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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 Oct 26 12:22:40 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 - The section describing the Description: package filed once again has
59 full details of the long description format. [5.7.2]
60 - Clarified that if a package has non-build-essential
61 build-dependencies, it should have them listed in the Build-Depends
62 and related fields (i.e. it's just optional). [2.4.2]
63 - When asked to restart a service that isn't already running,
64 the init script should start the service. [10.3.2]
68 - It is no longer necessary to keep a log of changes to the upstream
69 sources in the copyright file. Instead, all such changes should be
70 documented in the changelog file. [13.7]
71 - <tt>Build-Depends</tt>, <tt>Build-Conflicts</tt>,
72 <tt>Build-Depends-Indep</tt>, and
73 <tt>Build-Conflicts-Indep</tt> must also be satisfied when the
74 clean target is called. [7.6]
75 - A new apps/Science menu section is available [menu policy]
76 - debconf specification cleared up, various changes. [debconf
78 - It is no longer recommended to create symlinks from nonexistent
79 manual pages to undocumented(7). Missing manual pages for programs
80 are still a bug. [13.1]
84 - Packages no longer have to ask permission to call MAKEDEV in
85 postinst, merely notifying the user ought to be enough. [11.6]
86 - cryptographic software may now be included in the main
88 - task packages are no longer permitted; tasks are now created by a
89 special Tasks: field in the control file. [2.3.8]
90 - window managers that support netwm can now add 20 points when
91 they add themselves as an alternative for
92 /usr/bin/x-window-manager [12.8.4]
93 - The default compilation options have now changed, one should
94 provide debugging symbols in all cases, and optionally step
95 back optimization to -O0, depending on the DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS
96 environment variable. [11.1]
97 - Added mention of build-arch, build-indep, etc, in describing
98 the relationships with `Build-Depends', `Build-Conflicts',
99 `Build-Depends-Indep', and `Build-Conflicts-Indep'. May need to
100 review the new rules. [7.6, 5.2]
101 - Changed rules on how, and when, to invoke ldconfig in maintiner
102 scripts. Long rationale. [9]
103 - [Added the last note in 3.5.6 upgrading checklist item regarding
104 build rules, please see below]
108 - Emacs and TeX are no longer mandated by policy to be priority
109 standard packages [2.2]
110 - Programs that access docs need to do so via /usr/share/doc, and
111 not via /usr/doc/ as was the policy previously [12.5]
112 - Putting documentation in /usr/doc versus /usr/share/doc is now
113 a ``serious'' policy violation. [13.3]
114 - For web servers, one should not provide non-local access to the
115 /usr/share/doc hierarchy. If one can't provide access controls for
116 the http://localhost/doc/ directory, then it is preferred that one
117 ask permission to expose that information during the install. [12.5]
118 - There are new rules for build-indep/build-arch targets and
119 there is a new Build-Depend-Indep semantic. [7]
124 - Manpages should not rely on header information to have
125 alternative manpage names available; it should only use
126 symlinks or .so pages to do this [13.1]
127 - [Clarified note in 3.5.3.0 upgrading checklist regarding
128 examples and templates: this refers only to those examples used
129 by scripts; see section 11.7.3 for the whole story]
130 - Included a new section 11.9.1 describing the use of
131 dpkg-statoverride; this does not have the weight of policy
132 - Clarify Standards-Version: you don't need to rebuild your
133 packages just to change the Standards-Version!
