The checklist below has been created to simplify the upgrading process of old packages. Note that this list is not `official'; it simply gives an indication of what has changed and whether you are likely to need to make changes to your package in light of this. If you have doubts about a certain topic, if you need more details, or if you think some other package does not comply with policy, please refer to the Policy Manual itself. All of the changes from version 3.0.0 onwards indicate which section of the Policy Manual discusses the issue: [3.4] means section 3.4. The section numbering changed when the packaging manual was incorporated into policy; the section numbers used below refer to the current version.
Here is how the check list works: Check which policy version your package complies with currently (indicated in the "Standards-Version" field of the source package). Then move upwards until the top and check which of the items on the list might concern your package. Note which sections of policy discuss this, and then check out the Policy Manual for details. If you are upgrading from Policy version < 2.5.0, it may be easier to check through the whole of policy instead of picking your way through this list.
3.7.4.0 unreleased
* The base section has been removed. contrib and non-free have been
removed from the section list; they are only categories. The base
system is now defined by priority. [2.4, 3.7]
* If dpkg-source -x doesn't provide the source that will be compiled,
a debian/rules patch target is recommended and should do whatever
else is necessary. [4.9]
* Standardized the format of DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS. Specified permitted
characters for tags, required that tags be whitespace-separated,
allowed packages to assume non-conflicting tags, and required
unknown flags be ignored. [4.9.1, 10.1]
* Added parallel=n to the standardized DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS tags,
indicating that a package should be built using up to n parallel
processes if the package supports it [4.9.1]
* Debian packages should not use convience copies of code from other
packages unless the included package is explicitly intended to be
used that way. [4.13]
* If dpkg-source -x doesn't produce source ready for editing and
building with dpkg-buildpackage, packages should include a
debian/README.source file explaining how to generate the patched
source, add a new modification, and remove an existing
modification. This file may also be used to document packaging a
new upstream release and any other complexity of the Debian build
process. [4.14]
* The Uploaders field in debian/control may be wrapped. [5.6.3]
* New Homepage field for upstream web sites. [5.6.23]
* The Breaks field declares that this package breaks another and
prevents installation of the breaking package unless the package
named in Breaks is deconfigured first. This field should not be
used until the dpkg in Debian stable supports it. [6.5, 6.6, 7]
* Files in /etc/cron.{hourly,daily,weekly,monthly} must be
configuration files (upgraded from should). Mention the hourly
directory. [9.5]
* Manual pages in locale-specific directories should use either the
legacy encoding for that directory or UTF-8. Country names should
not be included in locale-specific manual page directories unless
indicating a significant difference in the language. All
characters in the manual page source should be representable in the
legacy encoding for a locale even if the man page is encoded in
UTF-8. [12.1]
* The Apache 2.0 license is now in common-licenses and should be
referenced rather than quoted in debian/copyright. [12.5]
* Packages in contrib and non-free should state in the copyright file
that the package is not part of Debian GNU/Linux and briefly
explain why. [12.5]
3.7.3.0 Dec 2007
* Package version numbers may contain tildes, which sort before
anything, even the end of a part. [5.6.12]
* Scripts may assume that /bin/sh supports local (at a basic level)
and that its test builtin (if any) supports -a and -o binary
logical operators. [10.4]
* The substitution variable ${binary:Version} should be used in place
of ${Source-Version} for dependencies between packages of the same
library. [8.5]
* Substantial reorganization and renaming of sections in the Debian
menu structure. Packages with menu entries should be reviewed to
see if the menu section has been renamed or if one of the new
sections would be more appropriate. [menu policy]
* The Source field in a .changes file may contain a version number
in parentheses. [5.6.1]
* The acceptable values for the Urgency field are low, medium, high,
critical, or emergency. [5.6.17]
* The shlibs file now allows an optional type field, indicating the
type of package for which the line is valid. The only currently
supported type is udeb, used with packages for the Debian
Installer. [8.6]
* Packages following the Debian Configuration management
specification must allow for translation of their messages by using
a gettext-based system such as po-debconf. [3.9.1]
* GFDL 1.2, GPL 3, and LGPL 3 are now in common-licenses and should
be referenced rather than quoted in debian/copyright. [12.5]
3.7.2.2 Oct 2006
* Maintainer scripts must not be world writeable (up from a
should to a must) [6.1]
3.7.2.0 Apr 2006
* Revert the cgi-lib change. [11.5]
3.7.1.0 Apr 2006
* It is now possible to create shared libraries without
relocatable code (using -fPIC) in certain exceptional cases,
provided some procedures are followed, and for creating static
libraries with relocatable code (again, using -fPIC).
