Recipe authoring

Every package in a Keru system is described by a recipe: a plain POSIX shell script in kama-packages. Writing one is closer to filling a form than engineering a build.

The template

kama-packages/TEMPLATE.sh is the canonical starting point. Copy it, fill the easy tier:

name=hello            # required
version=2.12.1        # required for fetch
url=https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/hello/hello-2.12.1.tar.gz
deps=()               # build-time deps, compiled then purged

build() {
    ./configure --prefix=/usr
    make -j"$JOBS"
}

install() {
    make install DESTDIR="$pkgdir"   # stage, never $ROOT
}

A real, complete recipe

This is the entire busybox recipe currently in the repo:

name=busybox
version=1.36.1
url=https://busybox.net/downloads/busybox-1.36.1.tar.bz2
deps=()

build() {
    make defconfig
    make -j"$JOBS"
}

install() {
    make install CONFIG_PREFIX="$pkgdir"
}

That's it. Kama downloads, extracts, strips the top dir, builds, stages, and installs.

Stepping up

Need	Field / function
Colliding with another package	`provides=(...) conflicts=(...)`
Build deps that must stay	`runtime_deps=(...)`
Arch-restricted	`arch=(x86_64)`
Repo or vcs sources	`noextract=("$url")` + own `build()`
Custom fetch (patch first)	`pkg_fetch() { default_fetch; patch ...; }`
Post-install work	`pkg_post()` · `pkg_split()` for subpackages

Rules of the road

Stage, don't touch. install() installs into $pkgdir. Kama commits the staging dir to $ROOT only after a successful build.
Add pure build deps to deps. They're purged automatically after the build (AUR-style). Keeps the door clean.
Declare the license. license=(SPDX) — supply chain cleanliness starts here.
Pin exactly. A fixed url + version, never a moving "latest".

Checking your work

sh -n recipe.sh            # syntax check
kama info <pkgname>      # metadata parses (name from the recipe)
make recipe-check        # lint the whole kama-packages repo
kama make <pkgname>      # build it for real

The behavioral spec lives at recipe format. For hands-on, mirror the recipe concept page and start with busybox.sh, the smallest real recipe.

← Recipe format · The repos