<abstract>
This manual describes the policy requirements for the Debian
- GNU/Linux distribution. This includes the structure and
+ distribution. This includes the structure and
contents of the Debian archive and several design issues of
the operating system, as well as technical requirements that
each package must satisfy to be included in the distribution.
<p>
A copy of the GNU General Public License is available as
- <file>/usr/share/common-licenses/GPL</file> in the Debian GNU/Linux
+ <file>/usr/share/common-licenses/GPL</file> in the Debian
distribution or on the World Wide Web at
<url id="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html"
name="the GNU General Public Licence">. You can also
<heading>Scope</heading>
<p>
This manual describes the policy requirements for the Debian
- GNU/Linux distribution. This includes the structure and
+ distribution. This includes the structure and
contents of the Debian archive and several design issues of the
operating system, as well as technical requirements that
each package must satisfy to be included in the
The actual editing is done by a group of maintainers that have
no editorial powers. These are the current maintainers:
- <enumlist>
- <item>Julian Gilbey</item>
- <item>Branden Robinson</item>
- <item>Josip Rodin</item>
- <item>Manoj Srivastava</item>
- </enumlist>
+ <enumlist>
+ <item>Russ Allbery</item>
+ <item>Bill Allombert</item>
+ <item>Andrew McMillan</item>
+ <item>Manoj Srivastava</item>
+ <item>Colin Watson</item>
+ </enumlist>
</p>
<p>
<heading>The Debian Archive</heading>
<p>
- The Debian GNU/Linux system is maintained and distributed as a
+ The Debian system is maintained and distributed as a
collection of <em>packages</em>. Since there are so many of
them (currently well over 15000), they are split into
<em>sections</em> and given <em>priorities</em> to simplify
</p>
<p>
- The <em>main</em> archive area forms the <em>Debian GNU/Linux
- distribution</em>.
+ The <em>main</em> archive area forms the <em>Debian distribution</em>.
</p>
<p>
<sect1 id="main">
<heading>The main archive area</heading>
+ <p>
+ The <em>main</em> archive area comprises the Debian
+ distribution. Only the packages in this area are considered
+ part of the distribution. None of the packages in
+ the <em>main</em> archive area require software outside of
+ that area to function. Anyone may use, share, modify and
+ redistribute the packages in this archive area
+ freely<footnote>
+ See <url id="http://www.debian.org/intro/free"
+ name="What Does Free Mean?"> for
+ more about what we mean by free software.
+ </footnote>.
+ </p>
+
<p>
Every package in <em>main</em> must comply with the DFSG
(Debian Free Software Guidelines).
<sect1 id="contrib">
<heading>The contrib archive area</heading>
+ <p>
+ The <em>contrib</em> archive area contains supplemental
+ packages intended to work with the Debian distribution, but
+ which require software outside of the distribution to either
+ build or function.
+ </p>
+
<p>
Every package in <em>contrib</em> must comply with the DFSG.
</p>
</list>
</p>
-
<p>
Examples of packages which would be included in
<em>contrib</em> are:
<sect1 id="non-free">
<heading>The non-free archive area</heading>
+ <p>
+ The <em>non-free</em> archive area contains supplemental
+ packages intended to work with the Debian distribution that do
+ not comply with the DFSG or have other problems that make
+ their distribution problematic. They may not comply with all
+ of the policy requirements in this manual due to restrictions
+ on modifications or other limitations.
+ </p>
+
<p>
Packages must be placed in <em>non-free</em> if they are
not compliant with the DFSG or are encumbered by patents
<heading>Binary packages</heading>
<p>
- The Debian GNU/Linux distribution is based on the Debian
+ The Debian distribution is based on the Debian
package management system, called <prgn>dpkg</prgn>. Thus,
all packages in the Debian distribution must be provided
in the <tt>.deb</tt> file format.
</sect>
- <sect>
+ <sect id="maintainer">
<heading>The maintainer of a package</heading>
<p>
- Every package must have a Debian maintainer (the
- maintainer may be one person or a group of people
- reachable from a common email address, such as a mailing
- list). The maintainer is responsible for ensuring that
- the package is placed in the appropriate distributions.