Discussion on debian-devel@lists.debian.org, getting a rough
consensus, and documenting it in README.Debian constitute most
of the process. [10.2]
* Packages should install any relevant files into the directories
/usr/include/X11/and /usr/lib/X11/, but if they do so, they
must pre-depend on x11-common (>= 1:7.0.0) [11.8.7]
3.7.0.0 Apr 2006
* Packages shipping web server CGI files are expected to install
them in /usr/lib/cgi-lib/ directories. This location change
perhaps should be documented in NEWS [11.5]
* Web server packages should include a standard scriptAlias of
cgi-lib to /usr/lib/cgi-lib. [11.5]
* The version of FHS mandated by policy has been upped to
2.3. There should be no changes required for most packages,
though new top level directories /media, /srv, etc may be of
interest. [9.1.1]
* All fields, apart from the Uploaders field, in the control file
are supposed to be a single logical line, which may be spread
over multiple physical lines (newline followed by space is
elided). However, any parser for the control file must allow
the Uploaders field to be spread over multiple physical lines
as well, to prepare for future changes. [ 5.1, 5.6.3 ]
* When scripts are installed into a directory in the system
PATH, the script name should not include an extension that
denotes the scripting language currently used to implement it.
[ 10.4 ]
* packages that invoke initscripts now must use invoke-rc.d to do
so since it also pays attention to run levels and other local
constraints. [ 9.3.3.2 ]
* We no longer use /usr/X11R6, since we have migrated away to
using Xorg paths. This means, for one thing, fonts live in
/usr/share/fonts/X11/ now, and /usr/X11R6 is gone.
[ 11.8.5.2, 11.8.7, etc]
3.6.2.0 2005
* Recommend doc-base, and not menu, for registering package documentation.
* Run time support programs should live in subdirectories of
/usr/lib/ or /usr/share, and preferably the shared lib is named
the same as the package name (to avoid name collisions). [8.1]
* It is recommended that HTTP servers provide an alias /images to
allow packages to share image files with the web server [11.5]
3.6.1.0 Aug 2003
+ Prompting the user should be done using debconf. Non debconf
user prompts are now deprecated. [3.10.1]
3.6.0 Jul 2003
- Restructuring causing shifts in section numbers and bumping of
the minor version number:
+ Many packaging manual appendices that were integrated into policy
sections are now empty, and replaced with links to the Policy.
In particular, the appendices that included the list of control
fields were updated (new fields like Closes, Changed-By were added)
and the list of fields for each of control, .changes and .dsc files
is now in Policy, and they're marked mandatory, recommended or
optional based on the current practice and the behavior of the
deb-building tool-chain.
+ Elimination of needlessly deep section levels, primarily in the
chapter Debian Archive, from which two new chapters were split out,
Binary packages and Source packages. What remained was reordered
properly, that is, some sect1s became sects etc.
+ Several sections that were redundant, crufty or simply not designed
with any sort of vision, were rearranged according to the formula that
everything should be either in the same place or properly interlinked.
Some things remained split up between different chapters when they
talked about different aspects of files: their content, their syntax,
and their placement in the file system. In particular, see the new
sections about changelog files.
