Error while trying to create RPM for java app

Question

I'm new to RPM packaging and I got stuck for quite a long time and cannot find root cause of the problem. I'm not quite sure I fully understand the concept of BuildRoot in the spec file.

My RPM packaging happens in my home dir: /home/virtual/rpmbuild.

I'm trying to package a java application located in /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp/BDHistProcessor with the structure:

BDHistProcessor
 lib
 bin
 conf
 deploy

Here is my spec file I created:

%define _tmppath  /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp

Name:           BDHistProcessor
Version:        1.0.0
Release:        1%{?dist}
Summary:        component which feed data into DB

Group:        Applications/System   
License:      GPL  
URL:          https://www.tem.com/  
BuildRoot: %{tmppath}/%{name}

%description
Component which feed data into DB

%prep

%build

%install
rm -rf $RPM_BUILD_ROOT
cp -r  /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp/BDHistProcessor $RPM_BUILD_ROOT 

%files
%defattr(-,root,root)
%{buildroot}/BDHistProcessor/lib
%{buildroot}/BDHistProcessor/bin
%{buildroot}/BDHistProcessor/conf
%{buildroot}/BDHistProcessor/deploy
%{buildroot}/BDHistProcessor/README.txt

%doc
%changelog

Running rpmbuild -v -bb -clean SPECS/myRPM.spec returns output:

[virtual@virtual rpmbuild]$ rpmbuild -v -bb --clean SPECS/myRPM.spec
Executing(%prep): /bin/sh -e /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp/rpm-tmp.t2AMGe
+ umask 022
+ cd /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILD
+ exit 0
Executing(%build): /bin/sh -e /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp/rpm-tmp.1unXP8
+ umask 022
+ cd /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILD
+ exit 0
Executing(%install): /bin/sh -e /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp/rpm-tmp.SoaH02
+ umask 022
+ cd /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILD
+ rm -rf /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64
+ cp -r /home/virtual/rpmbuild/tmp/BDHistProcessor /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64
+ /usr/lib/rpm/check-rpaths /usr/lib/rpm/check-buildroot
+ /usr/lib/rpm/brp-compress
+ /usr/lib/rpm/brp-strip
+ /usr/lib/rpm/brp-strip-static-archive
+ /usr/lib/rpm/brp-strip-comment-note
Processing files: BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64
error: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/lib
error: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/bin
error: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/conf
error: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/deploy
error: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/README.txt


RPM build errors:
    File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/lib
    File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/bin
    File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/conf
    File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/deploy
    File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/README.txt

I'm not quite sure how the paths get cycled in the error report. Can someone please clarify what I'm doing wrong here?

Solution

Background - rpmbuild setup

How did you create your rpmbuild directory? Did you use a tool such as rpmdev-setuptree? I always recommend newcomers start out by using this package, rpmdevtools.

Example

To start I have no bulid area, as user saml.

$ ls -la | grep -E "rpmbuild|\.rpm"
$

Then install the package rpmdevtools.

$ sudo yum install rpmdevtools

After it's been installed, you'll now have another application which you can use to create your rpmbuild directory.

$ rpmdev-setuptree

It won't say anything, it silently just did the following things for you:

$ ls -la | grep -E "rpmbuild|\.rpm"
drwxrwxr-x.   7 saml saml     4096 Dec 16 12:22 rpmbuild
-rw-rw-r--.   1 saml saml      620 Dec 16 12:22 .rpmmacros

Afterwards you'll now have the following directory structure in your rpmbuild developers directory:

$ ls -l ~/rpmbuild
total 20
drwxrwxr-x. 2 saml saml 4096 Dec 16 12:22 BUILD
drwxrwxr-x. 2 saml saml 4096 Dec 16 12:22 RPMS
drwxrwxr-x. 2 saml saml 4096 Dec 16 12:22 SOURCES
drwxrwxr-x. 2 saml saml 4096 Dec 16 12:22 SPECS
drwxrwxr-x. 2 saml saml 4096 Dec 16 12:22 SRPMS

Your issue

Your issue looks to be in the %files macro section of the .spec file. Looking at the output of the error messages:

error: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6.x86_64/BDHistProcessor/lib

Notice that the BUILDROOT path repeats 2 times. You don't need to include variable $buildroot in your %files macro section, it's already targeting this directory automatically for you.

Try this instead:

%files
%defattr(-,root,root)
/usr/bin/BDHistProcessor/lib
/usr/bin/BDHistProcessor/bin
/usr/bin/BDHistProcessor/conf
/usr/bin/BDHistProcessor/deploy
/usr/bin/BDHistProcessor/README.txt

Put whatever is the eventual destination for the packages in place of /usr/bin.

Comments

[jaksky]

I am not quite sure how I will specify that I would like the final rpm package install under /usr/local/BDHistProcessor. As now I am more fighting with creating rpm itself. I followed tutorials like this one link but I miss those details. Thanks for helping me out!

[slm]

@jaksky - RPMs are useful if you want to deploy the software as part of a system build or it has dependencies, but in general isn't necessary for deploying standalone apps, unless you want to do it this way.

[jaksky]

I am aware of that fact. I selected this way intentionally as we need to automate it to possibly large number of nodes and secondly we want to manage dependencies between packages. How the rpm system know where to install the package? I understand that buildroot is sort of proxy which should denote the root of the installation.

[slm]

@jaksky - sorry didn't mean to imply you didn't know that, was just re-iterating in case you didn't. I've used this method for mass deployments as well, so IMO your rational makes sense. The %files macro will use buildroot during development, but when you deploy that variables is either blank or not part of the mix. Here's a post I wrote a while ago that shows how I packages JBoss for deployment as an RPM. lamolabs.org/blog/6837/…

[jaksky]

thanks for your replies. I wasn't probably clear so sorry for that. Let me clarify that: I still don't fully understand how the buildroot is propagated (set) during the rpm installation. Because if the build root is taken from the spec than I have to do all the packaging under /usr/local - that seems to me as a nonsense, or I have to supply it latter somehow. Hopefully question make sense. For some reason I cannot access link you posted.

[jaksky]

I tried to alter the %files part as you suggest targeting to /usr/local/BDhistProcessor ... %files %defattr(-,root,root) /usr/local/BDHistProcessor/lib /usr/local/BDHistProcessor/bin /usr/local/BDHistProcessor/conf /usr/local/BDHistProcessor/deploy /usr/local/BDHistProcessor/README.txt And know getting errors like: File not found: /home/virtual/rpmbuild/BUILDROOT/BDHistProcessor-1.0.0-1.el6‌​.x86_64/usr/local/BD‌​HistProcessor/lib That's why I was asking why the BuildRoot is set for the rpm installation as that is not clear to me. Do I need to mimic real strucute starting from root?