I managed to feed matplotlib into svn-buildpackage.

svn-inject -o loaded it into the archive

svn-update worked though it took a try or two for it to create all the directories that it wanted.

svn-buildpackage works reasonably well.

After svn-update I fixed the changelog a little and then was able to build the package.

lintian complaining about several things.

• installing \*.pyc files
• copyright
• dependencies
• description

However I managed to fix all of them

Next question should I store the tarball in svn and if so where?