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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 : Sat Aug 31 02:02:54 2002
11 Last Machine Used: glaurung.green-gryphon.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'; it simply
31 gives an indication of what has changed and whether you are likely to
32 need to make changes to your package in light of this. If you have
33 doubts about a certain topic, if you need more details, or if you
34 think some other package does not comply with policy, please refer to
35 the Policy Manual itself. All of the changes from version 3.0.0
36 onwards indicate which section of the Policy Manual discusses the
37 issue: [3.4] means section 3.4. The section numbering changed when
38 the packaging manual was incorporated into policy; the section numbers
39 used below refer to the current version.
43 Here is how the check list works: Check which policy version your
44 package complies with currently (indicated in the "Standards-Version"
45 field of the source package). Then move upwards until the top and
46 check which of the items on the list might concern your package. Note
47 which sections of policy discuss this, and then check out the Policy
48 Manual for details. If you are upgrading from Policy version < 2.5.0,
49 it may be easier to check through the whole of policy instead of
50 picking your way through this list.
53 <h2>The checklist</h2>
58 - Packages no longer have to ask permission to call MAKEDEV in
59 postinst, merely notifying the user ought to be enough.
60 - cryptographic software may now be included in the main
62 - task packages are now not permitted; tasks are now created by a
63 special Tasks: field in the control file.
64 - window managers that support netwm now can added 20 points when
65 they add themselves as an alternative for
66 /usr/bin/x-window-manager
67 - There are new rules for build-indep/build-arch targets and
68 there is a new Build-Depend-Indep semantic. These were actually
69 introduced in 3.5.6, but I forgot to mention them here.
70 - The default compilation options have now changed, one should
71 provide debugging symbols in all cases, and optionally step
72 back optimization to -O0, depending on the DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS
74 - Added mention of build-arch, build-indep, etc, in describing
75 the relationships with `Build-Depends', `Build-Conflicts',
76 `Build-Depends-Indep', and `Build-Conflicts-Indep'. May need to
78 - Changed rules on how, and when, to invoke ldconfig in maintiner
79 scripts. Long rationale.
83 - Emacs and TeX are no longer mandated by policy to be priority
84 standard packages [2.2]
85 - Programs that access docs need to do so via /usr/share/doc, and
86 not via /usr/doc/ as was the policy previously [12.5]
87 - Putting documentation in /usr/doc versus /usr/share/doc is now
88 a ``serious'' policy violation
89 - For web servers, one should not provide non-local access to the
90 /usr/share/doc hierarchy. If one can't provide access controls for
91 the //localhost/doc/ directory, then it is preferred that one
92 ask permission to expose that information during the install [12.5]
97 - Manpages should not rely on header information to have
98 alternative manpage names available; it should only use
99 symlinks or .so pages to do this [13.1]
100 - [Clarified note in 3.5.3.0 upgrading checklist regarding
101 examples and templates: this refers only to those examples used
102 by scripts; see section 11.7.3 for the whole story]
103 - Included a new section 11.9.1 describing the use of
104 dpkg-statoverride; this does not have the weight of policy
105 - Clarify Standards-Version: you don't need to rebuild your
106 packages just to change the Standards-Version!