- </p>
-
- <p>
- The maintainer must be specified in the
- <tt>Maintainer</tt> control field with their correct name
- and a working email address. If one person maintains
- several packages, they should try to avoid having
- different forms of their name and email address in
+ Every package must have a maintainer, except for orphaned
+ packages as described below. The maintainer may be one person
+ or a group of people reachable from a common email address, such
+ as a mailing list. The maintainer is responsible for
+ maintaining the Debian packaging files, evaluating and
+ responding appropriately to reported bugs, uploading new
+ versions of the package (either directly or through a sponsor),
+ ensuring that the package is placed in the appropriate archive
+ area and included in Debian releases as appropriate for the
+ stability and utility of the package, and requesting removal of
+ the package from the Debian distribution if it is no longer
+ useful or maintainable.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ The maintainer must be specified in the <tt>Maintainer</tt>
+ control field with their correct name and a working email
+ address. The email address given in the <tt>Maintainer</tt>
+ control field must accept mail from those role accounts in
+ Debian used to send automated mails regarding the package. This
+ includes non-spam mail from the bug-tracking system, all mail
+ from the Debian archive maintenance software, and other role
+ accounts or automated processes that are commonly agreed on by
+ the project.<footnote>
+ A sample implementation of such a whitelist written for the
+ Mailman mailing list management software is used for mailing
+ lists hosted by alioth.debian.org.
+ </footnote>
+ If one person or team maintains several packages, they should
+ use the same form of their name and email address in
the <tt>Maintainer</tt> fields of those packages.
</p>
</p>
<p>
- If the maintainer of a package quits from the Debian
- project, "Debian QA Group"
- <email>packages@qa.debian.org</email> takes over the
- maintainer-ship of the package until someone else
- volunteers for that task. These packages are called
- <em>orphaned packages</em>.<footnote>
- The detailed procedure for doing this gracefully can
- be found in the Debian Developer's Reference,
- see <ref id="related">.
+ If the maintainer of the package is a team of people with a
+ shared email address, the <tt>Uploaders</tt> control field must
+ be present and must contain at least one human with their
+ personal email address. See <ref id="f-Uploaders"> for the
+ syntax of that field.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ An orphaned package is one with no current maintainer. Orphaned
+ packages should have their <tt>Maintainer</tt> control field set
+ to <tt>Debian QA Group <packages@qa.debian.org></tt>.
+ These packages are considered maintained by the Debian project
+ as a whole until someone else volunteers to take over
+ maintenance.<footnote>
+ The detailed procedure for gracefully orphaning a package can
+ be found in the Debian Developer's Reference
+ (see <ref id="related">).
</footnote>
</p>
</sect>
</sect>
- <sect>
+ <sect id="dependencies">
<heading>Dependencies</heading>
<p>
<p>
Sometimes, unpacking one package requires that another package
be first unpacked <em>and</em> configured. In this case, the
- dependent package must specify this dependency in
+ depending package must specify this dependency in
the <tt>Pre-Depends</tt> control field.
</p>
<p>
The <tt>base system</tt> is a minimum subset of the Debian
- GNU/Linux system that is installed before everything else
+ system that is installed before everything else
on a new system. Only very few packages are allowed to form
part of the base system, in order to keep the required disk
usage very small.
The maintainer name and email address used in the changelog
should be the details of the person uploading <em>this</em>
version. They are <em>not</em> necessarily those of the
- usual package maintainer. The information here will be
- copied to the <tt>Changed-By</tt> field in the
- <tt>.changes</tt> file (see <ref id="f-Changed-By">),
- and then later used to send an acknowledgement when the
- upload has been installed.
+ usual package maintainer.<footnote>
+ If the developer uploading the package is not one of the usual
+ maintainers of the package (as listed in
+ the <qref id="f-Maintainer"><tt>Maintainer</tt></qref>
+ or <qref id="f-Uploaders"><tt>Uploaders</tt></qref> control
+ fields of the package), the first line of the changelog is
+ conventionally used to explain why a non-maintainer is
+ uploading the package. The Debian Developer's Reference
+ (see <ref id="related">) documents the conventions
+ used.</footnote>
+ The information here will be copied to the <tt>Changed-By</tt>
+ field in the <tt>.changes</tt> file
+ (see <ref id="f-Changed-By">), and then later used to send an
+ acknowledgement when the upload has been installed.