134 - Plugins are no longer bound by all the rules of shared
136 - X Windows related things:
137 * Clarification of priority levels of X Window System related
139 * Rules for defining x-terminal-emulator improved [12.8.3]
140 * X Font policy rewritten: you must read this if you provide
141 fonts for the X Window System [12.8.5]
142 * Packages must not ship /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults/ [12.8.6]
143 * X-related packages should usually use the regular FHS
144 locations; imake-using packages are exempted from this [12.8.7]
145 * OpenMotif linked binaries have the same rules as
146 OSF/Motif-linked ones [12.8.8]
151 - The system-wide mail directory is now /var/mail, no longer
152 /var/spool/mail. Any packages accessing the mail spool should
153 access it via /var/mail and include a suitable Depends field;
155 - The perl policy is now part of Debian policy proper. Perl
156 programs and modules should follow the current Perl policy
162 - Build-Depends arch syntax has been changed to be less
163 ambiguous. This should not affect any current packages [7.1]
164 - Examples and templates files for use by scripts should now live
165 in /usr/share/<package> or /usr/lib/<package>, with
166 symbolic links from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples as
172 - X app-defaults directory has moved from
173 /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults to /etc/X11/app-defaults [12.8.6]
178 - dpkg-shlibdeps now uses objdump, so shared libraries have to be
179 run through dpkg-shlibdeps as well as executables [9.1]
184 - Font packages for the X Window System must now declare a
185 dependency on xutils (>= 4.0.2) [12.8.5]
190 - Daemon startup scripts in /etc/init.d/ should not contain
191 modifiable parameters; these should be moved to a file in
192 /etc/default/; see [10.3.2] for details
193 - Files in /usr/share/doc must not be referenced by any
194 program. If such files are needed, they must be placed in
195 /usr/share/<package>/, and symbolic links created as required
196 in /usr/share/doc/<package>/ [13.3]
197 - Much of the packaging manual has now been imported into the
203 - A package of priority standard or higher may provide two
204 binaries, one compiled with support for the X Window System,
205 and the other without [12.8.1]
210 - By default executables should not be built with the debugging
211 option -g. Instead, it is recommended to support building the
212 package with debugging information optionally. Details in [11.1]
213 - Policy for packages where the upstream uses HTML changelog
214 files has been expanded. In short, a plain text changelog file
215 should always be generated for the upstream changes [13.8]
216 - Please note that the new release of the X window system (4.x)
217 shall probably need sweeping changes in policy
218 - Policy for packages providing the following X-based features
220 - X server (virtual package xserver) [12.8.2]
221 - X terminal emulator (virtual package x-terminal-emulator) [12.8.3]
222 - X window manager (virtual package x-window-manager, and
223 /usr/bin/x-window-manager alternative, with priority
224 calculation guidelines) [12.8.4]
225 - X fonts (this section has been written from scratch) [12.8.5]
226 - X application defaults [12.8.6]
227 - Policy for packages using the X Window System and FHS issues
228 has been clarified; see [12.8.7]
229 - No package may contain or make hard links to conffiles [11.7.3]
230 - Noted that newer dpkg versions do not require extreme care in
231 always creating the shared lib before the symlink, so the unpack
237 - Correction to semantics of architecture lists in Build-Depends
238 etc. Should not affect many packages [7.1]
243 - /usr/doc/<package> has to be a symlink pointing to
244 /usr/share/doc/<package>, to be maintained by postinst
245 and prerm scripts. Details are in [13.4]
246 - Introduced source dependencies (Build-Depends, etc.) [7.1, 7.6]
247 - /etc/rc.boot has been deprecated in favour of /etc/rcS.d.
248 (Packages should not be touching this directory, but should use
249 update-rc.d instead) [10.3.4]
250 - update-rc.d is now the *only* allowable way of accessing the
251 /etc/rc?.d/[SK]??* links. Any scripts which manipulate them
252 directly must be changed to use update-rc.d instead. (This is
253 because the file-rc package handles this information in an
254 incompatible way.) [10.3.3]
255 - Architecture-specific examples go in /usr/lib/<package>/examples
256 with symlinks from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples/* or from
257 /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples itself [13.7]
258 - Updated FHS to a 2.1 draft; this reverts /var/state to
260 - Added MIME sub-policy document [10.7; mime-policy]
261 - VISUAL is allowed as a (higher priority) alternative to EDITOR [12.4]
262 - Modified liblockfile description, which affects
263 mailbox-accessing programs. Please see the policy document for
265 - If a package provides a changelog in HTML format, a text-only
266 version should also be included. (Such a version may be prepared
267 using lynx -dump -nolist.) [13.8]
268 - Description of how to handle version numbers based on dates
274 - Added the clarification that the .la files are essential for the
275 packages using libtool's libltdl library, in which case the
276 .la files must go in the run-time library package [11.2]
281 - Debian formally moves from the FSSTND to the FHS. This is a
282 major change, and the implications of this move are probably
283 not all known. [10.1]
284 - Only 3 digits of the Standards version need be included in
285 control files, though all four digits are still permitted. [2.4.1]
286 - The location of the GPL has changed to
287 /usr/share/common-licenses. This may require changing the
288 copyright files to point to the correct location of the GPL and
289 other major licenses [13.6]
290 - Packages that use libtool to create shared libraries must
291 include the .la files in the -dev packages [11.2]
292 - Use logrotate to rotate log files [11.8]
293 - section 5.8 has been rewritten (Programs for the X Window
295 - There is now an associated menu policy, in a separate document,
296 that carries the full weight of Debian policy [10.6; menu-policy]
297 - Programs which need to modify the files /var/run/utmp,
298 /var/log/wtmp and /var/log/lastlog must be installed setgid utmp [12.3]
