path: root/upgrading-checklist.xml

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='utf-8'?>
<!-- -*- DocBook -*- -->
<!DOCTYPE appendix PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.5//EN"
  "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.5/docbookx.dtd" [
]>

<appendix id="upgrading-checklist">
  <title>Upgrading checklist</title>

  <section id="about">
    <title>About the checklist</title>

    <para>
      The checklist below has been created to simplify the upgrading
      process of old packages.  This list is not official or normative.
      It only provides an indication of what has changed and whether you
      are likely to need to make changes to your package in light of this.
      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 itself.
    </para>
    <para>
      All of the changes from version 3.0.0 onwards indicate which section
      of the Policy Manual discusses the issue.  The section numbering
      should still be accurate for changes back to the 2.5.0 release.
      Before that point, the sections listed here probably no longer
      correspond to sections in the modern Policy Manual.
    </para>
    <para>
      Here is how the check list works: Check which policy version your
      package was checked against last (indicated in the
      <literal>Standards-Version</literal> field of the source package).
      Then move upwards until the top and check which of the items on the
      list might concern your package.  Note which sections of policy
      discuss this, and then check out the Policy Manual for details.
      Once you've made all necessary changes to match the current rules,
      update the value of <literal>Standards-Version</literal> to the
      current Policy Manual version.
    </para>
    <para>
      The sections in this checklist match the values for the
      <literal>Standards-Version</literal> control field in omitting the
      minor patch version, except in the two anomalous historical cases
      where normative requirements were changed in a minor patch release.
    </para>
  </section>

  <section id="s-4.0.1">
    <title>Version 4.0.1</title>

    <para>
      Unreleased.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Priorities are now used only for controlling which packages
            are part of a minimal or standard Debian installation and
            should be selected based on functionality provided directly to
            users (so nearly all shared libraries should have a priority
            of <literal>optional</literal>).  Packages may now depend on
            packages with a lower priority.
          </para>
          <para>
            The <literal>extra</literal> priority has been deprecated and
            should be treated as equivalent to
            <literal>optional</literal>.  All <literal>extra</literal>
            priorities should be changed to <literal>optional</literal>.
            Packages with a priority of <literal>optional</literal> may
            conflict with each other (but packages that both have a
            priority of <literal>standard</literal> or higher still may
            not conflict).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.30</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section documenting the <literal>Testsuite</literal> field in
            Debian source control files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Shared libraries must now invoke
            <command>ldconfig</command> by means of triggers, instead
            of maintscripts.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages are recommended to use debhelper tools instead of
            invoking <command>update-rc.d</command> and
            <command>invoke-rc.d</command> directly.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Policy's description of how the local system administrator
            may modify the runlevels at which a daemon is started and
            stopped, and how init scripts may depend on other init
            scripts, have been removed.  These are now handled by LSB
            headers.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Policy's specification of the console messages that should
            be emitted by <literal>init.d</literal> scripts has been
            removed.  This is now defined by LSB, for sysvinit, and is
            not expected to be followed by other init systems.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages installing a Free Desktop entry must not also
            install a Debian menu system entry.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The prohibition against depending on environment variables for
            reasonable defaults is only for programs on the system PATH and
            only for custom environment variable settings (not, say, a
            sane PATH).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-4.0.0">
    <title>Version 4.0.0</title>

    <para>
      Released May, 2017.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <command>config.sub</command> and
            <command>config.guess</command> should be updated at build
            time or replaced with the versions from <systemitem
            role="package">autotools-dev</systemitem>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>TARGET</literal> set of
            <command>dpkg-architecture</command> variables and new
            <literal>DEB_*_ARCH_BITS</literal> and
            <literal>DEB_*_ARCH_ENDIAN</literal> variables.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS</literal> tag,
            <literal>nodoc</literal>, which says to suppress documentation
            generation (but continue to build all binary packages, even
            documentation packages, just let them be mostly empty).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Automatically-generated debug packages do not need to have a
            corresponding paragraph in
            <filename>debian/control</filename>.  (This is existing
            practice; this Policy update is just clearer about it.)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.12</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Colons are not permitted in upstream version numbers.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>Build-Depends-Arch</literal> and
            <literal>Build-Conflicts-Arch</literal> fields are now
            supported.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The recommended package name for shared library development
            files is now <replaceable>libraryname</replaceable>-dev or
            <replaceable>libraryname</replaceable><replaceable>apiversion</replaceable>-dev,
            not
            <replaceable>libraryname</replaceable><replaceable>soversion</replaceable>-dev.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The stable release of Debian supports
            <filename>/run</filename>, so packages may now assume that it
            exists and do not need any special dependency on a version of
            initscripts.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New optional <literal>try-restart</literal> standard init
            script argument, which (if supported) should restart the
            service if it is already running and otherwise just report
            success.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Support for the <literal>status</literal> init script argument
            is recommended.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages must not call <filename>/etc/init.d</filename>
            scripts directly even as a fallback, and instead must always
            use <command>invoke-rc.d</command> (which is essential and
            shouldn't require any conditional).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.11.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Instructions for <command>upstart</command> integration
            removed since <command>upstart</command> is no longer
            maintained in Debian.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages may not install files in both
            <filename>/<replaceable>path</replaceable></filename> and
            <filename>/usr/<replaceable>path</replaceable></filename>, and
            must manage any backward-compatibility symlinks so that they
            don't break if
            <filename>/<replaceable>path</replaceable></filename> and
            <filename>/usr/<replaceable>path</replaceable></filename> are
            the same directory.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages should assume device files in
            <filename>/dev</filename> are dynamically managed and don't
            have to be created by the package.  Packages other than those
            whose purpose is to manage <filename>/dev</filename> must not
            create or remove files there when a dynamic management
            facility is in use.  Named pipes and device files outside of
            <filename>/dev</filename> should normally be created on demand
            via init scripts, systemd units, or similar mechanisms, but
            may be created and removed in maintainer scripts if they must
            be created during package installation.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Checking with the base-passwd maintainer is no longer required
            (or desirable) when creating a new dynamic user or group in a
            package.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Dependencies on *-doc packages should be at most Recommends
            (Suggests if they only include documentation in supplemental
            formats).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Mozilla Public License 1.1 and 2.0 (MPL-1.1 and MPL-2.0)
            are now included in
            <filename>/usr/share/common-licenses</filename> and do not
            need to be copied verbatim in the package
            <filename>copyright</filename> file.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>copyright-format</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>https</literal> form of the copyright-format URL
            is now allowed and preferred in the <literal>Format</literal>
            field.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Perl search path now includes multiarch directories.  The
            vendor directory for architecture-specific modules is now
            versioned to support multiarch.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>adventure</literal> virtual package for
            implementations of the classic Colossal Cave Adventure game.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>httpd-wsgi3</literal> virtual package for Python
            3 WSGI-capable HTTP servers.  The existing
            <literal>httpd-wsgi</literal> virtual package is for Python 2
            WSGI-capable HTTP servers.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>virtual-mysql-client</literal>,
            <literal>virtual-mysql-client-core</literal>,
            <literal>virtual-mysql-server</literal>,
            <literal>virtual-mysql-server-core</literal>, and
            <literal>virtual-mysql-testsuite</literal> virtual packages
            for MySQL-compatible software.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.8.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.8</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2016.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The menu system is deprecated in favor of the FreeDesktop menu
            standard.  New requirements set for FreeDesktop menu entries.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New instructions for registering media type handlers with the
            FreeDesktop system, which automatically synchronizes with
            mailcap and therefore replaces mailcap registration for
            packages using desktop entries.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.7.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.7</title>