</p>
<p>
identical behavior.
</p>
+ <p>
+ The following targets are required and must be implemented
+ by <file>debian/rules</file>: <tt>clean</tt>, <tt>binary</tt>,
+ <tt>binary-arch</tt>, <tt>binary-indep</tt>, and <tt>build</tt>.
+ These are the targets called by <prgn>dpkg-buildpackage</prgn>.
+ </p>
+
<p>
Since an interactive <file>debian/rules</file> script makes it
- impossible to auto-compile that package and also makes it
- hard for other people to reproduce the same binary
- package, all <em>required targets</em> must be
- non-interactive. At a minimum, required targets are the
- ones called by <prgn>dpkg-buildpackage</prgn>, namely,
- <em>clean</em>, <em>binary</em>, <em>binary-arch</em>,
- <em>binary-indep</em>, and <em>build</em>. It also follows
- that any target that these targets depend on must also be
+ impossible to auto-compile that package and also makes it hard
+ for other people to reproduce the same binary package, all
+ required targets must be non-interactive. It also follows that
+ any target that these targets depend on must also be
non-interactive.
</p>
<p>
- The targets are as follows (required unless stated otherwise):
+ The targets are as follows:
<taglist>
- <tag><tt>build</tt></tag>
+ <tag><tt>build</tt> (required)</tag>
<item>
<p>
The <tt>build</tt> target should perform all the
</p>
</item>
- <tag><tt>binary</tt>, <tt>binary-arch</tt>,
- <tt>binary-indep</tt>
+ <tag><tt>binary</tt> (required), <tt>binary-arch</tt>
+ (required), <tt>binary-indep</tt> (required)
</tag>
<item>
<p>
</p>
</item>
- <tag><tt>clean</tt></tag>
+ <tag><tt>clean</tt> (required)</tag>
<item>
<p>
This must undo any effects that the <tt>build</tt>
<p>
The architectures we build on and build for are determined
- by <prgn>make</prgn> variables using the utility
- <qref id="pkg-dpkg-architecture"><prgn>dpkg-architecture</prgn></qref>.
- You can determine the
- Debian architecture and the GNU style architecture
- specification string for the build machine (the machine type
- we are building on) as well as for the host machine (the
- machine type we are building for). Here is a list of
- supported <prgn>make</prgn> variables:
+ by <prgn>make</prgn> variables using the
+ utility <qref id="pkg-dpkg-architecture"><prgn>dpkg-architecture</prgn></qref>.
+ You can determine the Debian architecture and the GNU style
+ architecture specification string for the build architecture as
+ well as for the host architecture. The build architecture is
+ the architecture on which <file>debian/rules</file> is run and
+ the package build is performed. The host architecture is the
+ architecture on which the resulting package will be installed
+ and run. These are normally the same, but may be different in
+ the case of cross-compilation (building packages for one
+ architecture on machines of a different architecture).
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ Here is a list of supported <prgn>make</prgn> variables:
<list compact="compact">
<item>
<tt>DEB_*_ARCH</tt> (the Debian architecture)
<tt>DEB_*_GNU_TYPE</tt>)
</list>
where <tt>*</tt> is either <tt>BUILD</tt> for specification of
- the build machine or <tt>HOST</tt> for specification of the
- host machine.
+ the build architecture or <tt>HOST</tt> for specification of the
+ host architecture.
</p>
<p>
<item><qref id="f-Source"><tt>Source</tt></qref> (mandatory)</item>
<item><qref id="f-Maintainer"><tt>Maintainer</tt></qref> (mandatory)</item>
<item><qref id="f-Uploaders"><tt>Uploaders</tt></qref></item>
+ <item><qref id="f-DM-Upload-Allowed"><tt>DM-Upload-Allowed</tt></qref></item>
<item><qref id="f-Section"><tt>Section</tt></qref> (recommended)</item>
<item><qref id="f-Priority"><tt>Priority</tt></qref> (recommended)</item>
<item><qref id="sourcebinarydeps"><tt>Build-Depends</tt> et al</qref></item>
<item><qref id="f-Version"><tt>Version</tt></qref> (mandatory)</item>
<item><qref id="f-Maintainer"><tt>Maintainer</tt></qref> (mandatory)</item>
<item><qref id="f-Uploaders"><tt>Uploaders</tt></qref></item>
+ <item><qref id="f-DM-Upload-Allowed"><tt>DM-Upload-Allowed</tt></qref></item>
<item><qref id="f-Homepage"><tt>Homepage</tt></qref></item>
<item><qref id="f-Standards-Version"><tt>Standards-Version</tt></qref> (recommended)</item>
<item><qref id="sourcebinarydeps"><tt>Build-Depends</tt> et al</qref></item>
putting the name in round brackets and moving it to the
end, and bringing the email address forward).
