Community Debian repository [beta]

1

The official MNT Debian repository only contains the core packages necessary for the Reform: reform-tools, Linux, flash-kernel. We don’t want to add more because building all of this already takes 45 minutes on the MNT gitlab CI workers and that’s already quite long and makes iterating on features painful. For the same reason, the reform.debian.net repo does not contain more packages.

Luckily, Freexian offers a service called debusine to Debian Developers where it can be used like a Ubuntu PPA or a OpenSuSE OBS. Using this generous donation of compute resources I am happy to announce an early beta of a new Debian repository for MNT Reform users:

Essentially, create an apt.sources with this in it:

Types: deb
URIs: https://deb.debusine.debian.net/debian/r-josch-reform
Suites: sid-reform
Components: main
Signed-By:
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The repository currently contains the following packages:

Let me know if you are facing any issues with these packages.

10 Likes
2

Thanks for providing this <3
Added it and installed mpv without any flaws :3

Edit: i do get a Unsupported hwdec: v4l2request from mpv thou jfi ^^v
I double checked it, its installed from your repo:

Get:1 https://deb.debusine.debian.net/debian/r-josch-reform sid-reform/main arm64 libmpv2 arm64 0.41.0-2+reform20260618T183445Z1 [931 kB]
Get:2 https://deb.debusine.debian.net/debian/r-josch-reform sid-reform/main arm64 mpv arm64 0.41.0-2+reform20260618T183445Z1 [1,285 kB]
3

What is your kernel version? You at least need version 7.0 for v4l2request to work. My notes say that this should work:

mpv --hwdec=v4l2request --gpu-context=wayland

I can test on rk3588 later. (typing this on a311d)

4

Morning ^^
I am on 7.X

[08:56:56] rick@mnt-rick /home/rick (0) 
> uname -a
Linux mnt-rick 7.0.12-mnt-reform-arm64 #1 SMP PREEMPT Debian 7.0.12-2+reform20260602T222813Z (2026-06-0 aarch64 GNU/Linux
[08:56:57] rick@mnt-rick /home/rick (0) 
> mpv --hwdec=v4l2request --gpu-context=wayland https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnkhBwzBqlQ
● Video  --vid=1               (av1 1440x1080 30 fps) [default]
● Audio  --aid=1  --alang=eng  (opus 2ch 48000 Hz) [default]
File tags:
 Date: 20210428
 Uploader: Aiobahn
 Channel_URL: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3XZCxTQ55JkT35W27Jtbyg
Unsupported hwdec: v4l2request
AO: [pipewire] 48000Hz stereo 2ch floatp
VO: [gpu-next] 1440x1080 yuv420p
AV: 00:00:02 / 00:03:42 (1%) A-V: -0.000 Cache: 5.0s/1MB
Exiting... (Quit)
5

Ahhh i found it… obviously reinstalling only mpv wasn’t enough, i also had to reinstall ffmpeg and libavcodec62. now it works with the options:

--hwdec=v4l2request
--vo=dmabuf-wayland

with --gpu-context=wayland I now get a blue box and many errors like:

MESA: error: WSI pitch not properly aligned
[vo/gpu-next/drmprime] Failed to import surface in EGL: 12291
[vo/gpu-next/drmprime] mapping DRM dmabuf failed

Maybe i miss another package from your repo sources?
Well with an apt dist-upgrade it also pulls in mesa-vulcan* drivers from your repo.. ill try that and reboot..

urgh this is such a newbie error.. why didn’t i think of that yesterday night ^^v

Edit: yeah, mesa-vulcan* update was the other missing thing, now everything works :3

6

Then you should be using that. In the associated MR I also had in my notes to try:

  • vo=gpu-next
  • vo=gpu
  • vo=dmabuf-wayland

What worked changed over time and I also remember having seen the blue box. Pix the vo option that works for you, put it into your ~/.config/mpv/mpv.conf` and enjoy. :slight_smile:

1 Like
7

yeah, i just wanted to point out, that now also --gpu-context=wayland works. it didn’t cause i missed the mesa-vulcan* packages from your repo, i still had the debian default ones installed ^^ jfi :smiley:

8

Just wanted to jump in to say thanks <3 I’m especially happy about ffmpeg and mpv with hardware decoding <3

1 Like
9

Thank you for your feedback! Once new packages get uploaded to unstable i have to trigger a rebuild. When somebody notices, please feel free to ping me about it. I do not have this automated.

@moonglum what mpv options did you end up using?

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@josch good that your mention it. i upgraded recently and at least ffmpeg and libavcodec62 got overwritten from debian unstable :smiley:

This means its currently broken ^^
I’m not that deep into apt, but can’t we somehow use pin-priority to kinda enforce to stay on the packages grom your repo? In worst case there would be a dependency conflict, but its kinda a hint to check the upgrade more deeply

11

You can use sudo apt-mark hold <package> to prevent upgrades. Using showhold will show you anything that is held and unholdwill release it.

12

There are two downsides of using apt-mark hold:

  • you have to do it for every package individually and that is bad because:
    • there are over 186 packages (67 unique names) in that repository
    • package names of shared libraries changes with their SONAME
  • it prevents upgrades even when the upgrade comes from the debusine repository

Here is an untested apt preferences file to use pinning instead:

Package: *
Pin: release n=sid-reform, a=sid-reform
Pin: origin "deb.debusine.debian.net"
Pin-Priority: 991
2 Likes
13

@josch yeah this is what i meant with pin-priority. gonna test it thanks :3

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Should be fixed now.

Maybe in the future I’ll schedule automated rebuilds but so far I’m triggering them manually.

1 Like