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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 Jan 18 01:32:14 2001
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.' 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>
50 - If your package has a daemon startup script in /etc/init.d/,
51 and that script has parameters a system administrator may need,
52 you need to modify the script to read values from a conffile
53 placed in /etc/default/ directory. This conffile maybe sourced
54 by the init.d script to determine the sonfigurable values (and
55 the conffile may contain only variable settings and comments).
56 - Files in /usr/share/doc may not be referenced by any
57 program. If such files are needed, they must be placed in
58 /usr/share/package-name/, and symbolic links created as required
59 in /usr/share/doc/package-name/
64 - A package of priority standard or higher may provide two
65 binaries, one compiled with support for the X Window System,
66 and the other without.
72 - By default executables should not be built with the debugging
73 option -g. Instead, it is recommended to support building the
74 package with debugging information optionally.
75 - Policy for packages where the upstream uses html changelog
76 files has been expanded. In short, a plain text changelog file
77 should always be generated for the upstream changes.
78 - Please note that the new release of the X window system (4.x)
79 shall probably need sweeping changes in policy.
80 - Policy for packages providing an X server has been codified
81 (formalizes existing practice - use virtual package xserver)
82 - Policy for packages providing an X terminal emulator has been
83 codified (use virtual package x-terminal-emulator)
84 - Policy for packages providing an X window manager has been
85 codified (use virtual package x-window-anager, and also as an
86 alternative for /usr/bin/x-window-manager. The policy has
87 guidelines on how to calculate priority)
88 - Policy for packages providing an X fonts has been
89 codified. Please look into the manual for details; this section
90 has been written from scratch.
91 - Policy for packages using the X Window System and FHS issues
92 has been clarified. Please read the manual for details.
93 - Policy for packages providing an X application default has been
95 - No package may contain or make hard links to conffiles.
98 - Noted that newer dpkg versions do not require extreme care in
99 always creating the shared lib before the symlink, so the unpack
105 - Correction to semantics of architecture lists in Build-Depends
106 etc. Should not affect many packages.
111 - /usr/doc/<package> has to be a symlink pointing to
112 /usr/share/doc/<package>. This symlink has to be
113 maintained by postinst and prerm, because dpkg will cause
114 problems otherwise. Create/remote the symlinks using debhelper
115 or see section "6.4. Accessing the documentation" for more
117 - Introduced source dependencies. (Whereas this ought to demand a
118 major policy number rise, we've only just had one of them, so
119 I'm going to use a minor number instead.)
120 - /etc/rc.boot has been deprecated in favour of /etc/rcS.d.
121 Packages should not be touching this directory, anyway, but
122 should use update-rc.d instead.
123 - update-rc.d is now the *only* allowable way of accessing the
124 /etc/rc?.d/[SK]??* links. Any scripts which manipulate them
125 directly must be changed to use update-rc.d instead. (This is
126 because the file-rc package handles this information in an
128 - Compiled examples go in /usr/lib/<package>/examples with
129 symlinks from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples/* or from
130 /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples itself.
131 - Updated FHS to a 2.1 draft; this reverts /var/state to
133 - Added MIME sub-policy document.
134 - VISUAL is allowed as a (higher priority) alternative to EDITOR.
135 - Modified liblockfile description, which affects
136 mailbox-accessing programs. Please see the policy document for
138 - If a package provides a changelog in HTML format, a text-only
139 version should also be included. Such a version may be prepared
140 using lynx -dump -nolist.)
143 - Description of how to handle version numbers based on dates
144 added: see section 5.1.
150 - Added the clarification that the .la files are essential for the
151 packages using libtool's libltdl library, in which case the
152 .la files must go in the run-time library package.
158 - Debian formally moves from the FSSTND to the FHS. This is a
159 major change, and the implications of this move are probably
161 - Only 3 digits of the Standards version need be included in
162 control files, though all four digits are still permitted.
163 - The location of the GPL has changed to
164 /usr/share/common-licenses. This may require changing the
165 copyright files to point to the correct location of the GPL and
167 - Packages that use libtool to create shared libraries must
168 include the .la files in the -dev packages.
169 - Use logrotate to rotate log files
170 - section 5.8 has been rewritten (Programs for the X Window
172 - There is now anassociated menu policy, in a separate document,
173 that carries the full weight of Debian policy.