- Added Games/Simulation and Apps/Education to menu sub-policy
[menu policy]
- Debian changelogs should be UTF-8 encoded. [C.2.2]
- shared libraries must be linked against all libraries that they
use symbols from in the same way that binaries are. [10.2]
- build-depends-indep need not be satisfied during clean
target. [7.6]
3.5.10 May 2003
- packages providing the x-terminal-emulator virtual package
ought to ensure that they interpret the command line exactly
like xterm does. [11.8.3]
- Window managers compliant with the Window Manager Specification
Project may add 40 points for ranking in the alternatives [11.8.4]
3.5.9.0 Mar 2003
- The section describing the Description: package field once again has
full details of the long description format. [3.4.2]
- Clarified that if a package has non-build-essential
build-dependencies, it should have them listed in the Build-Depends
and related fields (i.e. it's not merely optional). [4.2]
- When asked to restart a service that isn't already running,
the init script should start the service. [9.3.2]
- If the purpose of a package is to provide examples, then the
example files can be installed into /usr/share/doc/package
(rather than /usr/share/doc/package/examples). [12.6]
3.5.8.0 Nov 2002
- It is no longer necessary to keep a log of changes to the upstream
sources in the copyright file. Instead, all such changes should be
documented in the changelog file. [12.7]
- Build-Depends, Build-Conflicts,
Build-Depends-Indep, and
Build-Conflicts-Indep must also be satisfied when the
clean target is called. [7.6]
- A new Apps/Science menu section is available [menu policy]
- debconf specification cleared up, various changes. [debconf
policy]
- It is no longer recommended to create symlinks from nonexistent
manual pages to undocumented(7). Missing manual pages for programs
are still a bug. [12.1]
3.5.7.0 Aug 2002
- Packages no longer have to ask permission to call MAKEDEV in
postinst, merely notifying the user ought to be enough. [10.6]
- cryptographic software may now be included in the main
archive. [2.2.4]
- task packages are no longer permitted; tasks are now created by a
special Tasks: field in the control file. [3.9]
- window managers that support netwm can now add 20 points when
they add themselves as an alternative for
/usr/bin/x-window-manager [11.8.4]
- The default compilation options have now changed, one should
provide debugging symbols in all cases, and optionally step
back optimization to -O0, depending on the DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS
environment variable. [10.1]
- Added mention of build-arch, build-indep, etc, in describing
the relationships with `Build-Depends', `Build-Conflicts',
`Build-Depends-Indep', and `Build-Conflicts-Indep'. May need to
review the new rules. [7.6, 4.8]
- Changed rules on how, and when, to invoke ldconfig in maintainer
scripts. Long rationale. [8]
- [Added the last note in 3.5.6 upgrading checklist item regarding
build rules, please see below]
3.5.6.0 Jul 2001
- Emacs and TeX are no longer mandated by policy to be priority
standard packages [2.5]
- Programs that access docs need to do so via /usr/share/doc, and
not via /usr/doc/ as was the policy previously [11.5]
- Putting documentation in /usr/doc versus /usr/share/doc is now
a ``serious'' policy violation. [12.3]
- For web servers, one should not provide non-local access to the
/usr/share/doc hierarchy. If one can't provide access controls for
the http://localhost/doc/ directory, then it is preferred that one
ask permission to expose that information during the install. [11.5]
- There are new rules for build-indep/build-arch targets and
there is a new Build-Depend-Indep semantic. [7]
3.5.5.0 May 2001
- Manpages should not rely on header information to have
alternative manpage names available; it should only use
symlinks or .so pages to do this [12.1]
- [Clarified note in 3.5.3.0 upgrading checklist regarding
examples and templates: this refers only to those examples used
by scripts; see section 10.7.3 for the whole story]
- Included a new section 10.9.1 describing the use of
dpkg-statoverride; this does not have the weight of policy
- Clarify Standards-Version: you don't need to rebuild your
packages just to change the Standards-Version!
- Plugins are no longer bound by all the rules of shared
libraries [10.2]
- X Windows related things:
* Clarification of priority levels of X Window System related
packages [11.8.1]
* Rules for defining x-terminal-emulator improved [11.8.3]
* X Font policy rewritten: you must read this if you provide
fonts for the X Window System [11.8.5]
* Packages must not ship /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults/ [11.8.6]
* X-related packages should usually use the regular FHS
locations; imake-using packages are exempted from this [11.8.7]
* OpenMotif linked binaries have the same rules as
OSF/Motif-linked ones [11.8.8]
3.5.4.0 Apr 2001
- The system-wide mail directory is now /var/mail, no longer
/var/spool/mail. Any packages accessing the mail spool should
access it via /var/mail and include a suitable Depends field;
details in [11.6]
- The perl policy is now part of Debian policy proper. Perl
programs and modules should follow the current Perl policy
[11.9; perl-policy]
3.5.3.0 Apr 2001
- Build-Depends arch syntax has been changed to be less
ambiguous. This should not affect any current packages [7.1]
- Examples and templates files for use by scripts should now live
