Daniel Kahn Gillmor <dkg@fifthhorseman.net> writes:

> hi notmuch people--
>
> debian/control's build-dependencies list a bunch of things that i think
> are only relevant for running the tests (e.g. dtach -- and maybe emacs
> and bash-completion and other packages).
>
> These should be marked <!nocheck> so that dpkg-buildpackage can know to
> ignore them when trying to build with BUILD_DEB_OPTIONS=nocheck.
>
> This is called a "build profile", if you want to look up more about it:
>
>   https://wiki.debian.org/BuildProfileSpec
>   https://bugs.debian.org/757760
>
> I'd send a patch, but i'm not entirely sure which packages are strictly
> for the build-time tests, so i hope someone with more experience with
> the debian package can mark them appropriately.  Thanks!

Daniel and I chatted a bit on IRC, but for the record, other than lack
of time, my current concern about this is how well supported
build-profiles are supported on Debian stable. I haven't researched
this, but feedback is welcome.

BTW, bash completion is not there for the tests, nor is emacs (only) for
the tests.  Emacs might be avoidable as a Debian build-dep (since Debian
does byte compilation at install time), but would come back if we switch
to "dh_elpa".