</p>
+
+ <p>
+ See <ref id="maintainer"> for additional requirements and
+ information about package maintainers.
+ </p>
</sect1>
<sect1 id="f-Uploaders">
<heading><tt>Uploaders</tt></heading>
<p>
- List of the names and email addresses of co-maintainers of
- the package, if any. If the package has other maintainers
- beside the one named in the
- <qref id="f-Maintainer">Maintainer field</qref>, their names
- and email addresses should be listed here. The format of each
- entry is the same as that of the Maintainer field, and
- multiple entries must be comma separated. This is an optional
- field.
+ List of the names and email addresses of co-maintainers of the
+ package, if any. If the package has other maintainers besides
+ the one named in the <qref id="f-Maintainer">Maintainer
+ field</qref>, their names and email addresses should be listed
+ here. The format of each entry is the same as that of the
+ Maintainer field, and multiple entries must be comma
+ separated.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ This is normally an optional field, but if
+ the <tt>Maintainer</tt> control field names a group of people
+ and a shared email address, the <tt>Uploaders</tt> field must
+ be present and must contain at least one human with their
+ personal email address.
</p>
<p>
must match the list of files in the <tt>Files</tt> field.
</p>
</sect1>
+
+ <sect1 id="f-DM-Upload-Allowed">
+ <heading><tt>DM-Upload-Allowed</tt></heading>
+
+ <p>
+ The most recent version of a package uploaded to unstable or
+ experimental must include the field <tt>DM-Upload-Allowed:
+ yes</tt> in the source section of its source control file for
+ the Debian archive to accept uploads signed with a key in the
+ Debian Maintainer keyring. See the General
+ Resolution <url id="http://www.debian.org/vote/2007/vote_003"
+ name="Endorse the concept of Debian Maintainers"> for more
+ details.
+ </p>
+ </sect1>
</sect>
<sect>
the <prgn>preinst</prgn> script cannot rely on any files
included in its package. Only essential packages and
pre-dependencies (<tt>Pre-Depends</tt>) may be assumed to be
- available. Pre-dependencies will be at least unpacked.
- They may be only unpacked or "Half-Configured", not
- completely configured, but only if a previous version of the
- pre-dependency was completely configured and the
- pre-dependency had not been removed since then.
+ available. Pre-dependencies will have been configured at
+ least once, but at the time the <prgn>preinst</prgn> is
+ called they may only be in an unpacked or "Half-Configured"
+ state if a previous version of the pre-dependency was
+ completely configured and has not been removed since then.
</item>
<tag><var>old-preinst</var> <tt>abort-upgrade</tt>
unpacking the new package because the <tt>postrm
upgrade</tt> action failed. The unpacked files may be
partly from the new version or partly missing, so the script
- cannot not rely on files included in the package. Package
+ cannot rely on files included in the package. Package
dependencies may not be available. Pre-dependencies will be
at least unpacked following the same rules as above, except
they may be only "Half-Installed" if an upgrade of the
- pre-dependency failed.
+ pre-dependency failed.<footnote>
+ This can happen if the new version of the package no
+ longer pre-depends on a package that had been partially
+ upgraded.
+ </footnote>
</item>
</taglist>
</p>
The files contained in the package will be unpacked. All
package dependencies will at least be unpacked. If there
are no circular dependencies involved, all package
- dependencies will be configured.
+ dependencies will be configured. For behavior in the case
+ of circular dependencies, see the discussion
+ in <ref id="binarydeps">.
</item>
<tag><var>old-postinst</var> <tt>abort-upgrade</tt>
foo's <tt>postinst abort-remove</tt> would be called with
bar only "Half-Installed".