    <para>
      Released February, 2016.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Symbolic links must not traverse above the root directory.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.2.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            32bit UIDs in the range 65536-4294967293 are reserved for
            dynamically allocated user accounts.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Empty field values in control files are only permitted in the
            <filename>debian/control</filename> file of a source package.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>debian/rules</filename>: required targets must not
            attempt network access.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            recommend to ship additional documentation for package
            <command>pkg</command> in a separate package
            <command>pkg-doc</command> and install it into
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/pkg</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.6.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.6</title>

    <para>
      Released September, 2014.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The FHS is relaxed to allow a subdirectory of
            <filename>/usr/lib</filename> to hold a mixture of
            architecture-independent and architecture-dependent files,
            though directories entirely composed of
            architecture-independent files should be located in
            <filename>/usr/share</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The FHS requirement for <filename>/usr/local/lib64</filename>
            to exist if <filename>/lib64</filename> or
            <filename>/usr/lib64</filename> exists is removed.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            An FHS exception has been granted for multiarch include files,
            permitting header files to instead be installed to
            <filename>/usr/include/triplet</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Binaries must not be statically linked with the GNU C library,
            see policy for exceptions.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            It is clarified that signature appearing in debian/changelog
            should be the details of the person who prepared this release
            of the package.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The default web document root is now
            <filename>/var/www/html</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>java1-runtime</literal> and
            <literal>java2-runtime</literal> are removed,
            <literal>javaN-runtime</literal> and
            <literal>javaN-runtime-headless</literal> are added for all N
            between 5 and 9.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Added <literal>httpd-wsgi</literal> for WSGI capable HTTP
            servers.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Perl packages should use the <literal>%Config</literal> hash
            to locate module paths instead of hardcoding paths in
            <literal>@INC</literal>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Perl binary modules and any modules installed into
            <literal>$Config{vendorarch}</literal> must depend on the
            relevant <systemitem role="package">perlapi-*</systemitem>
            package.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.5.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.5</title>

    <para>
      Released October, 2013.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Control data fields must not start with the hyphen character
            (<literal>-</literal>), to avoid potential confusions when
            parsing clearsigned control data files that were not properly
            unescaped.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.4, 5.6.24</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>Checksums-Sha1</literal> and
            <literal>Checksums-Sha256</literal> are now mandatory in
            <filename>.dsc</filename> files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.25, 5.8.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>DM-Upload-Allowed</literal> field is obsolete.
            Permissions are now granted via
            <emphasis>dak-commands</emphasis> files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.27</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section documenting the <literal>Package-List</literal>
            field in Debian source control files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.28</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section documenting the <literal>Package-Type</literal>
            field in source package control files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.29</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section documenting the <literal>Dgit</literal> field in
            Debian source control files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The exception to the FHS for the <filename>/selinux</filename>
            was removed.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.7.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages should remove all obsolete configuration files
            without local changes during upgrades.  The
            <command>dpkg-maintscript-helper</command> tool, available
            from the <systemitem role="package">dpkg</systemitem> package
            since <emphasis>Wheezy</emphasis>, can help with this.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.10</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The name of the files and directories installed by binary
            packages must be encoded in UTF-8 and should be restricted to
            ASCII when possible.  In the system PATH, they must be
            restricted to ASCII.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Stop recommending to serve HTML documents from
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/<replaceable>package</replaceable></filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages distributing Info documents should use <systemitem
            role="package">install-info</systemitem>'s trigger, and do not
            need anymore to depend on <literal>dpkg (>= 1.15.4) |
            install-info</literal>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>debconf</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>escape</literal> capability is now documented.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>mp3-decoder</literal> and
            <literal>mp3-encoder</literal> are removed.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.4.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.4</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 2012.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <emphasis>tasks</emphasis> archive section.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>build-arch</literal> and
            <literal>build-indep</literal> are now mandatory targets in
            <filename>debian/rules</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.26</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section documenting the <literal>Vcs-*</literal> fields,
            which are already in widespread use.  Note the mechanism for
            specifying the Git branch used for packaging in the Vcs-Git
            field.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The deprecated relations &lt; and &gt; now must not be used.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New <literal>Built-Using</literal> field, which must be used
            to document the source packages for any binaries that are
            incorporated into this package at build time.  This is used to
            ensure that the archive meets license requirements for
            providing source for all binaries.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Policy for dependencies between shared libraries and other
            packages has been largely rewritten to document the
            <literal>symbols</literal> system and more clearly document
            handling of shared library ABI changes.
            <filename>symbols</filename> files are now recommended over
            <filename>shlibs</filename> files in most situations.  All
            maintainers of shared library packages should review the
            entirety of this section.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages must not assume the <filename>/run</filename>
            directory exists or is usable without a dependency on
            <literal>initscripts (>= 2.88dsf-13.3)</literal> until the
            stable release of Debian supports <filename>/run</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages including MIME configuration can now rely on triggers
            and do not need to call update-mime.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.11</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section documenting general requirements for alternate
            init systems and specific requirements for integrating with
            upstart.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            All copyright files must be encoded in UTF-8.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.3.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.3</title>

