Things learned:

• do not depend on php5 unless you need webserver. php5 depends on apache modules (or php-cgi/fpm), and depending on it will cause those modules to install. This is not desired when all you need is a simple command-line script. Depend on php5-cli in this case (libraries may depend on php5 | php-cli)


• Launchpad PPA wants you to upload source packages. Use debuild -S (this only briefly mentioned in the debuild manpage on Debian)


• If you're building packages on Debian and want to upload it to PPA you will need to force ubuntu suite by tweaking dput.cf (so it will reference ppa incoming like this: ~weirdan/imap-forward/ubuntu/maverick)


• Debian packaging guide is better in explaining workflow than Ubuntu's one.

https://weirdan.livejournal.com/76984.html