</footnote>
+ The <prgn>postinst</prgn> should still attempt any actions
+ for which its dependencies are required, since they will
+ normally be available, but consider the correct error
+ handling approach if those actions fail. Aborting
+ the <prgn>postinst</prgn> action if commands or facilities
+ from the package dependencies are not available is often the
+ best approach.
</item>
</taglist>
</p>
previously been deconfigured and only be unpacked, at which
point subsequent package changes do not consider its
dependencies. Therefore, all <prgn>postrm</prgn> actions
- may only rely on essential packages and cannot assume that
- the package's dependencies are available.
+ may only rely on essential packages and must gracefully skip
+ any actions that require the package's dependencies if those
+ dependencies are unavailable.<footnote>
+ This is often done by checking whether the command or
+ facility the <prgn>postrm</prgn> intends to call is
+ available before calling it. For example:
+<example>
+if [ "$1" = purge ] && [ -e /usr/share/debconf/confmodule ]; then
+ . /usr/share/debconf/confmodule
+ db_purge
+fi
+</example>
+ in <prgn>postrm</prgn> purges the <prgn>debconf</prgn>
+ configuration for the package
+ if <package>debconf</package> is installed.
+ </footnote>
</item>
<tag><var>new-postrm</var> <tt>failed-upgrade</tt>
<tag><var>new-postrm</var> <tt>abort-upgrade</tt>
<var>old-version</var></tag>
<item>
- Called before unpackaging the new package as part of the
+ Called before unpacking the new package as part of the
error handling of <prgn>preinst</prgn> failures. May assume
the same state as <prgn>preinst</prgn> can assume.
</item>
<p>
Since <tt>Depends</tt> only places requirements on the order in
which packages are configured, packages in an installation run
- are usually all unpacked first and all configured later. This
- allows multiple packages to be upgraded in one unpack and
- configure step even if some packages being upgraded have
- versioned dependencies on the upgraded versions of other
- packages involved in the installation run.
+ are usually all unpacked first and all configured later.
+ <footnote>
+ This approach makes dependency resolution easier. If two
+ packages A and B are being upgraded, the installed package A
+ depends on exactly the installed package B, and the new
+ package A depends on exactly the new package B (a common
+ situation when upgrading shared libraries and their
+ corresponding development packages), satisfying the
+ dependencies at every stage of the upgrade would be
+ impossible. This relaxed restriction means that both new
+ packages can be unpacked together and then configured in their
+ dependency order.
+ </footnote>
</p>
<p>
broken at some point and the dependency requirements violated
for at least one package. Packages involved in circular
dependencies may not be able to rely on their dependencies being
- configured when being configured depending on which side of the
- break of the circular dependency loop they happen to be on. If
- one of the packages in the loop has no <prgn>postinst</prgn>
- script, then the cycle will be broken at that package; this
- ensures that all <prgn>postinst</prgn> scripts are run with
- their dependencies properly configured if this is possible.
- Otherwise the breaking point is arbitrary. Packages should
- therefore avoid circular dependencies where possible,
- particularly if they have <prgn>postinst</prgn> scripts.
+ configured before they themselves are configured, depending on
+ which side of the break of the circular dependency loop they
+ happen to be on. If one of the packages in the loop has
+ no <prgn>postinst</prgn> script, then the cycle will be broken
+ at that package; this ensures that all <prgn>postinst</prgn>
+ scripts are run with their dependencies properly configured if
+ this is possible. Otherwise the breaking point is arbitrary.
+ Packages should therefore avoid circular dependencies where
+ possible, particularly if they have <prgn>postinst</prgn>
+ scripts.
</p>
<p>
dependency loop, this might not work as expected; see the
explanation a few paragraphs back.) In the case
of <prgn>prerm</prgn> or other <prgn>postinst</prgn>
- actions, the package dependencies will be at least
- unpacked or "Half-Installed".
+ actions, the package dependencies will normally be at
+ least unpacked, but they may be only "Half-Installed" if a
+ previous upgrade of the dependency failed.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ Finally, the <tt>Depends</tt> field should be used if the
+ depended-on package is needed by the <prgn>postrm</prgn>
+ script to fully clean up after the package removal. There
+ is no guarantee that package dependencies will be
+ available when <prgn>postrm</prgn> is run, but the
+ depended-on package is more likely to be available if the
+ package declares a dependency (particularly in the case
+ of <tt>postrm remove</tt>). The <prgn>postrm</prgn>
+ script must gracefully skip actions that require a
+ dependency if that dependency isn't available.