in /usr/share/<package> or /usr/lib/<package>, with
symbolic links from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples as
needed [10.7.3]
3.5.2.0 Feb 2001
- X app-defaults directory has moved from
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults to /etc/X11/app-defaults [11.8.6]
3.5.1.0 Feb 2001
- dpkg-shlibdeps now uses objdump, so shared libraries have to be
run through dpkg-shlibdeps as well as executables [8.1]
3.5.0.0 Jan 2001
- Font packages for the X Window System must now declare a
dependency on xutils (>= 4.0.2) [11.8.5]
3.2.1.1 Jan 2001
- Daemon startup scripts in /etc/init.d/ should not contain
modifiable parameters; these should be moved to a file in
/etc/default/; see [9.3.2] for details
- Files in /usr/share/doc must not be referenced by any
program. If such files are needed, they must be placed in
/usr/share/<package>/, and symbolic links created as required
in /usr/share/doc/<package>/ [12.3]
- Much of the packaging manual has now been imported into the
policy document
3.2.1.0 Aug 00
- A package of priority standard or higher may provide two
binaries, one compiled with support for the X Window System,
and the other without [11.8.1]
3.2.0.0 Aug 00
- By default executables should not be built with the debugging
option -g. Instead, it is recommended to support building the
package with debugging information optionally. Details in [10.1]
- Policy for packages where the upstream uses HTML changelog
files has been expanded. In short, a plain text changelog file
should always be generated for the upstream changes [12.8]
- Please note that the new release of the X window system (3.2)
shall probably need sweeping changes in policy
- Policy for packages providing the following X-based features
has been codified:
- X server (virtual package xserver) [11.8.2]
- X terminal emulator (virtual package x-terminal-emulator) [11.8.3]
- X window manager (virtual package x-window-manager, and
/usr/bin/x-window-manager alternative, with priority
calculation guidelines) [11.8.4]
- X fonts (this section has been written from scratch) [12.8.5]
- X application defaults [11.8.6]
- Policy for packages using the X Window System and FHS issues
has been clarified; see [11.8.7]
- No package may contain or make hard links to conffiles [11.7.3]
- Noted that newer dpkg versions do not require extreme care in
always creating the shared lib before the symlink, so the unpack
order be correct [8]
3.1.1.0 Nov 1999
- Correction to semantics of architecture lists in Build-Depends
etc. Should not affect many packages [7.1]
3.1.0.0 Oct 1999
- /usr/doc/<package> has to be a symlink pointing to
/usr/share/doc/<package>, to be maintained by postinst
and prerm scripts. Details are in [defunct]
- Introduced source dependencies (Build-Depends, etc.) [7.1, 7.6]
- /etc/rc.boot has been deprecated in favour of /etc/rcS.d.
(Packages should not be touching this directory, but should use
update-rc.d instead) [9.3.4]
- update-rc.d is now the *only* allowable way of accessing the
/etc/rc?.d/[SK]??* links. Any scripts which manipulate them
directly must be changed to use update-rc.d instead. (This is
because the file-rc package handles this information in an
incompatible way.) [9.3.3]
- Architecture-specific examples go in /usr/lib/<package>/examples
with symlinks from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples/* or from
/usr/share/doc/<package>/examples itself [12.7]
- Updated FHS to a 2.1 draft; this reverts /var/state to
/var/lib [9.1.1]
- Added MIME sub-policy document [9.7; mime-policy]
- VISUAL is allowed as a (higher priority) alternative to EDITOR [12.4]
- Modified liblockfile description, which affects
mailbox-accessing programs. Please see the policy document for
details [11.6]
- If a package provides a changelog in HTML format, a text-only
version should also be included. (Such a version may be prepared
using lynx -dump -nolist.) [12.7]
- Description of how to handle version numbers based on dates
added [3.2.1]
3.0.1.0 Jul 1999
- Added the clarification that the .la files are essential for the
packages using libtool's libltdl library, in which case the
.la files must go in the run-time library package [10.2]
3.0.0.0 Jun 1999
- Debian formally moves from the FSSTND to the FHS. This is a
major change, and the implications of this move are probably
not all known. [9.1]
- Only 3 digits of the Standards version need be included in
control files, though all four digits are still permitted. [4.1]
- The location of the GPL has changed to
/usr/share/common-licenses. This may require changing the
copyright files to point to the correct location of the GPL and
other major licenses [12.6]
- Packages that use libtool to create shared libraries must
include the .la files in the -dev packages [10.2]
- Use logrotate to rotate log files [10.8]
- section 5.8 has been rewritten (Programs for the X Window
System) [now 11.8]
- There is now an associated menu policy, in a separate document,
that carries the full weight of Debian policy [9.6; menu-policy]
- Programs which need to modify the files /var/run/utmp,
/var/log/wtmp and /var/log/lastlog must be installed setgid utmp [11.3]
** Please note that section numbers below this point may not be up to date **
2.5.0.0 Oct 1998
Policy Manual:
- Rearranged the manual to create a new Section 4, Files
+ Section 3.3 ("Files") was moved to Section 4. The Sections
that were Section 4 and Section 5 were moved down to become
Section 5 and Section 6.
