (eg. "xchatdsl")

2) Copy all of the program contents from the extracted folders into the new one. For example in the new folder 'prgdsl/usr/lib' copy all of the files from the program and dependencies from each of the '<extract>/usr/lib' into this folder. Do the same for the remaining (<extract>/etc/... & <ext>/usr/bin/... & <ext>/usr/share/... ) to ther respective programs (<pkgdsl>/etc/... & <pkgdsl>/usr/bin/... & <pkg>/usr/share/...). Does this make sense yet?

3) Once all of the program and dependencies are in that folder you are ready to package.

4) Navigate into the <pkgdsl> folder in a terminal.

5) run

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6) you should see something to the effect of

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# ls
etc usr
dam----#

7) if you see that then you are ready to add the final touches.

8) If you want to launch the program from the myDSL menu when you right click then you will need to create a menu file.
A) in the <pkgdsl> directory run:

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mkdir ./var/tmp/mydsl.menu
cd ./var/tmp/mydsl.menu
touch <program name> (ex. xchat)
scite ./<prgname>

b) you now should have scite with a blank slate ready to go.
c) the syntax of the menu file is a follows:

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[exec] (xchat) {/usr/bin/xchat}

d) save the file and exit. You will now be able to run from the menu.

9) Once that is made we are ready to pack.

10) to create the dsl make sure there are no other files but the folders (etc, usr, bin, var, root, you wont have all of the these but folders should be the only thing there.) no '.deb', no '.tar.gz', no files.

11) execute

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tar cvfz <packagenamefordsl>.dsl *

12) you now should have a DSL package ready to go on a live boot. Go and test it out.

Creating Desktop Icons for you DSL packages

Ok so you have a dsl package that works but you want a freaking desktop icon so i looks better.

SIMPLE! Rigt? Sorta.

You will need to repack the dsl (well, yea) but the trick can be the location.
All packages that have desktop icons seem to have an empty /home/damnsmall directory. Actualy there is a hidden '.xtdesktop' folder that most time will not show up. Here is the easy method.

Go to the folder where you packed the dsl (or extract your dsl, its just a renamed tar.gz) and round up an icon.

1) Create the folder

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mkdir ./home/damnsmall/.xtdesktop/
cd ./home/damnsmall/.xtdesktop/

2) Create the lnk file:

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touch <progname>.lnk
scite ./*.lnk

3) In the file put the following

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table Icon
Type: Program
Caption: MSN Messenger
Command: /usr/bin/amsn
Icon: .xtdesktop/amsn.png
X: 50
Y: 450
end

4) Edit the file to suit your needs. The X & Y cordinates are the pixels from the uper left corner the icon will be offset. Match the name of your icon to the one you will copy in.

5) save the file and exit.

6) Now copy in an icon that is either a: .png, .gif, .jpg, or .xpm (correct me if i am wrong here)

7) make sure you have everything and you are ready to go.

8) repack the dsl (watch for stray files. only folders unless the file is needed)

At next boot there should be an icon ready for use on the desktop after enhancing the desktop.

Creating Menu Items in a Submenu

Some people find that their program can do many different things other then just one function. Rather then create multiple entries in the menu you can organize them into a sub menu. to do this just change the syntax of the menu file. Please note the following is a ficticious program.

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[submenu] (ScreenBlast) {}
[exec] (Rockets) {sbrocket}
[exec] (Magnum) {sbgun}
[exec] (Shotgun) {"sbgun --shotgun"}
[exec] (Lazercut) {/usr/share/scrblst/lazer}
[end]

Hope this will make some packages better. And remember that when all else fails, look at some other package.

Thank you so much for taking the time to do this!

Chris

I have a problem that might be very basic. I think I followed the tutorial to the "T". When I try to create the dsl file ig "tar: Cowardly refusing to create an empty archive. I am running the command from the /home/damnsmall/xtet42dsl directory. Is this the wrong place? Thanks

BTW - I am creating a file for xtet42 (tetris) it is very small and doesn't have dependencies. I thought this would be a good program to start with.

Chris

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