Merge branch 'master' into bug555977-rra

[debian/debian-policy.git] / policy.sgml

diff --git a/policy.sgml b/policy.sgml
index ae62c64e9d558815bfb41e5efa82ad4b69ff063f..945140505bc02106fd7c61323b6f991915e72e9f 100644 (file)
--- a/policy.sgml
+++ b/policy.sgml
@@ -878,36 +878,30 @@
 
          <p>
            In general, Debian packages should use the same version
-           numbers as the upstream sources.
-         </p>
-
-         <p>
-           However, in some cases where the upstream version number is
-           based on a date (e.g., a development "snapshot" release) the
-           package management system cannot handle these version
-           numbers without epochs. For example, dpkg will consider
-           "96May01" to be greater than "96Dec24".
+           numbers as the upstream sources.  However, upstream version
+           numbers based on some date formats (sometimes used for
+           development or "snapshot" releases) will not be ordered
+           correctly by the package management software.  For
+           example, <prng>dpkg</prng> will consider "96May01" to be
+           greater than "96Dec24".
          </p>
 
          <p>
            To prevent having to use epochs for every new upstream
-           version, the date based portion of the version number
-           should be changed to the following format in such cases:
-           "19960501", "19961224". It is up to the maintainer whether
-           they want to bother the upstream maintainer to change
-           the version numbers upstream, too.
-         </p>
-
-         <p>
-           Note that other version formats based on dates which are
-           parsed correctly by the package management system should
-           <em>not</em> be changed.
+           version, the date-based portion of any upstream version number
+           should be given in a way that sorts correctly: four-digit year
+           first, followed by a two-digit numeric month, followed by a
+           two-digit numeric date, possibly with punctuation between the
+           components.
          </p>
 
          <p>
-           Native Debian packages (i.e., packages which have been
-           written especially for Debian) whose version numbers include
-           dates should always use the "YYYYMMDD" format.
+           Native Debian packages (i.e., packages which have been written
+           especially for Debian) whose version numbers include dates
+           should also follow these rules.  If punctuation is desired
+           between the date components, remember that hyphen (<tt>-</tt>)
+           cannot be used in native package versions.  Period
+           (<tt>.</tt>) is normally a good choice.
          </p>
        </sect1>
 
@@ -5081,7 +5075,7 @@ Replaces: mail-transport-agent
            <p>
              There is no Build-Depends-Arch; this role is essentially
              met with Build-Depends.  Anyone building the
-             <tt>build-indep</tt> and binary-indep<tt></tt> targets is
+             <tt>build-indep</tt> and <tt>binary-indep</tt> targets is
              assumed to be building the whole package, and therefore
              installation of all build dependencies is required.
            </p>