</p>
</item>
installation would hamper the ability of the system to
continue with any upgrade that might be in progress.
</p>
+
+ <p>
+ You should not specify a <tt>Pre-Depends</tt> entry for a
+ package before this has been discussed on the
+ <tt>debian-devel</tt> mailing list and a consensus about
+ doing that has been reached. See <ref id="dependencies">.
+ </p>
</item>
</taglist>
</p>
<p>
When one binary package declares that it breaks another,
<prgn>dpkg</prgn> will refuse to allow the package which
- declares <tt>Breaks</tt> be unpacked unless the broken
+ declares <tt>Breaks</tt> to be unpacked unless the broken
package is deconfigured first, and it will refuse to
allow the broken package to be reconfigured.
</p>
When one binary package declares a conflict with another using
a <tt>Conflicts</tt> field, <prgn>dpkg</prgn> will refuse to
allow them to be unpacked on the system at the same time. This
- is a stronger restriction than <tt>Breaks</tt>, which only
- prevents both packages from being configured at the same time.
- Conflicting packages cannot be unpacked on the system at the
- same time.
+ is a stronger restriction than <tt>Breaks</tt>, which prevents
+ the broken package from being configured while the breaking
+ package is in the "Unpacked" state but allows both packages to
+ be unpacked at the same time.
</p>
<p>
<item>when two packages provide the same file and will
continue to do so,</item>
<item>in conjunction with <tt>Provides</tt> when only one
- package providing a given virtual facility may be installed
+ package providing a given virtual facility may be unpacked
at a time (see <ref id="virtual">),</item>
<item>in other cases where one must prevent simultaneous
installation of two packages for reasons that are ongoing
library directories of the dynamic linker (which are currently
<file>/usr/lib</file> and <file>/lib</file>) or a directory that is
listed in <file>/etc/ld.so.conf</file><footnote>
- These are currently
- <list compact="compact">
- <item>/usr/local/lib</item>
- <item>/usr/lib/libc5-compat</item>
- <item>/lib/libc5-compat</item>
- </list>
+ These are currently <file>/usr/local/lib</file> plus
+ directories under <file>/lib</file> and <file>/usr/lib</file>
+ matching the multiarch triplet for the system architecture.
</footnote>
must use <prgn>ldconfig</prgn> to update the shared library
system.
<file>/lib/<var>triplet</var></file> and
<file>/usr/lib/<var>triplet</var></file>, where
<tt><var>triplet</var></tt> is the value returned by
- <tt>dpkg-architecture -qDEB_HOST_GNU_TYPE</tt> for the
+ <tt>dpkg-architecture -qDEB_HOST_MULTIARCH</tt> for the
architecture of the package. Packages may <em>not</em>
install files to any <var>triplet</var> path other
than the one matching the architecture of that package;
for instance, an <tt>Architecture: amd64</tt> package
containing 32-bit x86 libraries may not install these
- libraries to <file>/usr/lib/i486-linux-gnu</file>.
+ libraries to <file>/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu</file>.
<footnote>
This is necessary in order to reserve the directories for
use in cross-installation of library packages from other
to get access to kernel information.</footnote>
</p>
</item>
+ <item>
+ <p>
+ On GNU/Hurd systems, the following additional
+ directories are allowed in the root
+ filesystem: <file>/hurd</file>
+ and <file>/servers</file>.<footnote>
+ These directories are used to store translators and as
+ a set of standard names for mount points,
+ respectively.
+ </footnote>
+ </p>
+ </item>
</enumlist>
-
</p>
+
<p>
The version of this document referred here can be
found in the <tt>debian-policy</tt> package or on <url
<item>The XSI extension to <prgn>trap</prgn> allowing numeric
signals must be supported. In addition to the signal
numbers listed in the extension, which are the same as for
- <prgn>kill<prgn> above, 13 (SIGPIPE) must be allowed.
+ <prgn>kill</prgn> above, 13 (SIGPIPE) must be allowed.