    <para>
      Released February, 2012.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New archive sections <emphasis>education</emphasis>,
            <emphasis>introspection</emphasis>, and
            <emphasis>metapackages</emphasis> added.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>Architecture</literal> field in
            <filename>*.dsc</filename> files may now contain the value
            <literal>any all</literal> for source packages building both
            architecture-independent and architecture-dependent packages.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            If a dependency is restricted to particular architectures, the
            list of architectures must be non-empty.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/run</filename> is allowed as an exception to the
            FHS and replaces <filename>/var/run</filename>.
            <filename>/run/lock</filename> replaces
            <filename>/var/lock</filename>.  The FHS requirements for the
            older directories apply to these directories as well.
            Backward compatibility links will be maintained and packages
            need not switch to referencing <filename>/run</filename>
            directly yet.  Files in <filename>/run</filename> should be
            stored in a temporary file system.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New section spelling out the requirements for packages that
            use files in <filename>/run</filename>,
            <filename>/var/run</filename>, or
            <filename>/var/lock</filename>.  This generalizes information
            previously only in 9.3.2.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Cron job file names must not contain <literal>.</literal> or
            <literal>+</literal> or they will be ignored by cron.  They
            should replace those characters with <literal>_</literal>.  If
            a package provides multiple cron job files in the same
            directory, they should each start with the package name
            (possibly modified as above), <literal>-</literal>, and then
            some suitable suffix.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.10</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages using doc-base do not need to call install-docs anymore.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.7.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages that declare the same <literal>conffile</literal> may
            see left-over configuration files from each other even if they
            conflict.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Policy rules around Motif libraries were just a special
            case of normal rules for non-free dependencies and were
            largely obsolete, so they have been removed.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>debian/copyright</filename> is no longer required to
            list the Debian maintainers involved in the creation of the
            package (although note that the requirement to list copyright
            information is unchanged).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>copyright-format</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Version 1.0 of the "Machine-readable
            <filename>debian/copyright</filename> file" specification is
            included.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>mime</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            This separate document has been retired and and its (short)
            contents merged into Policy section 9.7.  There are no changes
            to the requirements.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages may declare an interest in the
            <replaceable>perl-major-upgrade</replaceable> trigger to be
            notified of major upgrades of perl.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>ttf-japanese-{mincho, gothic}</literal> is renamed to
            <literal>fonts-japanese-{mincho, gothic}</literal>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.2.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.2</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2011.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>*</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Multiple clarifications throughout Policy where "installed"
            was used and the more precise terms "unpacked" or "configured"
            were intended.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The maintainer address must accept mail from Debian role
            accounts and the BTS.  At least one human must be listed with
            their personal email address in <literal>Uploaders</literal>
            if the maintainer is a shared email address.  The duties of a
            maintainer are also clearer.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            All control fields are now classified as simple, folded, or
            multiline, which governs whether their values must be a single
            line or may be continued across multiple lines and whether
            line breaks are significant.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Parsers are allowed to accept paragraph separation lines
            containing whitespace, but control files should use completely
            empty lines.  Ordering of paragraphs is significant.  Field
            names must be composed of printable ASCII characters except
            colon and must not begin with #.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.25</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>DM-Upload-Allowed</literal> field is now
            documented.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>6.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The system state maintainer scripts can rely upon during each
            possible invocation is now documented.  In several less-common
            cases, this is stricter than Policy had previously documented.
            Packages with complex maintainer scripts should be reviewed in
            light of this new documentation.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The impact on system state when maintainer scripts that are
            part of a circular dependency are run is now documented.
            Circular dependencies are now a should not.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The system state when <command>postinst</command> and
            <command>prerm</command> scripts are run is now documented,
            and the documentation of the special case of dependency state
            for <command>postrm</command> scripts has been improved.
            <command>postrm</command> scripts are required to gracefully
            skip actions if their dependencies are not available.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            GNU/Hurd systems are allowed <filename>/hurd</filename> and
            <filename>/servers</filename> directories in the root
            filesystem.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages installing to architecture-specific subdirectories of
            <filename>/usr/lib</filename> must use the value returned by
            <command>dpkg-architecture -qDEB_HOST_MULTIARCH</command>, not
            by <command>dpkg-architecture -qDEB_HOST_GNU_TYPE</command>;
            this is a path change on i386 architectures and a no-op for
            other architectures.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>virtual</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>mailx</literal> is now a virtual package provided by
            packages that install <command>/usr/bin/mailx</command> and
            implement at least the POSIX-required interface.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.1</title>

    <para>
      Released July, 2010.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.2.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Date-based version components should be given as the
            four-digit year, two-digit month, and then two-digit day, but
            may have embedded punctuation.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Maintainer scripts must pass <literal>--package</literal> to
            <command>dpkg-divert</command> when creating or removing
            diversions and must not use <literal>--local</literal>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.10</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Only <command>dpkg-gencontrol</command> supports variable
            substitution.  <command>dpkg-genchanges</command> (for
            <filename>*.changes</filename>) and
            <command>dpkg-source</command> (for
            <filename>*.dsc</filename>) do not.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Architecture restrictions and wildcards are also allowed in
            binary package relationships provided that the binary package
            is not architecture-independent.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>Conflicts</literal> and <literal>Breaks</literal>
            should only be used when there are file conflicts or one
            package breaks the other, not just because two packages
            provide similar functionality but don't interfere.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The SONAME of a library should change whenever the ABI of the
            library changes in a way that isn't backward-compatible.  It
            should not change if the library ABI changes are
            backward-compatible.  Discourage bundling shared libraries
            together in one package.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Ada Library Information (<filename>*.ali</filename>) files
            must be installed read-only.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.6.1, 8.6.2, 8.6.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages should normally not include a
            <filename>shlibs.local</filename> file since we now have
            complete <filename>shlibs</filename> coverage.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.6.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The SONAME of a library may instead be of the form
            <literal><replaceable>name</replaceable>-<replaceable>major-version</replaceable>.so</literal>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Libtool <filename>.la</filename> files should not be installed
            for public libraries.  If they're required (for
            <literal>libltdl</literal>, for instance), the
            <literal>dependency_libs</literal> setting should be emptied.
            Library packages historically including
            <filename>.la</filename> files must continue to include them
            (with <literal>dependency_libs</literal> emptied) until all
            libraries that depend on that library have removed or emptied
            their <filename>.la</filename> files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Libraries no longer need to be built with
            <literal>-D_REENTRANT</literal>, which was an obsolete
            LinuxThreads requirement.  Instead, say explicitly that
            libraries should be built with threading support and to be
            thread-safe if the library supports this.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/bin/sh</filename> scripts may assume that
            <command>kill</command> supports an argument of
            <literal>-<replaceable>signal</replaceable></literal>, that
            <command>kill</command> and <command>trap</command> support
            the numeric signals listed in the XSI extension, and that
            signal 13 (SIGPIPE) can be trapped with
            <command>trap</command>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Use of
            <filename>/etc/logrotate.d/<replaceable>package</replaceable></filename>
            for logrotate rules is now recommended.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Control information files should be owned by
            <literal>root:root</literal> and either mode 644 or mode 755.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.4, 11.8.3, 11.8.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages providing alternatives for <command>editor</command>,
            <command>pager</command>,
            <command>x-terminal-emulator</command>, or
            <command>x-window-manager</command> should also provide a
            slave alternative for the corresponding manual page.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Cgi-bin executable files may be installed in subdirectories of
            <filename>/usr/lib/cgi-bin</filename> and web servers should
            serve out executables in those subdirectories.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The GPL version 1 is now included in common-licenses and
            should be referenced from there instead of included in the
            <filename>copyright</filename> file.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.9.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.9.0</title>

