running debexpo =============== First, create a virtualenv. % sudo apt-get install virtualenvwrapper % mkdir ~/.virtualenvs % source /etc/bash_completion % mkvirtualenv expo % workon expo This creates a virtual Python environment in which you can install the dependencies for debexpo without altering your system (i.e., without requiring root). Once you have the virtualenv set up, run this command to download the dependencies and set up the debexpo code so it can be run: % python setup.py develop You might think you are done, but wait! You have to compile the translations from "PO" format into "MO" format. To do that: % python setup.py compile_catalog Hooray! Now you're ready to run the automated tests. (The code for the tests lives in debexpo/tests/*. This is a test suite; you can read more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test_suite .) % nosetests --with-pylons=test.ini As of the time of writing, all the tests do not pass. That means there is work to do on the test suite. They should at least run, though. (Nosetests is a "test runner" package that provides some useful add-ons. It has its own idiosyncracies, though.) debugging a debexpo test that fails =================================== So you've found a test that fails (F) or exits with an unhandled exception (E)? Time to use the Python debugger. Run the test suite with these parameters: % nosetests --with-pylons=test.ini --pdb-failures --pdb-errors (If you've used pdb.set_trace(), this is an automatic way that Nose gives you that functionality.) debexpo documentation ===================== The debexpo documentation is being stored in restructured text inside the docs/ directory. You can find the current installation guide at docs/installing.rst. You should build and view the html docs by executing: % sudo apt-get install python-sphinx # needed to build the docs % cd docs/ % make html % sensible-browser .build/html/index.html