9.4. Building Reverse Dependencies

Starting with abuild version 1.1, it is possible to use the --with-rdeps flag to instruct abuild to expand the build set by adding all reverse dependencies of any build item initially in the build set. When combined with --repeat-expansion, this process is applied iteratively so that all forward and reverse dependencies of every item in the build set will also be in the build set. [22] This can be especially useful if you are changing a widely used item and you want to make sure your change didn't break any build items that use your item. For additional details on how the build set is constructed, see Section 33.5, “Construction of the Build Set”..



[22] Stated formally, when abuild is invoked with both --with-rdeps and --repeat-expansion, the build set is closed with respect to forward and reverse dependencies.