+ What was Section 5.5 ("Log files") is now a subsection of the
new Section 4 ("Files"), becoming section 4.8, placed after
"Configuration files", moving the Section 4.8 ("Permissions
and owners") to Section 4.9. All subsections of the old
Section 5 after 5.5 were moved down to fill in the number
gap.
- Modified the section about changelog files to accommodate
upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML/ These
upstream changelog files should now be accessible as
/usr/doc/package/changelog.html.gz
+ Symlinks are permissible to link the real, or upstream,
changelog name to the Debian mandated name.
- Clarified that HTML documentation should be present in some
package, though not necessarily the main binary package.
- Corrected all references to the location of the copyright
files. The correct location is /usr/doc/package/copyright
- Ratified the architecture specification strings to cater to the
HURD.
2.4.1.0 Apr 1998
Policy Manual:
- Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic links:
+ symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be relative,
symbolic links between toplevel directories should be absolute
(cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 2)
- Updated section 4.9 Games:
+ manpages for games should be installed in /usr/man/man6
(cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 3)
Packaging Manual:
- Updated prefix of chapter 12, Shared Libraries:
ldconfig must be called in the postinst script if the package
installs shared libraries
(cf., Policy Weekly Issue #6, fixes:bug#20515)
2.4.0.0 Jan 1998
- Updated section 3.3.4 Scripts:
+ /bin/sh may be any POSIX compatible shell
+ scripts including bashisms have to specify /bin/bash as
interpreter
+ scripts which create files in world-writable directories
(e.g., in /tmp) should use tempfile or mktemp for creating
the directory
- Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic Links:
+ symbolic links referencing compressed files must have the same
file extension as the referenced file
- Updated section 3.3.6 Device files:
+ /dev/tty* serial devices should be used instead of /dev/cu*
- Updated section 3.4.2 Writing the scripts [in /etc/init.d]:
+ all /etc/init.d scripts have to provide the following options:
start, stop, restart, force-reload
+ the reload option is optional and must never stop and restart
the service
- Updated section 3.5 Cron jobs:
+ cron jobs that need to be executed more often than daily should
be installed into /etc/cron.d
- Updated section 3.7 Menus:
+ removed section about how to register HTML docs to `menu'
(the corresponding section in 4.4, Web servers and applications,
has been removed in policy 2.2.0.0 already, so this one was
obsolete)
- New section 3.8 Keyboard configuration:
+ details about how the backspace and delete keys should be
handled
- New section 3.9 Environment variables:
+ no program must depend on environment variables to get a
reasonable default configuration
- New section 4.6 News system configuration:
+ /etc/news/organization and /etc/news/server should be supported
by all news servers and clients
- Updated section 4.7 Programs for the X Window System:
+ programs requiring a non-free Motif library should be provided
as foo-smotif and foo-dmotif package
+ if lesstif works reliably for such program, it should be linked
against lesstif and not against a non-free Motif library
- Updated section 4.9 Games:
+ games for X Windows have to be installed in /usr/games, just as
non-X games
2.3.0.1, 2.3.0.0 Sep 1997
* new section `4.2 Daemons' including rules for
/etc/services, /etc/protocols, /etc/rpc, and /etc/inetd.conf
* updated section about `Configuration files':
packages may not touch other packages' configuration files
* MUAs and MTAs have to use liblockfile
2.2.0.0 Jul 1997
* added section 4.1 `Architecture specification strings':
use
<arch>-linux
where <arch> is one of the following:
i386, alpha, arm, m68k, powerpc, sparc.
* detailed rules for /usr/local
* user ID's
* editor/pager policy
* cron jobs
* device files
* don't install shared libraries as executable
* app-defaults files may not be conffiles
2.1.3.2, 2.1.3.1, 2.1.3.0 Mar 1997
* two programs with different functionality must not have the
same name
* "Webstandard 3.0"
* "Standard for Console Messages"
* Libraries should be compiled with `-D_REENTRANT'
* Libraries should be stripped with "strip --strip-unneeded"
2.1.2.2, 2.1.2.1, 2.1.2.0 Nov 1996
* Some changes WRT shared libraries
2.1.1.0 Sep 1996
* No hard links in source packages
* Do not use dpkg-divert or update-alternatives without consultation
* Shared libraries must be installed stripped
2.1.0.0 Aug 1996
* Upstream changelog must be installed too