304 - Rearranged the manual to create a new Section 4, Files
305 + Section 3.3 ("Files") was moved to Section 4. The Sections
306 that were Section 4 and Section 5 were moved down to become
307 Section 5 and Section 6.
308 + What was Section 5.5 ("Log files") is now a subsection of the
309 new Section 4 ("Files"), becoming section 4.8, placed after
310 "Configuration files", moving the Section 4.8 ("Permissions
311 and owners") to Section 4.9. All subsections of the old
312 Section 5 after 5.5 were moved down to fill in the number
314 - Modified the section about changelog files to accommodate
315 upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML/ These
316 upstream changelog files should now be accessible as
317 /usr/doc/package/changelog.html.gz
318 + Symlinks are permissible to link the real, or upstream,
319 changelog name to the Debian mandated name.
320 - Clarified that HTML documentation should be present in some
321 package, though not necessarily the main binary package.
322 - Corrected all references to the location of the copyright
323 files. The correct location is /usr/doc/package/copyright
324 - Ratified the architecture specification strings to cater to the
330 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic links:
331 + symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be relative,
332 symbolic links between toplevel directories should be absolute
333 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 2)
335 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
336 + manpages for games should be installed in /usr/man/man6
337 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 3)
340 - Updated prefix of chapter 12, Shared Libraries:
341 ldconfig must be called in the postinst script if the package
342 installs shared libraries
343 (cf., Policy Weekly Issue #6, fixes:bug#20515)
347 - Updated section 3.3.4 Scripts:
348 + /bin/sh may be any POSIX compatible shell
349 + scripts including bashisms have to specify /bin/bash as
351 + scripts which create files in world-writable directories
352 (e.g., in /tmp) should use tempfile or mktemp for creating
355 - Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic Links:
356 + symbolic links referencing compressed files must have the same
357 file extension as the referenced file
359 - Updated section 3.3.6 Device files:
360 + /dev/tty* serial devices should be used instead of /dev/cu*
362 - Updated section 3.4.2 Writing the scripts [in /etc/init.d]:
363 + all /etc/init.d scripts have to provide the following options:
364 start, stop, restart, force-reload
365 + the reload option is optional and must never stop and restart
368 - Updated section 3.5 Cron jobs:
369 + cron jobs that need to be executed more often than daily should
370 be installed into /etc/cron.d
372 - Updated section 3.7 Menus:
373 + removed section about how to register HTML docs to `menu'
374 (the corresponding section in 4.4, Web servers and applications,
375 has been removed in policy 2.2.0.0 already, so this one was
378 - New section 3.8 Keyboard configuration:
379 + details about how the backspace and delete keys should be
382 - New section 3.9 Environment variables:
383 + no program must depend on environment variables to get a
384 reasonable default configuration
386 - New section 4.6 News system configuration:
387 + /etc/news/organization and /etc/news/server should be supported
388 by all news servers and clients
390 - Updated section 4.7 Programs for the X Window System:
391 + programs requiring a non-free Motif library should be provided
392 as foo-smotif and foo-dmotif package
393 + if lesstif works reliably for such program, it should be linked
394 against lesstif and not against a non-free Motif library
396 - Updated section 4.9 Games:
397 + games for X Windows have to be installed in /usr/games, just as
400 2.3.0.1, 2.3.0.0 Sep 97
402 * new section `4.2 Daemons' including rules for
403 /etc/services, /etc/protocols, /etc/rpc, and /etc/inetd.conf
405 * updated section about `Configuration files':
406 packages may not touch other packages' configuration files
408 * MUAs and MTAs have to use liblockfile
412 * added section 4.1 `Architecture specification strings':
415 where <arch> is one of the following:
416 i386, alpha, arm, m68k, powerpc, sparc.
418 * detailed rules for /usr/local
422 * editor/pager policy
428 * don't install shared libraries as executable
430 * app-defaults files may not be conffiles
432 2.1.3.2, 2.1.3.1, 2.1.3.0 Mar 97
434 * two programs with different functionality must not have the
439 * "Standard for Console Messages"
441 * Libraries should be compiled with `-D_REENTRANT'
443 * Libraries should be stripped with "strip --strip-unneeded"
445 2.1.2.2, 2.1.2.1, 2.1.2.0 Nov 96
447 * Some changes WRT shared libraries
451 * No hard links in source packages
453 * Do not use dpkg-divert or update-alternatives without consultation
455 * Shared libraries must be installed stripped
459 * Upstream changelog must be installed too
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