DEBSIGN

Section: User Commands (1)
Updated: Debian Utilities
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NAME

debsign - sign a Debian changes and dsc file pair using GPG/PGP

SYNOPSIS

debsign [options] [changes-file|dsc-file]

DESCRIPTION

debsign takes either an unsigned .dsc file or an unsigned .changes file and the associated unsigned .dsc file (found by replacing the architecture name and .changes by .dsc) if it appears in the .changes file and signs them using the GNU Privacy Guard or PGP. It is careful to calculate the size and MD5 sum of the newly signed .dsc file and replace the original values in the .changes file.

If a .changes or .dsc file is specified, it is signed, otherwise, debian/changelog is parsed to determine the name of the .changes file to look for in the parent directory.

This utility is useful if a developer must build a package on one machine where it is unsafe to sign it; they need then only transfer the small .dsc and .changes files to a safe machine and then use the debsign program to sign them before transferring them back. This process can be automated in two ways. If the files to be signed live on the remote machine, the -r option may be used to copy them to the local machine and back again after signing. If the files live on the local machine, then they may be transferred to the remote machine for signing using debrsign(1).

This program can take default settings from the devscripts configuration files, as described below.

OPTIONS

-r [username@]remotehost: The .changes and .dsc files live on the specified remote host. In this case, a .changes file must be explicitly named, with an absolute directory or one relative to the remote home directory. SSH will be used for the copying. The [username@]remotehost:changes syntax is permitted as an alternative.
-pprogname: progname is one of pgp or gpg, and specifies which signing program is to be called. The default is gpg if ~/.gnupg/secring.gpg exists and pgp otherwise.
-mmaintainer: Specify the maintainer name to be used for signing.
-emaintainer: Same as -m but takes precedence.
-kkeyid: Specify the key ID to be used for signing; overrides any -m option.
-spgp, -sgpg: Whether the signing program is to be called with command line arguments like those of pgp or gpg.
-S: Look for a source-only .changes file instead of a binary-build changes file.
-adebian-architecture, -tGNU-system-type: See dpkg-architecture(1) for a description of these options. They affect the search for the .changes file.
--help, --version: Show help message and version information respectively.

CONFIGURATION VARIABLES

The two configuration files /etc/devscripts.conf and ~/.devscripts are sourced in that order to set configuration variables. Command line options can be used to override configuration file settings. Environment variable settings are ignored for this purpose. The currently recognised variables are:

DEBSIGN_PROGRAM: Setting this is equivalent to giving a -p option.
DEBSIGN_SIGNLIKE: This must be gpg or pgp and is equivalent to using either -sgpg or -spgp respectively.
DEBSIGN_MAINT: This is the -m option.
DEBSIGN_KEYID: And this is the -k option.

AUTHOR

This program was written by Julian Gilbey <jdg@debian.org> and is copyright under the GPL, version 2 or later.

This document was created by man2html, using the manual pages.
Time: 16:18:40 GMT, May 08, 2025