[Try #2. Changes in a specific line are marked diff-style with a "-"
and "+". Diff itself wasn't used, since it gets caught up on changes
in wordwrap and wdiff looked awful.]
The following is a pre-proposal for changes in the policy document.
It requires two seconds to become a formal proposal. This is a call
for those seconds, and should those seconds be received, a call for
informal discussion of the changes in the proposal. None of the
changes listed are intended to be controversial, and have already been
reported as bugs in the BTS. The deadline for discussion is set at 14
days from receipt of the necessary seconds. If a consensus cannot be
reached within that time, the proposal will be withdrawn.
All Section numbers refer to the Policy Manual.
Part 1: (bug#26461)
The part of the fourth paragraph of Section 2.3.8 ("Maintainer
scripts") reading:
message. Copyright messages do not count as vitally important (they
- belong in /usr/doc/copyright); neither do instructions on how to use a
program (these should be in on line documentation, where all the users
should be changed to:
message. Copyright messages do not count as vitally important (they
+ belong in /usr/doc/<package-name>/copyright); neither do instructions
on how to use a program (these should be in on line documentation,
Part 2: (bug#25911)
Section 3.3 ("Files") should become Section 4. The Sections that are
currently Section 4 and Section 5 should be moved down to become
Section 5 and Section 6 accordingly.
What is now Section 5.5 ("Log files") should be moved to be a
subsection of the new Section 4 ("Files"), becoming section 4.8,
placing it after "Configuration files", moving the would-be Section
4.8 ("Permissions and owners") to Section 4.9. All subsections of the
current Section 5 after 5.5 should be accordingly moved down to fill
in the number gap.
Part 3: (bug#25385)
Section 4.1 ("Architecture specification strings") should be changed
to make allowances for proper handling of configure scripts on the
Hurd operating system. The following change to the text of 4.1 is
proposed from:
If a program needs to specify an architecture specification string
in some place, the following format has to be used:
- <arch>-linux
where `<arch>' is one of the following: i386, alpha, arm, m68k,
- powerpc, sparc.
to:
If a program needs to specify an architecture specification string
in some place, the following format has to be used:
+ <arch>-<os>
where `<arch>' is one of the following: i386, alpha, arm, m68k,
+ powerpc, sparc and `<os>' is one of: linux, gnu. Use of "gnu" in
+ this string is reserved for the GNU Hurd operating system.
Part 4: (bug#21185)
The first paragraph of Section 5.8 ("Changelog files") be changed
from:
This installed file must contain a copy of the debian/changelog file
from your Debian source tree, and a copy of the upstream changelog
- file if there is one. They should usually be installed in
- /usr/doc/package as changelog.Debian.gz and changelog.gz
- respectively.
to:
The installed file must contain a copy of the debian/changelog file
from your Debian source tree, and a copy of the upstream changelog
+ file if there is one. The debian/changelog file should be installed
+ in /usr/doc/<package> as changelog.Debian.gz. If the upstream
+ changelog file is text formatted, it must be accessable as
+ /usr/doc/<package>/changelog.gz. If the upstream changelog file is
+ HTML formatted, it must be accessable as
+ /usr/doc/<package>/changelog.html.gz. If the upstream changelog
+ files do not already conform to this naming convention, then this may
+ be achieved by either renaming the files or adding a symbolic link at
+ the packaging developer's discretion.
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Zed Pobre <zed@va.debian.org> | PGP key on servers, fingerprint on finger
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