---
name: "pkgctl-license-setup"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "devtools"
version: "1:1.5.3-1"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/pkgctl-license-setup"
---

# pkgctl-license-setup(1)

Automatically detect and setup a basic REUSE configuration

## NAME

pkgctl-license-setup - Automatically detect and setup a basic REUSE configuration

## SYNOPSIS

pkgctl license setup \[OPTIONS\] \[PKGBASE...\]

## DESCRIPTION

This subcommand automates the creation of the Arch Linux 0BSD package license file as well as a basic [reuse(1)](/reuse/1.md) configuration by applying simple heuristics. It comes in especially handy when initially setting up licensing for a package without the need to manually write a `REUSE.toml` file.

If any `.patch` files are detected and the [PKGBUILD(5)](/PKGBUILD/5.md) has only a single entry in the `license=()` array, this subcommand assumes the patches are licensed under that license and generates annotations for them.

In case there are no patches, no additional annotations are generated.

Manual annotations are necessary in case the subcommand can’t generate a configuration that accounts for all files. In this case, `reuse lint` will fail with a descriptive error of which files are missing an annotation.

If no `PKGBASE` is specified, the command defaults to using the current working directory.

## OPTIONS

- **-f, --force**

  Overwrite existing [reuse(1)](/reuse/1.md) configuration

- **--no-check**

  Do not run [pkgctl-license-check(1)](/pkgctl-license-check/1.md) after setup

- **-h, --help**

  Show a help text

## SEE ALSO

[pkgctl-license(1)](/pkgctl-license/1.md) [pkgctl-license-check(1)](/pkgctl-license-check/1.md) [reuse(1)](/reuse/1.md) [PKGBUILD(5)](/PKGBUILD/5.md)

## HOMEPAGE

 *\<https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/devtools\>*

*Please report bugs and feature requests in the issue tracker. Please do your best to provide a reproducible test case for bugs.*