Ugh..  gnats Makefine.in files strike again!  Looks like the gnats and
gnats-user packages for Debian have some odd path problems[1],[2].
Adding a $(DESTDIR) variable preceeding install and mkinstalldirs path
locations and mkinstalldirs locations fixes this.  The debian/rules file
should then be able to specify a DESTDIR for the installation target.

Here's where we come to the kicker.  I originally wanted to simply "fix"
the debian/rules file, but since it was originally constructed, the
Debian build utilities and scripts have vastly improved.  Much of the
custom scripting necessary to make the gnats and gnats-user packages is
now obsolete.

Additionally, there are some fundamental differences in how packages are
designed.  There is a lot of duplicated effort between the gnats and
gnats-user packages.  Currently, there are few differences between them.
The gnats-user package contains mostly the same files as gnats, which
contains a few more files and additional scripts to add system users,
cron jobs, and aliases into the MTA aliases file.  I plan on changing
the dependencies between these two files.  Rather than having gnats
conflict with gnats-user, gnats will depend upon gnats-user and perform
the additional steps to set up the machine as a server.

I really wanted to get a quick fix in the archives, but I believe that
there is no such thing.  I may as well put in the initial work to "do it
right" so that further maintainence is minimized.

The patches for the gnats Makefile.in files are attached.  I'll roll
them into CVS if there are no objections.

REFERENCES
==========
1. http://bugs.debian.org/241416
2. http://bugs.debian.org/222830

-- 
Chad Walstrom <chewie@wookimus.net>           http://www.wookimus.net/
           assert(expired(knowledge)); /* core dump */