Autopkgtest runs tests on binary packages. The tests are run on the package as installed on a testbed system (which may be found via a virtualisation or containment system). The tests are expected to be supplied in the corresponding Debian source package.

See autopkgtest(1) and /usr/share/doc/autopkgtest. Depending on which virtualization server you want to use, you need to install additional packages (schroot, lxc, lxd, or qemu-system)

For generating tests of well-known source packages such as Perl and Ruby libraries you should install the autodep8 package.