    <para>
      Released June, 2010.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.4, 5.6.15</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The required format for the date in a changelog entry and in
            the Date control field is now precisely specified.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            A control paragraph must not contain more than one instance of
            a particular field name.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.4, 5.5, 5.6.24</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>Checksums-Sha1</literal> and
            <literal>Checksums-Sha256</literal> fields in
            <filename>*.dsc</filename> and <filename>*.changes</filename>
            files are now documented and recommended.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.5, 5.6.16</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The <literal>Format</literal> field of
            <filename>.changes</filename> files is now 1.8.  The
            <literal>Format</literal> field syntax for source package
            <filename>.dsc</filename> files allows a subtype in
            parentheses, and it is used for a different purpose than the
            <literal>Format</literal> field for
            <filename>.changes</filename> files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The syntax of the <literal>Maintainer</literal> field is now
            must rather than should.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The comma separating entries in <literal>Uploaders</literal>
            is now must rather than should.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.8, 7.1, 11.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Architecture wildcards may be used in addition to specific
            architectures in <filename>debian/control</filename> and
            <filename>*.dsc</filename> Architecture fields, and in
            architecture restrictions in build relationships.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>6.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Maintainer scripts are no longer guaranteed to run with a
            controlling terminal and must be able to fall back to
            noninteractive behavior (debconf handles this).  Maintainer
            scripts may abort if there is no controlling terminal and no
            reasonable default for a high-priority question, but should
            avoid this if possible.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.3, 7.6.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>Breaks</literal> should be used with
            <literal>Replaces</literal> for moving files between packages.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>Breaks</literal> should normally be used instead of
            <literal>Conflicts</literal> for transient issues and moving
            files between packages.  New documentation of when each should
            be used.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Use <literal>Conflicts</literal> with
            <literal>Provides</literal> if only one provider of a virtual
            facility can be installed at a time.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            All shared library development files are no longer required to
            be in the <literal>-dev</literal> package, only be available
            when the <literal>-dev</literal> package is installed.  This
            allows the <literal>-dev</literal> package to be split as long
            as it depends on the additional packages.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.2.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The UID range of user accounts is extended to 1000-59999.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2, 10.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>init.d</filename> scripts are a possible exception
            from the normal requirement to use <literal>set -e</literal>
            in each shell script.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The UCB BSD license was removed from the list of licenses that
            should be referenced from
            <filename>/usr/share/common-licenses/BSD</filename>.  It
            should instead be included directly in
            <filename>debian/copyright</filename>, although it will still
            be in common-licenses for the time being.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>debconf</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <literal>SETTITLE</literal> is now documented (it has been
            supported for some time).  <literal>SETTITLE</literal> is like
            <literal>TITLE</literal> but takes a template instead of a
            string to allow translation.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <systemitem role="package">perl-base</systemitem> now provides
            <systemitem
            role="package">perlapi-<replaceable>abiname</replaceable></systemitem>
            instead of a package based solely on the Perl version.  Perl
            packages must now depend on <systemitem
            role="package">perlapi-$Config{debian_abi}</systemitem>,
            falling back on <literal>$Config{version}</literal> if
            <literal>$Config{debian_abi}</literal> is not set.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages using <filename>Makefile.PL</filename> should use
            <literal>DESTDIR</literal> rather than
            <literal>PREFIX</literal> to install into the package staging
            area.  <literal>PREFIX</literal> only worked due to a
            Debian-local patch.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.8.4.0">
    <title>Version 3.8.4</title>

    <para>
      Released January, 2010.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            An FHS exception has been granted for multiarch libraries.
            Permitting files to instead be installed to
            <filename>/lib/triplet</filename> and
            <filename>/usr/lib/triplet</filename> directories.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages may not contain named pipes and should instead create
            them in postinst and remove them in prerm or postrm.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/sys</filename> and <filename>/selinux</filename>
            directories are explicitly allowed as an exception to the FHS.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.8.3.0">
    <title>Version 3.8.3</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 2009.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            DEB_*_ARCH_CPU and DEB_*_ARCH_OS variables are now documented
            and recommended over GNU-style variables for that information.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Source package Architecture fields may contain
            <emphasis>all</emphasis> in combination with other
            architectures.  Clarify when <emphasis>all</emphasis> and
            <emphasis>any</emphasis> may be used in different versions of
            the field.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.14</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Debian archive software does not support uploading to
            multiple distributions with one <filename>*.changes</filename>
            file.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.19</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Binary field may span multiple lines.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Shared library packages are no longer allowed to install
            libraries in a non-standard location and modify
            <filename>ld.so.conf</filename>.  Packages should either be
            installed in a standard library directory or packages using
            them should be built with RPATH.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Installation directories for X programs have been clarified.
            Packages are no longer required to pre-depend on x11-common
            before installing into <filename>/usr/include/X11</filename>
            and <filename>/usr/lib/X11</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Manual pages are no longer required to contain only characters
            representable in the legacy encoding for that language.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Localized man pages should either be kept up-to-date with the
            original version or warn that they're not up-to-date, either
            with warning text or by showing missing or changed portions in
            the original language.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            install-info is now handled via triggers so packages no longer
            need to invoke it in maintainer scripts.  Info documents
            should now have directory sections and entries in the
            document.  Packages containing info documents should add a
            dependency to support partial upgrades.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>perl</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The requirement for Perl modules to have a versioned Depend
            and Build-Depend on <literal>perl &gt;= 5.6.0-16</literal> has
            been removed.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.8.2.0">
    <title>Version 3.8.2</title>

