Introduction
============

AliBI is AliEn Build & Integration tool. It is derived KDE Konstruct tool
which was modified to handle the binary package distributions.

Like "Konstruct", AliBIT is a build system which helps you to install releases 
and applications on your system. It downloads defined source or binary 
tarballs, checks their integrity, decompresses, patches, configures, builds 
and installs them.

A complete AliEn installation should be as easy as "alibi install".

By default AliBI installs to ~/alien  which means you don't have to possess 
root privileges or risk to damage your system.

The following table shows how many MBytes source tarballs will be downloaded:

   Directory/Target   |  Size | Description
  --------------------+-------+----------------------------------------------
   meta/alien         | 200MB  | AliEn and external dependencies

AliBI is based on "Konstruct" tool ([email protected]) which is in turn based on 
GAR ports system by Nick Moffitt (http://www.lnx-bbc.org/garchitecture.html) 
and is inspired by GARNOME distribution by Jeff Waugh 
(http://www.gnome.org/~jdub/garnome/).


Preconditions
=============
A working GNU tool chain (gcc, GNU make, flex, BSD yacc, gettext etc.) and
additional GNU tools like tar, gzip, bzip2, md5sum, patch and wget.

Configuration
=============

Run 'alibi configure --help' to list configuration options. Common options:

  --prefix      Where to install AliEn. Default is ~/alien .

  --binary      Do not compile source code, use binary packages when possible

  GARCHIVEDIR If you have already downloaded source tarballs set the path here.

  HAVE_64BIT_TARGET Set this if you want to compile for a 64bit target (x86_64)

  OWN_CFLAGS  Allows you to specify compiler flags specific to your CPU.

  BUILD_CLEAN Set this if you're low on available file system space.

If the download fails because of a proxy, then please consult the wget man page
for necessary options in your ~/.wgetrc. If download.kde.org redirects you to a
broken or incomplete mirror you may fix your problem by changing alien.conf.mk.

Usage
=====
Be sure that you have a live internet connection. Choose a target and change
to the directory which helds its definition, e.g. "cd apps/perl/perl". Now run
make with one of the following targets, usually you only need "make install".

The AliBI system provides these basic targets for each package:

 fetch
   This target downloads all files and patches needed to compile the package.
   Typically this is a single tarball, accompanied by occasional patch files.

 checksum
   Uses md5sum to ensure that the downloaded files match those with which the
   package maintainer worked.

 extract
   Makes sure that all of the necessary source files are available in a working
   directory. In some cases (such as when downloading a single C++ source file)
   this will simply copy files over.

 patch
   If the package has to be patched (either via third-party patches or package
   maintainer patches), this target will perform that step.

 configure
   Configures the package as specified in the Makefile. It will typically run
   the package's underlying configuration system (such as autoconf or Imake).

 build
   Performs the actual step of compilation after installing the dependencies.

 install
   Puts files in the proper locations and performs any necessary mop-up work.

 bininstall
   Installs packages from pre-built tarballs.

These targets are named after their counterparts in the BSD Ports system and
behave in the same manner. If you want to install a package you have to enter
the package's or target's directory and to run "make install" or "make patch"
(just two examples). A later target includes all the previously listed ones.

Some additional useful targets which you usually don't require are:

 buildclean
   Clean up the working directory but don't delete downloaded packages. Run thisif you installed missing dependencies and want to re-configure the package.

 clean
   Clean up the working directory. This also deletes downloaded packages! Eitheruse "buildclean" instead or call "garchive" before to prevent new downloads.

 garchive
   Call "checksum" target and save downloaded files to GARCHIVEDIR directory.

 showdeps
   Print a tree with the recursive dependencies of current package.

For every target exists a deep-foo variant which will also call it recursively
for all its dependencies, e.g. with "make deep-checksum" you can download all
required source tarballs and build it later (when you have no net connection).


After installation
==================
After installation run "alien config user".


How to get latest version
=========================

Run 'alibi sync'

License
=======
Redistribution and/or use, with or without modification, is permitted. This
software is without warranty of any kind. The author(s) shall not be liable
in the event that use of the software causes damage.