174 - The files `/var/run/utmp', `/var/log/wtmp' and
175 `/var/log/lastlog' must be installed writeable by group
176 utmp. Programs who need to modify those files must be installed
183 - Rearranged the manual to create a new Section 4, Files
184 + Section 3.3 ("Files") was moved to Section 4. The Sections
185 that were Section 4 and Section 5 were moved down to become
186 Section 5 and Section 6.
187 + What was Section 5.5 ("Log files") is now a subsection of the
188 new Section 4 ("Files"), becoming section 4.8, placed after
189 "Configuration files", moving the Section 4.8 ("Permissions
190 and owners") to Section 4.9. All subsections of the old
191 Section 5 after 5.5 were moved down to fill in the number
193 - Modified the section about changelog files to accomodate
194 upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML/ These
195 upstream chagelog files should now be accessible as
196 /usr/doc/package/changelog.html.gz
197 + Symlinks are permissible to link the real, or upstream,
198 changelog name to the Debian mandated name.
199 - Clarified that HTML documentation should be present in some
200 package, though not necessarily the main binary package.
201 - Corrected all references to the location of the copyright
202 files. The correct location is /usr/doc/package/copyright
203 - Ratified the architecture specification strings to cater to the
209 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic links:
210 + symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be relative,
211 symbolic links between toplevel directories should be absolute
212 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 2)
214 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
215 + manpages for games should be installed in /usr/man/man6
216 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 3)
219 - Updated prefix of chapter 12, Shared Libraries:
220 ldconfig must be called in the postinst script if the package
221 installs shared libraries
222 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue #6, fixes:bug#20515)
226 - Updated section 3.3.4 Scripts:
227 + /bin/sh may be any POSIX compatible shell
228 + scripts including bashisms have to specify /bin/bash as
230 + scripts which create files in world-writable directories
231 (e.g., in /tmp) should use tempfile or mktemp for creating
234 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic Links:
235 + symbolic links referencing compressed files must have the same
236 file extension as the referenced file
238 - Updated section 3.3.6 Device files:
239 + /dev/tty* serial devices should be used instead of /dev/cu*
241 - Updated section 3.4.2 Writing the scripts [in /etc/init.d]:
242 + all /etc/init.d scripts have to provide the following options:
243 start, stop, restart, force-reload
244 + the reload option is optional and must never stop and restart
247 - Updated section 3.5 Cron jobs:
248 + cron jobs that need to be executed more often than daily should
249 be installed into /etc/cron.d
251 - Updated section 3.7 Menus:
252 + removed section about how to register HTML docs to `menu'
253 (the corresponding section in 4.4, Web servers and applications,
254 has been removed in policy 2.2.0.0 already, so this one was
257 - New section 3.8 Keyboard configuration:
258 + details about how the backspace and delete keys should be
261 - New section 3.9 Environment variables:
262 + no program must depend on environment variables to get a
263 reasonable default configuration
265 - New section 4.6 News system configuration:
266 + /etc/news/organization and /etc/news/server should be supported
267 by all news servers and clients
269 - Updated section 4.7 Programs for the X Windows system:
270 + programs requiring a non-free Motif library should be provided
271 as foo-smotif and foo-dmotif package
272 + if lesstif works reliably for such program, it should be linked
273 against lesstif and not against a non-free Motif library
275 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
276 + games for X Windows have to be installed in /usr/games, just as
279 2.3.0.1, 2.3.0.0 Sep 97
281 * new section `4.2 Daemons' including rules for
282 /etc/services, /etc/protocols, /etc/rpc, and /etc/inetd.conf
284 * updated section about `Configuration files':
285 packages may not touch other packages' configuration files
287 * MUAs and MTAs have to use liblockfile
291 * added section 4.1 `Architecture specification strings':
294 where <arch> is one of the following:
295 i386, alpha, arm, m68k, powerpc, sparc.
297 * detailed rules for /usr/local
301 * editor/pager policy
307 * don't install shared libraries as executable
309 * app-defaults files may not be conffiles
311 2.1.3.2, 2.1.3.1, 2.1.3.0 Mar 97
313 * two programs with different functionality must not have the
318 * "Standard for Console Messages"
320 * Libraries should be compiled with `-D_REENTRANT'
322 * Libraries should be stripped with "strip --strip-unneeded"
324 2.1.2.2, 2.1.2.1, 2.1.2.0 Nov 96
326 * Some changes WRT shared libraries
330 * No hard links in source packages
332 * Do not use dpkg-divert or update-alternatives without consultation
334 * Shared libraries must be installed stripped
338 * Upstream changelog must be installed too
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