The dist directory contains files & scripts for building distributable packages.

RPM packaging

Tools for making rpms are in dist/rpm. To build, go to that directory and run one of the two shell scripts.

setup-here.sh requires one argument, a version number. It builds an appropriate source tarball,modifies the spec file and sets a user config file (~/.rpmmacros) to use this directory.
just-prep.sh is for users that already have their own rpm build environment. It also takes one argument, a version number, and simply produces an appropriate source tarball and spec file for use elsewhere.

The build doesn't have any requirements other than rpmbuild itself (note: if you have trouble finding it, the OS package containing rpmbuild is often hyphenated as rpm-build.) The whole procedure looks like this

$ ./setup-here.sh
$ rpmbuild -ba SPECS/it-core.spec

This creates four RPMs. Paths given below are typical and may vary on some distributions:

it-core contains the license (/usr/share/it-core/license) and an apache config directive to point http://localhost/it-core at /usr/share/it-core. This directory is chosen to comply with Red Hat packaging guidelines for web applications, should IT CORE ever be submitted for formal inclusion in a distribution.
it-core-doc contains the documentation and installs to /usr/share/it-core/documentation
it-core-fannie contains the backend and installs to /usr/share/it-core/fannie. This package also assigns appropriate config file permissions.
it-core-is4c-nf contains the front-end and installs to /usr/share/it-core/is4c-nf. This package also assigns appropriate config file permissions.

All RPMs require PHP 5+, Apache 2+, MySQL 5+, and php-mysql. The subpackages each require the main it-core but are otherwise independent.

Installation would look like this:

$ cd BUILD/noarch
$ sudo rpm -Uvh it-core-<version>.rpm
$ sudo /etc/init.d/httpd restart
$ sudo rpm -Uvh it-core-doc-<version>.rpm
$ sudo rpm -Uvh it-core-fannie-<version>.rpm
$ sudo rpm -Uvh it-core-is4c-nf-<version>.rpm

Any of the last three lines could be omitted, although omitting all three would be kind of silly.

DEB Packaging

The dist/deb contains a single alien-based script for converting .rpm files to .deb files. To create deb packges:

Set up a dkpg+alien environment ($deity help you if you're on an rpm-based system and have to do this from source packages)
Build RPMs under dist/rpm as described above.
Go to dist/deb and run the make-debs.sh script. This script requires both a version number and a build number (e.g., if the RPM is it-core-0.1.0-1.noarch.rpm, run make-debs.sh 0.1.0 1).