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5 upgrading-checklist.html
6 Author : Manoj Srivastava ( srivasta@tiamat.datasync.com )
7 Created On : Thu Oct 29 20:54:48 1998
8 Created On Node : tiamat.datasync.com
9 Last Modified By : Manoj Srivastava
10 Last Modified On : Thu Oct 29 22:12:16 1998
11 Last Machine Used: tiamat.datasync.com
13 Status : Unknown, Use with caution!
20 <title>Policy checklist for upgrading your packages</title>
24 <h1>Policy checklist for upgrading your packages</h1>
26 <h2>About the checklist</h2>
29 The checklist below has been created to simplify the upgrading process
30 of old packages. Note, that this list is not `official.' If you have
31 doubts about a certain topic, if you need more details, or if you
32 think some other package does not comply with policy, please refer to
37 Here is how the check list works: Check out which policy version your
38 packages complies with currently. Than move upwards until the top and
39 check which of the items on the list might concern your package. If an
40 item does not give you enough details, please check out the Policy
44 <h2>The checklist</h2>
51 - Rearranged the manual to create a new Section 4, Files
52 + Section 3.3 ("Files") was moved to Section 4. The Sections
53 that were Section 4 and Section 5 were moved down to become
54 Section 5 and Section 6.
55 + What was Section 5.5 ("Log files") is now a subsection of the
56 new Section 4 ("Files"), becoming section 4.8, placed after
57 "Configuration files", moving the Section 4.8 ("Permissions
58 and owners") to Section 4.9. All subsections of the old
59 Section 5 after 5.5 were moved down to fill in the number
61 - Modified the section about changelog files to accomodate
62 upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML/ These
63 upstream chagelog files should now be accessible as
64 /usr/doc/package/changelog.html.gz
65 + Symlinks are permissible to link the real, or upstream,
66 changelog name to the Debian mandated name.
67 - Clarified that HTML documentation should be present in some
68 package, though not necessarily the main binary package.
69 - Corrected all references to the location of the copyright
70 files. The correct location is /usr/doc/package/copyright
71 - Ratified the architecture specification strings to cater to the
77 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic links:
78 + symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be relative,
79 symbolic links between toplevel directories should be absolute
80 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 2)
82 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
83 + manpages for games should be installed in /usr/man/man6
84 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 3)
87 - Updated prefix of chapter 12, Shared Libraries:
88 ldconfig must be called in the postinst script if the package
89 installs shared libraries
90 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue #6, fixes:bug#20515)
94 - Updated section 3.3.4 Scripts:
95 + /bin/sh may be any POSIX compatible shell
96 + scripts including bashisms have to specify /bin/bash as
98 + scripts which create files in world-writable directories
99 (e.g., in /tmp) should use tempfile or mktemp for creating
102 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic Links:
103 + symbolic links referencing compressed files must have the same
104 file extension as the referenced file
106 - Updated section 3.3.6 Device files:
107 + /dev/tty* serial devices should be used instead of /dev/cu*
109 - Updated section 3.4.2 Writing the scripts [in /etc/init.d]:
110 + all /etc/init.d scripts have to provide the following options:
111 start, stop, restart, force-reload
112 + the reload option is optional and must never stop and restart
115 - Updated section 3.5 Cron jobs:
116 + cron jobs that need to be executed more often than daily should
117 be installed into /etc/cron.d
119 - Updated section 3.7 Menus:
120 + removed section about how to register HTML docs to `menu'
121 (the corresponding section in 4.4, Web servers and applications,
122 has been removed in policy 2.2.0.0 already, so this one was
125 - New section 3.8 Keyboard configuration:
126 + details about how the backspace and delete keys should be
129 - New section 3.9 Environment variables:
130 + no program must depend on environment variables to get a
131 reasonable default configuration
133 - New section 4.6 News system configuration:
134 + /etc/news/organization and /etc/news/server should be supported
135 by all news servers and clients
137 - Updated section 4.7 Programs for the X Windows system:
138 + programs requiring a non-free Motif library should be provided
139 as foo-smotif and foo-dmotif package
140 + if lesstif works reliably for such program, it should be linked
141 against lesstif and not against a non-free Motif library
143 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
144 + games for X Windows have to be installed in /usr/games, just as
147 2.3.0.1, 2.3.0.0 Sep 97
149 * new section `4.2 Daemons' including rules for
150 /etc/services, /etc/protocols, /etc/rpc, and /etc/inetd.conf
152 * updated section about `Configuration files':
153 packages may not touch other packages' configuration files
155 * MUAs and MTAs have to use liblockfile
159 * added section 4.1 `Architecture specification strings':
162 where <arch> is one of the following:
163 i386, alpha, arm, m68k, powerpc, sparc.
165 * detailed rules for /usr/local
169 * editor/pager policy
175 * don't install shared libraries as executable
177 * app-defaults files may not be conffiles
179 2.1.3.2, 2.1.3.1, 2.1.3.0 Mar 97
181 * two programs with different functionality must not have the
186 * "Standard for Console Messages"
188 * Libraries should be compiled with `-D_REENTRANT'
190 * Libraries should be stripped with "strip --strip-unneeded"
192 2.1.2.2, 2.1.2.1, 2.1.2.0 Nov 96
194 * Some changes WRT shared libraries
198 * No hard links in source packages
200 * Do not use dpkg-divert or update-alternatives without consultation
202 * Shared libraries must be installed stripped
206 * Upstream changelog must be installed too
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