We have this thingy here: Whonix build script now optionally supports installing packages from Whonix remote repository rather than building packages locally
So just by adding…
--remote-derivative-packages true
No packages should be built and all packages would be downloaded from the Whonix binary repository. It would skip all the lengthy package creation.
How does that sounds?
How often will we use --remote-derivative-packages true? Maybe for git commits, use it. For git tags, do it “proper” and drop it?
Though, when using --remote-derivative-packages true we would not notice when package builds fail. But that isn’t very likely since if packages are updated, I need to build them locally anyhow.
Absolutely makes sense. In my previous build, a rookie mistake for forgetting $SUDO_TO_ROOT has lead to a failed build. Another 40 minutes to wait for me now until I can see if that is fixed now - unless I do a local build with local hacks which with the CI we’re trying to avoid.
That’s also why I suggested Derivative Maker Automated CI Builder - #74 by Patrick - because then I would hack the build command to a much simpler various to a point where only a minimal raw image gets created with even nothing useful inside just to test various mount / umount to quickly get that fixed.