    <para>
      Released June, 2009.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The list of archive sections has been significantly expanded.
            See <ulink
            url="http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2009/03/msg00010.html">this
            debian-devel-announce message</ulink> for the list of new
            sections and rules for how to categorize packages.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            All packages must use debconf or equivalent for user
            prompting, though essential packages or their dependencies may
            also fall back on other methods.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The requirements for source package names are now explicitly
            spelled out.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Legacy XFree86 servers no longer get a special exception from
            the FHS permitting <filename>/etc/X11/XF86Config-4</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Removed obsolete dependency requirements for packages that use
            <filename>/var/mail</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Speedo fonts are now deprecated.  The X backend was disabled
            starting in lenny.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The GNU Free Documentation License version 1.3 is included in
            common-licenses and should be referenced from there.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.8.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.8.1</title>

    <para>
      Released March, 2009.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Care should be taken when adding functionality to essential
            and such additions create an obligation to support that
            functionality in essential forever unless significant work is
            done.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Changelog files must be encoded in UTF-8.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Some format requirements for changelog files are now "must"
            instead of "should."
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.4.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Alternative changelog formats have been removed.  Debian only
            supports one changelog format for the Debian Archive.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New nocheck option for DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS indicating any
            build-time test suite provided by the package should not be
            run.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            All control files must be encoded in UTF-8.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>debian/control</filename> allows comment lines
            starting with # with no preceding whitespace.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Init scripts ending in .sh are not handled specially.  They
            are not sourced and are not guaranteed to be run by
            <command>/bin/sh</command> regardless of the #!  line.  This
            brings Policy in line with the long-standing behavior of the
            init system in Debian.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The start action of an init script must exit successfully and
            not start the daemon again if it's already running.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/var/run</filename> and
            <filename>/var/lock</filename> may be mounted as temporary
            filesystems, and init scripts must therefore create any
            necessary subdirectories dynamically.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/bin/sh</filename> scripts may assume that local can
            take multiple variable arguments and supports assignment.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            User mailboxes may be mode 600 and owned by the user rather
            than mode 660, owned by user, and group mail.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.8.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.8.0</title>

    <para>
      Released June, 2008.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.4, 3.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The base section has been removed.  contrib and non-free have
            been removed from the section list; they are only categories.
            The base system is now defined by priority.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            If <command>dpkg-source -x</command> doesn't provide the
            source that will be compiled, a debian/rules patch target is
            recommended and should do whatever else is necessary.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9.1, 10.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Standardized the format of DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS.  Specified
            permitted characters for tags, required that tags be
            whitespace-separated, allowed packages to assume
            non-conflicting tags, and required unknown flags be ignored.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Added parallel=n to the standardized DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS tags,
            indicating that a package should be built using up to n
            parallel processes if the package supports it
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.13</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Debian packages should not use convenience copies of code from
            other packages unless the included package is explicitly
            intended to be used that way.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.14</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            If dpkg-source -x doesn't produce source ready for editing and
            building with dpkg-buildpackage, packages should include a
            <filename>debian/README.source</filename> file explaining how
            to generate the patched source, add a new modification, and
            remove an existing modification.  This file may also be used
            to document packaging a new upstream release and any other
            complexity of the Debian build process.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Uploaders field in debian/control may be wrapped.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.12</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            An empty Debian revision is equivalent to a Debian revision of
            0 in a version number.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.23</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            New Homepage field for upstream web sites.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>6.5, 6.6, 7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Breaks field declares that this package breaks another and
            prevents installation of the breaking package unless the
            package named in Breaks is deconfigured first.  This field
            should not be used until the dpkg in Debian stable supports
            it.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.1, 8.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Clarify which files should go into a shared library package,
            into a separate package, or into the -dev package.  Suggest
            -tools instead of -runtime for runtime support programs, since
            that naming is more common in Debian.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Files in
            <filename>/etc/cron.{hourly,daily,weekly,monthly}</filename>
            must be configuration files (upgraded from should).  Mention
            the hourly directory.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages providing <filename>/etc/X11/Xresources</filename>
            files need not conflict with <literal>xbase (&lt;&lt;
            3.3.2.3a-2)</literal>, which is long-obsolete.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Manual pages in locale-specific directories should use either
            the legacy encoding for that directory or UTF-8.  Country
            names should not be included in locale-specific manual page
            directories unless indicating a significant difference in the
            language.  All characters in the manual page source should be
            representable in the legacy encoding for a locale even if the
            man page is encoded in UTF-8.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Apache 2.0 license is now in common-licenses and should be
            referenced rather than quoted in
            <filename>debian/copyright</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages in contrib and non-free should state in the copyright
            file that the package is not part of Debian GNU/Linux and
            briefly explain why.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>debconf</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Underscore (_) is allowed in debconf template names.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.7.3.0">
    <title>Version 3.7.3</title>

    <para>
      Released December, 2007.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.12</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Package version numbers may contain tildes, which sort before
            anything, even the end of a part.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Scripts may assume that <filename>/bin/sh</filename> supports
            local (at a basic level) and that its test builtin (if any)
            supports -a and -o binary logical operators.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The substitution variable ${binary:Version} should be used in
            place of ${Source-Version} for dependencies between packages
            of the same library.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>menu policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Substantial reorganization and renaming of sections in the
            Debian menu structure.  Packages with menu entries should be
            reviewed to see if the menu section has been renamed or if one
            of the new sections would be more appropriate.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The Source field in a .changes file may contain a version
            number in parentheses.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.6.17</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The acceptable values for the Urgency field are low, medium,
            high, critical, or emergency.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The shlibs file now allows an optional type field, indicating
            the type of package for which the line is valid.  The only
            currently supported type is udeb, used with packages for the
            Debian Installer.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages following the Debian Configuration management
            specification must allow for translation of their messages by
            using a gettext-based system such as po-debconf.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            GFDL 1.2, GPL 3, and LGPL 3 are now in common-licenses and
            should be referenced rather than quoted in debian/copyright.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.7.2.2">
    <title>Version 3.7.2.2</title>