107 - Plugins are no longer bound by all the rules of shared
109 - X Windows related things:
110 * Clarification of priority levels of X Window System related
112 * Rules for defining x-terminal-emulator improved [12.8.3]
113 * X Font policy rewritten: you must read this if you provide
114 fonts for the X Window System [12.8.5]
115 * Packages must not ship /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults/ [12.8.6]
116 * X-related packages should usually use the regular FHS
117 locations; imake-using packages are exempted from this [12.8.7]
118 * OpenMotif linked binaries have the same rules as
119 OSF/Motif-linked ones [12.8.8]
124 - The system-wide mail directory is now /var/mail, no longer
125 /var/spool/mail. Any packages accessing the mail spool should
126 access it via /var/mail and include a suitable Depends field;
128 - The perl policy is now part of Debian policy proper. Perl
129 programs and modules should follow the current Perl policy
135 - Build-Depends arch syntax has been changed to be less
136 ambiguous. This should not affect any current packages [7.1]
137 - Examples and templates files for use by scripts should now live
138 in /usr/share/<package> or /usr/lib/<package>, with
139 symbolic links from /usr/share/doc//<package>/examples as
145 - X app-defaults directory has moved from
146 /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults to /etc/X11/app-defaults [12.8.6]
151 - dpkg-shlibdeps now uses objdump, so shared libraries have to be
152 run through dpkg-shlibdeps as well as executables [9.1]
157 - Font packages for the X Window System must now declare a
158 dependency on xutils (>= 4.0.2) [12.8.5]
163 - Daemon startup scripts in /etc/init.d/ should not contain
164 modifiable parameters; these should be moved to a file in
165 /etc/default/; see [10.3.2] for details
166 - Files in /usr/share/doc must not be referenced by any
167 program. If such files are needed, they must be placed in
168 /usr/share/<package>/, and symbolic links created as required
169 in /usr/share/doc/<package>/ [13.3]
170 - Much of the packaging manual has now been imported into the
176 - A package of priority standard or higher may provide two
177 binaries, one compiled with support for the X Window System,
178 and the other without [12.8.1]
183 - By default executables should not be built with the debugging
184 option -g. Instead, it is recommended to support building the
185 package with debugging information optionally. Details in [11.1]
186 - Policy for packages where the upstream uses HTML changelog
187 files has been expanded. In short, a plain text changelog file
188 should always be generated for the upstream changes [13.8]
189 - Please note that the new release of the X window system (4.x)
190 shall probably need sweeping changes in policy
191 - Policy for packages providing the following X-based features
193 - X server (virtual package xserver) [12.8.2]
194 - X terminal emulator (virtual package x-terminal-emulator) [12.8.3]
195 - X window manager (virtual package x-window-manager, and
196 /usr/bin/x-window-manager alternative, with priority
197 calculation guidelines) [12.8.4]
198 - X fonts (this section has been written from scratch) [12.8.5]
199 - X application defaults [12.8.6]
200 - Policy for packages using the X Window System and FHS issues
201 has been clarified; see [12.8.7]
202 - No package may contain or make hard links to conffiles [11.7.3]
203 - Noted that newer dpkg versions do not require extreme care in
204 always creating the shared lib before the symlink, so the unpack
210 - Correction to semantics of architecture lists in Build-Depends
211 etc. Should not affect many packages [7.1]
216 - /usr/doc/<package> has to be a symlink pointing to
217 /usr/share/doc/<package>, to be maintained by postinst
218 and prerm scripts. Details are in [13.4]
219 - Introduced source dependencies (Build-Depends, etc.) [7.1, 7.6]
220 - /etc/rc.boot has been deprecated in favour of /etc/rcS.d.
221 (Packages should not be touching this directory, but should use
222 update-rc.d instead) [10.3.4]
223 - update-rc.d is now the *only* allowable way of accessing the
224 /etc/rc?.d/[SK]??* links. Any scripts which manipulate them
225 directly must be changed to use update-rc.d instead. (This is
226 because the file-rc package handles this information in an
227 incompatible way.) [10.3.3]
228 - Architecture-specific examples go in /usr/lib/<package>/examples
229 with symlinks from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples/* or from
230 /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples itself [13.7]
231 - Updated FHS to a 2.1 draft; this reverts /var/state to
233 - Added MIME sub-policy document [10.7; mime-policy]
234 - VISUAL is allowed as a (higher priority) alternative to EDITOR [12.4]
235 - Modified liblockfile description, which affects
236 mailbox-accessing programs. Please see the policy document for
238 - If a package provides a changelog in HTML format, a text-only
239 version should also be included. (Such a version may be prepared
240 using lynx -dump -nolist.) [13.8]
241 - Description of how to handle version numbers based on dates
247 - Added the clarification that the .la files are essential for the
248 packages using libtool's libltdl library, in which case the
249 .la files must go in the run-time library package [11.2]
254 - Debian formally moves from the FSSTND to the FHS. This is a
255 major change, and the implications of this move are probably
256 not all known. [10.1]
257 - Only 3 digits of the Standards version need be included in
258 control files, though all four digits are still permitted. [2.4.1]
259 - The location of the GPL has changed to
260 /usr/share/common-licenses. This may require changing the
261 copyright files to point to the correct location of the GPL and
262 other major licenses [13.6]
263 - Packages that use libtool to create shared libraries must
264 include the .la files in the -dev packages [11.2]
265 - Use logrotate to rotate log files [11.8]
266 - section 5.8 has been rewritten (Programs for the X Window
268 - There is now an associated menu policy, in a separate document,
269 that carries the full weight of Debian policy [10.6; menu-policy]
270 - Programs which need to modify the files /var/run/utmp,
271 /var/log/wtmp and /var/log/lastlog must be installed setgid utmp [12.3]
