% README.debian 2026-03-26
% Tested on Ubuntu 24.04 LTS
% vim: set ts=4 sw=4 et :

(Note for normal building of zint on Debian systems, see "README.linux".)

This is the README for the "debian" directory that is included to enable creating a local Debian dpkg ".deb" file.

(The official Debian package is at https://salsa.debian.org/debian/zint)

Prerequisites are being on a Debian-based Linux system and the usual stuff for building zint (see "README.linux").

To create a local package, first clone the latest source:

    git clone https://git.code.sf.net/p/zint/code zint

Then create an archive:

    cd zint
    git archive -o /tmp/zint.tar.gz HEAD
    cd ..

Create a new directory (it doesn't matter where):

    mkdir zint-deb

Then untar the source archive into a sub-directory of the new directory:

    cd zint-deb
    mkdir zint-2.16.0.9-src
    cd zint-2.16.0.9-src
    tar xf /tmp/zint.tar.gz
    cd ..
    tar cvzf zint_2.16.0.9.orig.tar.gz zint-2.16.0.9-src

Note the very specific naming of the tarball and the use of an underscore: "zint_<ver>.orig.tar.gz".

Then run dpkg-buildpackage in the source sub-directory:

    cd zint-2.16.0.9-src
    dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc
    cd ..

If this works, there should be four ".deb" files (amongst other stuff) in the zint-deb directory, namely:

libzint2.16_2.16.0.9-1_<arch>.deb
libzint-dev_2.16.0.9-1_<arch>.deb
zint_2.16.0.9-1_<arch>.deb
zint-qt_2.16.0.9-1_<arch>.deb

where "<arch>" is e.g. "amd64" on an Intel system.

The ".deb" files can then be installed on "<arch>" systems, starting with the "libzint" ones first, e.g.

    sudo dpkg -i libzint2.16_2.16.0.9-1_amd64.deb

You may be prompted by dpkg to add other packages first.

Note that the GS1 Syntax Engine is not yet supported by the included "debian" directory (nor by the official
Debian package for that matter), which is an issue.