The checklist below has been created to simplify the upgrading process of old packages. Note, that this list is not `official.' 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.
Here is how the check list works: Check out which policy version your packages complies with currently. Than move upwards until the top and check which of the items on the list might concern your package. If an item does not give you enough details, please check out the Policy Manual.
3.1.1.0 Nov 99
Packaging Manual:
- Correction to semantics of architecture lists in Build-Depends
etc. Should not affect many packages.
3.1.0.0 Oct 99
Policy Manual:
- /usr/doc/<package> has to be a symlink pointing to
/usr/share/doc/<package>. This symlink has to be
maintained by postinst and prerm, because dpkg will cause
problems otherwise. Create/remote the symlinks using debhelper
or see section "6.4. Accessing the documentation" for more
information.
- Introduced source dependencies. (Whereas this ought to demand a
major policy number rise, we've only just had one of them, so
I'm going to use a minor number instead.)
- /etc/rc.boot has been deprecated in favour of /etc/rcS.d.
Packages should not be touching this directory, anyway, but
should use update-rc.d instead.
- 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.)
- Compiled examples go in /usr/lib/<package>/examples with
symlinks from /usr/share/doc/<package>/examples/* or from
/usr/share/doc/<package>/examples itself.
- Updated FHS to a 2.1 draft; this reverts /var/state to
/var/lib.
- Added MIME sub-policy document.
- VISUAL is allowed as a (higher priority) alternative to EDITOR.
- Modified liblockfile description, which affects
mailbox-accessing programs. Please see the policy document for
details.
- 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.)
Packaging Manual:
- Description of how to handle version numbers based on dates
added: see section 5.1.
3.0.1.0 Jul 99
Policy Manual:
- 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.
3.0.0.0 Jun 99
Policy Manual:
- 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.
- Only 3 digits of the Standards version need be included in
control files, though all four digits are still permitted.
- 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 licences
- Packages that use libtool to create shared libraries must
include the .la files in the -dev packages.
- Use logrotate to rotate log files
- section 5.8 has been rewritten (Programs for the X Window
System)
- There is now anassi=ociated menu policy, in a separate document,
that carries the full weight of Debian policy.
- The files `/var/run/utmp', `/var/log/wtmp' and
`/var/log/lastlog' must be installed writeable by group
utmp. Programs who need to modify those files must be installed
install setgid utmp.
2.5.0.0 Oct 98
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 accomodate
upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML/ These
upstream chagelog 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 98
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 98
- 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 Windows 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 97
* 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 97
* 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 97
* 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 96
* Some changes WRT shared libraries
2.1.1.0 Sep 96
* 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 96
* Upstream changelog must be installed too