From: Russ Allbery <rra@debian.org>
Date: Mon, 27 Feb 2012 04:11:37 +0000 (-0800)
Subject: Field names may not contain spaces
X-Git-Url: https://git.donarmstrong.com/?p=debian%2Fdebian-policy.git;a=commitdiff_plain;h=e729022ef948c6c423c32e96ba9313f9529e1ff8

Field names may not contain spaces

* Clarify the syntax of field names to make it clear that they may not
  contain spaces.  Thanks, Charles Plessy.  (Closes: #647645)
---

diff --git a/debian/changelog b/debian/changelog
index 9b82e5f..b81d85b 100644
--- a/debian/changelog
+++ b/debian/changelog
@@ -11,6 +11,8 @@ debian-policy (3.9.3.1) UNRELEASED; urgency=low
     dash.  Thanks, Raphael Geissert.  (Closes: #490604)
   * Remove the ambiguous word "installed" when requiring that the location
     of files and directories follow the FHS.  (Closes: #638060)
+  * Clarify the syntax of field names to make it clear that they may not
+    contain spaces.  Thanks, Charles Plessy.  (Closes: #647645)
   * Install the HTML version of upgrading-checklist in the policy.html
     directory as upgrading-checklist.html so that it can be deployed on
     www.debian.org in a way that will allow links to Policy sections to
diff --git a/policy.sgml b/policy.sgml
index 0121da5..465a129 100644
--- a/policy.sgml
+++ b/policy.sgml
@@ -2499,18 +2499,21 @@ endif
 	</p>
 
 	<p>
-	  Each paragraph consists of a series of data fields; each
-	  field consists of the field name, followed by a colon and
-	  then the data/value associated with that field.  The field
-	  name is composed of printable ASCII characters (i.e.,
-	  characters that have values between 33 and 126, inclusive)
-	  except colon and must not with a begin with #.  The
-	  field ends at the end of the line or at the end of the
-	  last continuation line (see below).  Horizontal whitespace
-	  (spaces and tabs) may occur immediately before or after the
-	  value and is ignored there; it is conventional to put a
-	  single space after the colon.  For example, a field might
-	  be:
+	  Each paragraph consists of a series of data fields.  Each field
+	  consists of the field name followed by a colon and then the
+	  data/value associated with that field.  The field name is
+	  composed of US-ASCII characters excluding control characters,
+	  space, and colon (i.e., characters in the ranges 33-57 and
+	  59-126, inclusive).  Field names must not begin with the comment
+	  character, <tt>#</tt>.
+	</p>
+
+	<p>
+	  The field ends at the end of the line or at the end of the last
+	  continuation line (see below).  Horizontal whitespace (spaces
+	  and tabs) may occur immediately before or after the value and is
+	  ignored there; it is conventional to put a single space after
+	  the colon.  For example, a field might be:
 	  <example compact="compact">
 Package: libc6
 	  </example>