Bug#593909: debian-policy: Clarifications about the syntax of Debian control files.
Charles Plessy <plessy@debian.org> writes:
> to this list I would like to add comment lines. Currently they are
> described in §5.2 (5.2 Source package control files -- debian/control),
> as an additional syntax, which strongly suggests that they are allowed
> in this file only.
That's correct; they're only allowed in source package control files.
> Independantly of whether this is confirmed or not, this syntactic
> information would rather belong to §5.1, that defines the syntax of the
> control files, instead of §5.2, which like the next chapters §5.3–6
> lists the fields allowed in the different Debian control files. I would
> therefore propose to have in §5.1:
> Lines starting with # without any preceding whitespace are ‘comments
> lines’ and are ignored, even in the middle of continuation lines for a
> multiline field. They do not end a multiline field.
> If comment lines are only allowed in source package control files, we could
> add:
> The use of such comments must be allowed on a per-file basis.
I would rather just say "These comments are only permitted in source
package control files (<file>debian/control</file>)," and preferrably say
that as the first sentence of the paragraph rather than the last. I can't
imagine us ever adding support for them anywhere else.
> And then in §5.2:
> Comment lines are allowed.
This is fine.
> The benefit of this is that it concentrates in §5.1 all the instructions
> to write a basic parser for Debian control files.
Yes, that's a good idea.
--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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