</item>
</list>
If a shell script requires non-SUSv3 features from the shell
<sect1>
<heading>Sharing configuration files</heading>
- <p>
- Packages which specify the same file as a
- <tt>conffile</tt> must be tagged as <em>conflicting</em>
- with each other. (This is an instance of the general rule
- about not sharing files. Note that neither alternatives
- nor diversions are likely to be appropriate in this case;
- in particular, <prgn>dpkg</prgn> does not handle diverted
- <tt>conffile</tt>s well.)
- </p>
-
- <p>
- The maintainer scripts must not alter a <tt>conffile</tt>
- of <em>any</em> package, including the one the scripts
- belong to.
- </p>
-
<p>
If two or more packages use the same configuration file
and it is reasonable for both to be installed at the same
and which manages the shared configuration files. (The
<tt>sgml-base</tt> package is a good example.)
</p>
+
+ <p>
+ If the configuration file cannot be shared as described above,
+ the packages must be marked as conflicting with each other.
+ Two packages that specify the same file as
+ a <tt>conffile</tt> must conflict. This is an instance of the
+ general rule about not sharing files. Neither alternatives
+ nor diversions are likely to be appropriate in this case; in
+ particular, <prgn>dpkg</prgn> does not handle diverted
+ <tt>conffile</tt>s well.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ When two packages both declare the same <tt>conffile</tt>, they
+ may see left-over configuration files from each other even
+ though they conflict with each other. If a user removes
+ (without purging) one of the packages and installs the other,
+ the new package will take over the <tt>conffile</tt> from the
+ old package. If the file was modified by the user, it will be
+ treated the same as any other locally
+ modified <tt>conffile</tt> during an upgrade.
+ </p>
+
+ <p>
+ The maintainer scripts must not alter a <tt>conffile</tt>
+ of <em>any</em> package, including the one the scripts
+ belong to.
+ </p>
</sect1>
<sect1>
<item>
If the window manager complies with <url
- id="http://www.freedesktop.org/Standards/wm-spec"
+ id="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/wm-spec"
name="The Window Manager Specification Project">,
- written by the <url id="http://www.freedesktop.org/"
+ written by the <url id="http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/"
name="Free Desktop Group">, add 40 points.
</item>
maintainer of the package is allowed to write this bug report
themselves, if they so desire). Do not close the bug report
until a proper man page is available.<footnote>
- It is not very hard to write a man page. See the
+ It is not very hard to write a man page. See the
<url id="http://www.schweikhardt.net/man_page_howto.html"
name="Man-Page-HOWTO">,
- <manref name="man" section="7">, the examples
- created by <prgn>debmake</prgn> or <prgn>dh_make</prgn>,
-
the helper program <prgn>help2man</prgn>, or the
- directory <file>/usr/share/doc/man-db/examples</file>.
+ <manref name="man" section="7">, the examples created
+ by <prgn>dh_make</prgn>, the helper
+ program <prgn>help2man</prgn>, or the
+ directory <file>/usr/share/doc/man-db/examples</file>.
</footnote>
</p>
<p>
Packages in the <em>contrib</em> or <em>non-free</em> archive
areas should state in the copyright file that the package is not
- part of the Debian GNU/Linux distribution and briefly explain
- why.
+ part of the Debian distribution and briefly explain why.
</p>
<p>
<prgn>dpkg</prgn> is a suite of programs for creating binary
package files and installing and removing them on Unix
systems.<footnote>
- <prgn>dpkg</prgn> is targeted primarily at Debian
- GNU/Linux, but may work on or be ported to other
- systems.
+ <prgn>dpkg</prgn> is targeted primarily at Debian, but may
+ work on or be ported to other systems.
</footnote>
</p>
</p>
<p>
- The Debian version of the FSF's GNU hello program is provided
- as an example for people wishing to create Debian
- packages. The Debian <prgn>debmake</prgn> package is
- recommended as a very helpful tool in creating and maintaining
- Debian packages. However, while the tools and examples are
- helpful, they do not replace the need to read and follow the
- Policy and Programmer's Manual.</p>
+ The Debian version of the FSF's GNU hello program is provided as
+ an example for people wishing to create Debian packages. However,
+ while the examples are helpful, they do not replace the need to
+ read and follow the Policy and Programmer's Manual.</p>
</appendix>
<appendix id="pkg-binarypkg">
projects / debian / debian-policy.git / blobdiff