    <para>
      Released October, 2006.
    </para>
    <para>
      This release broke the normal rule against introducing normative
      changes without changing the major patch level.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>6.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Maintainer scripts must not be world writeable (up from a
            should to a must)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.7.2.0">
    <title>Version 3.7.2</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2006.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Revert the cgi-lib change.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.7.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.7.1</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2006.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            It is now possible to create shared libraries without
            relocatable code (using -fPIC) in certain exceptional cases,
            provided some procedures are followed, and for creating static
            libraries with relocatable code (again, using -fPIC).
            Discussion on debian-devel@lists.debian.org, getting a rough
            consensus, and documenting it in README.Debian constitute most
            of the process.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages should install any relevant files into the
            directories <filename>/usr/include/X11/</filename> and
            <filename>/usr/lib/X11/</filename>, but if they do so, they
            must pre-depend on <literal>x11-common (&gt;=
            1:7.0.0)</literal>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.7.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.7.0</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2006.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages shipping web server CGI files are expected to install
            them in <filename>/usr/lib/cgi-lib/</filename> directories.
            This location change perhaps should be documented in NEWS
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Web server packages should include a standard scriptAlias of
            cgi-lib to <filename>/usr/lib/cgi-lib</filename>.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The version of FHS mandated by policy has been upped to 2.3.
            There should be no changes required for most packages, though
            new top level directories <filename>/media</filename>,
            <filename>/srv</filename>, etc.  may be of interest.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>5.1, 5.6.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            All fields, apart from the Uploaders field, in the control
            file are supposed to be a single logical line, which may be
            spread over multiple physical lines (newline followed by space
            is elided).  However, any parser for the control file must
            allow the Uploaders field to be spread over multiple physical
            lines as well, to prepare for future changes.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            When scripts are installed into a directory in the system
            PATH, the script name should not include an extension that
            denotes the scripting language currently used to implement it.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            packages that invoke initscripts now must use invoke-rc.d to
            do so since it also pays attention to run levels and other
            local constraints.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.5.2, 11.8.7, etc</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            We no longer use <filename>/usr/X11R6</filename>, since we
            have migrated away to using Xorg paths.  This means, for one
            thing, fonts live in
            <filename>/usr/share/fonts/X11/</filename> now, and
            <filename>/usr/X11R6</filename> is gone.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.6.2.0">
    <title>Version 3.6.2</title>

    <para>
      Released June, 2005.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Recommend doc-base, and not menu, for registering package
            documentation.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Run time support programs should live in subdirectories of
            <filename>/usr/lib/</filename> or
            <filename>/usr/share</filename>, and preferably the shared lib
            is named the same as the package name (to avoid name
            collisions).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            It is recommended that HTTP servers provide an alias /images
            to allow packages to share image files with the web server
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.6.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.6.1</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 2003.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.10.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Prompting the user should be done using debconf.  Non debconf
            user prompts are now deprecated.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.6.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.6.0</title>

    <para>
      Released July, 2003.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Restructuring causing shifts in section numbers and bumping of
            the minor version number:
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Many packaging manual appendices that were integrated into
            policy sections are now empty, and replaced with links to the
            Policy.  In particular, the appendices that included the list
            of control fields were updated (new fields like Closes,
            Changed-By were added) and the list of fields for each of
            control, .changes and .dsc files is now in Policy, and they're
            marked mandatory, recommended or optional based on the current
            practice and the behavior of the deb-building tool-chain.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Elimination of needlessly deep section levels, primarily in
            the chapter Debian Archive, from which two new chapters were
            split out, Binary packages and Source packages.  What remained
            was reordered properly, that is, some sects became sects etc.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Several sections that were redundant, crufty or simply not
            designed with any sort of vision, were rearranged according to
            the formula that everything should be either in the same place
            or properly interlinked.  Some things remained split up
            between different chapters when they talked about different
            aspects of files: their content, their syntax, and their
            placement in the file system.  In particular, see the new
            sections about changelog files.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>menu policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Added Games/Simulation and Apps/Education to menu sub-policy
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>C.2.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Debian changelogs should be UTF-8 encoded.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            shared libraries must be linked against all libraries that
            they use symbols from in the same way that binaries are.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            build-depends-indep need not be satisfied during clean target.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.10.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.10</title>

    <para>
      Released May, 2003.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            packages providing the x-terminal-emulator virtual package
            ought to ensure that they interpret the command line exactly
            like xterm does.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Window managers compliant with the Window Manager
            Specification Project may add 40 points for ranking in the
            alternatives
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.9.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.9</title>

    <para>
      Released March, 2003.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.4.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The section describing the Description: package field once
            again has full details of the long description format.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Clarified that if a package has non-build-essential
            build-dependencies, it should have them listed in the
            Build-Depends and related fields (i.e.  it's not merely
            optional).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            When asked to restart a service that isn't already running,
            the init script should start the service.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            If the purpose of a package is to provide examples, then the
            example files can be installed into
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/package</filename> (rather than
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/package/examples</filename>).
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.8.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.8</title>

    <para>
      Released November, 2002.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            It is no longer necessary to keep a log of changes to the
            upstream sources in the copyright file.  Instead, all such
            changes should be documented in the changelog file.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <replaceable>Build-Depends</replaceable>,
            <replaceable>Build-Conflicts</replaceable>,
            <replaceable>Build-Depends-Indep</replaceable>, and
            <replaceable>Build-Conflicts-Indep</replaceable> must also be
            satisfied when the clean target is called.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>menu policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            A new Apps/Science menu section is available
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>debconf policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            debconf specification cleared up, various changes.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            It is no longer recommended to create symlinks from
            nonexistent manual pages to undocumented(7).  Missing manual
            pages for programs are still a bug.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.7.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.7</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 2002.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages no longer have to ask permission to call MAKEDEV in
            postinst, merely notifying the user ought to be enough.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.2.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            cryptographic software may now be included in the main archive.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.9</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            task packages are no longer permitted; tasks are now created
            by a special Tasks: field in the control file.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            window managers that support netwm can now add 20 points when
            they add themselves as an alternative for
            <filename>/usr/bin/x-window-manager</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The default compilation options have now changed, one should
            provide debugging symbols in all cases, and optionally step
            back optimization to -O0, depending on the DEB_BUILD_OPTIONS
            environment variable.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.6, 4.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Added mention of build-arch, build-indep, etc, in describing
            the relationships with `Build-Depends', `Build-Conflicts',
            `Build-Depends-Indep', and `Build-Conflicts-Indep'.  May need
            to review the new rules.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Changed rules on how, and when, to invoke ldconfig in
            maintainer scripts.  Long rationale.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>