277 - Rearranged the manual to create a new Section 4, Files
278 + Section 3.3 ("Files") was moved to Section 4. The Sections
279 that were Section 4 and Section 5 were moved down to become
280 Section 5 and Section 6.
281 + What was Section 5.5 ("Log files") is now a subsection of the
282 new Section 4 ("Files"), becoming section 4.8, placed after
283 "Configuration files", moving the Section 4.8 ("Permissions
284 and owners") to Section 4.9. All subsections of the old
285 Section 5 after 5.5 were moved down to fill in the number
287 - Modified the section about changelog files to accommodate
288 upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML/ These
289 upstream changelog files should now be accessible as
290 /usr/doc/package/changelog.html.gz
291 + Symlinks are permissible to link the real, or upstream,
292 changelog name to the Debian mandated name.
293 - Clarified that HTML documentation should be present in some
294 package, though not necessarily the main binary package.
295 - Corrected all references to the location of the copyright
296 files. The correct location is /usr/doc/package/copyright
297 - Ratified the architecture specification strings to cater to the
303 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic links:
304 + symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be relative,
305 symbolic links between toplevel directories should be absolute
306 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 2)
308 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
309 + manpages for games should be installed in /usr/man/man6
310 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 3)
313 - Updated prefix of chapter 12, Shared Libraries:
314 ldconfig must be called in the postinst script if the package
315 installs shared libraries
316 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue #6, fixes:bug#20515)
320 - Updated section 3.3.4 Scripts:
321 + /bin/sh may be any POSIX compatible shell
322 + scripts including bashisms have to specify /bin/bash as
324 + scripts which create files in world-writable directories
325 (e.g., in /tmp) should use tempfile or mktemp for creating
328 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic Links:
329 + symbolic links referencing compressed files must have the same
330 file extension as the referenced file
332 - Updated section 3.3.6 Device files:
333 + /dev/tty* serial devices should be used instead of /dev/cu*
335 - Updated section 3.4.2 Writing the scripts [in /etc/init.d]:
336 + all /etc/init.d scripts have to provide the following options:
337 start, stop, restart, force-reload
338 + the reload option is optional and must never stop and restart
341 - Updated section 3.5 Cron jobs:
342 + cron jobs that need to be executed more often than daily should
343 be installed into /etc/cron.d
345 - Updated section 3.7 Menus:
346 + removed section about how to register HTML docs to `menu'
347 (the corresponding section in 4.4, Web servers and applications,
348 has been removed in policy 2.2.0.0 already, so this one was
351 - New section 3.8 Keyboard configuration:
352 + details about how the backspace and delete keys should be
355 - New section 3.9 Environment variables:
356 + no program must depend on environment variables to get a
357 reasonable default configuration
359 - New section 4.6 News system configuration:
360 + /etc/news/organization and /etc/news/server should be supported
361 by all news servers and clients
363 - Updated section 4.7 Programs for the X Window System:
364 + programs requiring a non-free Motif library should be provided
365 as foo-smotif and foo-dmotif package
366 + if lesstif works reliably for such program, it should be linked
367 against lesstif and not against a non-free Motif library
369 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
370 + games for X Windows have to be installed in /usr/games, just as
373 2.3.0.1, 2.3.0.0 Sep 97
375 * new section `4.2 Daemons' including rules for
376 /etc/services, /etc/protocols, /etc/rpc, and /etc/inetd.conf
378 * updated section about `Configuration files':
379 packages may not touch other packages' configuration files
381 * MUAs and MTAs have to use liblockfile
385 * added section 4.1 `Architecture specification strings':
388 where <arch> is one of the following:
389 i386, alpha, arm, m68k, powerpc, sparc.
391 * detailed rules for /usr/local
395 * editor/pager policy
401 * don't install shared libraries as executable
403 * app-defaults files may not be conffiles
405 2.1.3.2, 2.1.3.1, 2.1.3.0 Mar 97
407 * two programs with different functionality must not have the
412 * "Standard for Console Messages"
414 * Libraries should be compiled with `-D_REENTRANT'
416 * Libraries should be stripped with "strip --strip-unneeded"
418 2.1.2.2, 2.1.2.1, 2.1.2.0 Nov 96
420 * Some changes WRT shared libraries
424 * No hard links in source packages
426 * Do not use dpkg-divert or update-alternatives without consultation
428 * Shared libraries must be installed stripped
432 * Upstream changelog must be installed too
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