    <para>
      <emphasis>Added the last note in 3.5.6 upgrading checklist item
      regarding build rules, please see below</emphasis>
    </para>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.6.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.6</title>

    <para>
      Released July, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>2.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Emacs and TeX are no longer mandated by policy to be priority
            standard packages
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Programs that access docs need to do so via
            <filename>/usr/share/doc</filename>, and not via
            <filename>/usr/doc/</filename> as was the policy previously
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Putting documentation in <filename>/usr/doc</filename> versus
            <filename>/usr/share/doc</filename> is now a ``serious''
            policy violation.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            For web servers, one should not provide non-local access to
            the <filename>/usr/share/doc</filename> hierarchy.  If one
            can't provide access controls for the http://localhost/doc/
            directory, then it is preferred that one ask permission to
            expose that information during the install.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            There are new rules for build-indep/build-arch targets and
            there is a new Build-Depend-Indep semantic.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.5.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.5</title>

    <para>
      Released May, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Manpages should not rely on header information to have
            alternative manpage names available; it should only use
            symlinks or .so pages to do this
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <emphasis>Clarified note in 3.5.3.0 upgrading checklist
            regarding examples and templates: this refers only to those
            examples used by scripts; see section 10.7.3 for the whole
            story</emphasis>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Included a new section 10.9.1 describing the use of
            dpkg-statoverride; this does not have the weight of policy
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Clarify Standards-Version: you don't need to rebuild your
            packages just to change the Standards-Version!
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Plugins are no longer bound by all the rules of shared
            libraries
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>X Windows related things:</term>
        <listitem>
          <variablelist>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.1</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  Clarification of priority levels of X Window System
                  related packages
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.3</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  Rules for defining x-terminal-emulator improved
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.5</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X Font policy rewritten: you must read this if you
                  provide fonts for the X Window System
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.6</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  Packages must not ship
                  <filename>/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults/</filename>
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.7</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X-related packages should usually use the regular FHS
                  locations; imake-using packages are exempted from this
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.8</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  OpenMotif linked binaries have the same rules as
                  OSF/Motif-linked ones
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
          </variablelist>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.4.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.4</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The system-wide mail directory is now /var/mail, no longer
            /var/spool/mail.  Any packages accessing the mail spool should
            access it via /var/mail and include a suitable Depends field;
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.9; perl-policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The perl policy is now part of Debian policy proper.  Perl
            programs and modules should follow the current Perl policy
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.3.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.3</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Build-Depends arch syntax has been changed to be less
            ambiguous.  This should not affect any current packages
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.7.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Examples and templates files for use by scripts should now
            live in <filename>/usr/share/&lt;package&gt;</filename> or
            <filename>/usr/lib/&lt;package&gt;</filename>, with symbolic
            links from
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/&lt;package&gt;/examples</filename>
            as needed
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.2.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.2</title>

    <para>
      Released February, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            X app-defaults directory has moved from
            <filename>/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/app-defaults</filename> to
            <filename>/etc/X11/app-defaults</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.1</title>

    <para>
      Released February, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            dpkg-shlibdeps now uses objdump, so shared libraries have to
            be run through dpkg-shlibdeps as well as executables
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.5.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.5.0</title>

    <para>
      Released January, 2001.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.5</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Font packages for the X Window System must now declare a
            dependency on xutils (>= 4.0.2)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.2.1.1">
    <title>Version 3.2.1.1</title>

    <para>
      Released January, 2001.
    </para>
    <para>
      This release broke the normal rule against introducing normative
      changes without changing the major patch level.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Daemon startup scripts in <filename>/etc/init.d/</filename>
            should not contain modifiable parameters; these should be
            moved to a file in <filename>/etc/default/</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Files in <filename>/usr/share/doc</filename> must not be
            referenced by any program.  If such files are needed, they
            must be placed in
            <filename>/usr/share/&lt;package&gt;/</filename>, and symbolic
            links created as required in
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/&lt;package&gt;/</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Much of the packaging manual has now been imported into the
            policy document
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.2.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.2.1</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 2000.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            A package of priority standard or higher may provide two
            binaries, one compiled with support for the X Window System,
            and the other without
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.2.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.2.0</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 2000.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            By default executables should not be built with the debugging
            option -g.  Instead, it is recommended to support building the
            package with debugging information optionally.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Policy for packages where the upstream uses HTML changelog
            files has been expanded.  In short, a plain text changelog
            file should always be generated for the upstream changes
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Please note that the new release of the X window system (3.2)
            shall probably need sweeping changes in policy
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term></term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Policy for packages providing the following X-based features
            has been codified:
          </para>
          <variablelist>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.2</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X server (virtual package xserver)
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.3</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X terminal emulator (virtual package x-terminal-emulator)
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.4</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X window manager (virtual package x-window-manager, and
                  <filename>/usr/bin/x-window-manager</filename>
                  alternative, with priority calculation guidelines)
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>12.8.5</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X fonts (this section has been written from scratch)
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
            <varlistentry>
              <term>11.8.6</term>
              <listitem>
                <para>
                  X application defaults
                </para>
              </listitem>
            </varlistentry>
          </variablelist>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.8.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Policy for packages using the X Window System and FHS issues
            has been clarified;
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.7.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            No package may contain or make hard links to conffiles
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Noted that newer dpkg versions do not require extreme care in
            always creating the shared lib before the symlink, so the
            unpack order be correct
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.1.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.1.1</title>

    <para>
      Released November, 1999.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Correction to semantics of architecture lists in Build-Depends
            etc.  Should not affect many packages
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.1.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.1.0</title>

    <para>
      Released October, 1999.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>defunct</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/usr/doc/&lt;package&gt;</filename> has to be a
            symlink pointing to
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/&lt;package&gt;</filename>, to be
            maintained by postinst and prerm scripts.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>7.1, 7.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Introduced source dependencies (Build-Depends, etc.)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/etc/rc.boot</filename> has been deprecated in
            favour of <filename>/etc/rcS.d</filename>.  (Packages should
            not be touching this directory, but should use update-rc.d
            instead)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.3.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            update-rc.d is now the <emphasis>only</emphasis> allowable way
            of accessing the <filename>/etc/rc?.d/[SK]??*</filename>
            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.)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Architecture-specific examples go in
            <filename>/usr/lib/&lt;package&gt;/examples</filename> with
            symlinks from
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/&lt;package&gt;/examples/*</filename>
            or from
            <filename>/usr/share/doc/&lt;package&gt;/examples</filename>
            itself
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Updated FHS to a 2.1 draft; this reverts
            <filename>/var/state</filename> to
            <filename>/var/lib</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.7; mime-policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Added MIME sub-policy document
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.4</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            VISUAL is allowed as a (higher priority) alternative to EDITOR
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Modified liblockfile description, which affects
            mailbox-accessing programs.  Please see the policy document
            for details
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.7</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            If a package provides a changelog in HTML format, a text-only
            version should also be included.  (Such a version may be
            prepared using <command>lynx -dump -nolist</command>.)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>3.2.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Description of how to handle version numbers based on dates added
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.0.1.0">
    <title>Version 3.0.1</title>

    <para>
      Released July, 1999.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            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
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-3.0.0.0">
    <title>Version 3.0.0</title>

    <para>
      Released June, 1999.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            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.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>4.1</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Only 3 digits of the Standards version need be included in
            control files, though all four digits are still permitted.
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>12.6</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            The location of the GPL has changed to
            <filename>/usr/share/common-licenses</filename>.  This may
            require changing the copyright files to point to the correct
            location of the GPL and other major licenses
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.2</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Packages that use libtool to create shared libraries must
            include the .la files in the -dev packages
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>10.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Use logrotate to rotate log files
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>now 11.8</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            section 5.8 has been rewritten (Programs for the X Window System)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>9.6; menu-policy</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            There is now an associated menu policy, in a separate
            document, that carries the full weight of Debian policy
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>11.3</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            Programs which need to modify the files
            <filename>/var/run/utmp</filename>,
            <filename>/var/log/wtmp</filename> and
            <filename>/var/log/lastlog</filename> must be installed setgid
            utmp
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.5.0.0">
    <title>Version 2.5.0</title>

    <para>
      Released October, 1998.
    </para>
    <para>
      <emphasis>Please note that section numbers below this point may not
      match the current Policy Manual.</emphasis>
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Rearranged the manual to create a new Section 4, Files
        </para>
        <itemizedlist>
          <listitem>
            <para>
              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.
            </para>
          </listitem>
          <listitem>
            <para>
              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.
            </para>
          </listitem>
        </itemizedlist>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Modified the section about changelog files to accommodate
          upstream changelogs which were formatted as HTML.  These
          upstream changelog files should now be accessible as
          <filename>/usr/doc/package/changelog.html.gz</filename>
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Symlinks are permissible to link the real, or upstream,
          changelog name to the Debian mandated name.
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Clarified that HTML documentation should be present in some
          package, though not necessarily the main binary package.
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Corrected all references to the location of the copyright files.
          The correct location is
          <filename>/usr/doc/package/copyright</filename>
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Ratified the architecture specification strings to cater to the
          HURD.
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.4.1.0">
    <title>Version 2.4.1</title>

    <para>
      Released April, 1998.
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic links</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            symbolic links within a toplevel directory should be
            relative, symbolic links between toplevel directories should
            be absolute (cf., Policy Weekly Issue#6, topic 2)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 4.9 Games</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            manpages for games should be installed in
            <filename>/usr/man/man6</filename> (cf., Policy Weekly
            Issue#6, topic 3)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated Chapter 12 Shared Libraries</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            ldconfig must be called in the postinst script if the package
            installs shared libraries (cf., Policy Weekly Issue #6,
            fixes:bug#20515)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.4.0.0">
    <title>Version 2.4.0</title>

    <para>
      Released January, 1998
    </para>

    <variablelist>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 3.3.4 Scripts</term>
        <listitem>
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                /bin/sh may be any POSIX compatible shell
              </para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                scripts including bashisms have to specify
                <filename>/bin/bash</filename> as interpreter
              </para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                scripts which create files in world-writable directories
                (e.g., in <filename>/tmp</filename>) should use tempfile
                or mktemp for creating the directory
              </para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 3.3.5 Symbolic Links</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            symbolic links referencing compressed files must have the same
            file extension as the referenced file
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 3.3.6 Device files</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/dev/tty*</filename> serial devices should be used
            instead of <filename>/dev/cu*</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>
          Updated section 3.4.2 Writing the scripts in
          <filename>/etc/init.d</filename>
        </term>
        <listitem>
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                all <filename>/etc/init.d</filename> scripts have to
                provide the following options: start, stop, restart,
                force-reload
              </para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                the reload option is optional and must never stop and
                restart the service
              </para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 3.5 Cron jobs</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            cron jobs that need to be executed more often than daily
            should be installed into <filename>/etc/cron.d</filename>
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 3.7 Menus</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            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)
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>New section 3.8 Keyboard configuration</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            details about how the backspace and delete keys should be
            handled
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>New section 3.9 Environment variables</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            no program must depend on environment variables to get a
            reasonable default configuration
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>New section 4.6 News system configuration</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            <filename>/etc/news/organization</filename> and
            <filename>/etc/news/server</filename> should be supported by
            all news servers and clients
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 4.7 Programs for the X Window System</term>
        <listitem>
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                programs requiring a non-free Motif library should be
                provided as foo-smotif and foo-dmotif package
              </para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>
                if lesstif works reliably for such program, it should be
                linked against lesstif and not against a non-free Motif
                library
              </para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
      <varlistentry>
        <term>Updated section 4.9 Games</term>
        <listitem>
          <para>
            games for X Windows have to be installed in
            <filename>/usr/games</filename>, just as non-X games
          </para>
        </listitem>
      </varlistentry>
    </variablelist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.3.0.0">
    <title>Version 2.3.0</title>

    <para>
      Released September, 1997.
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          new section `4.2 Daemons' including rules for
          <filename>/etc/services</filename>,
          <filename>/etc/protocols</filename>,
          <filename>/etc/rpc</filename>, and
          <filename>/etc/inetd.conf</filename>
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          updated section about `Configuration files': packages may not
          touch other packages' configuration files
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          MUAs and MTAs have to use liblockfile
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.2.0.0">
    <title>Version 2.2.0</title>

    <para>
      Released July, 1997.
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          added section 4.1 `Architecture specification strings': use
          &lt;arch&gt;-linux where &lt;arch&gt; is one of the following:
          i386, alpha, arm, m68k, powerpc, sparc.
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          detailed rules for <filename>/usr/local</filename>
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          user ID's
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          editor/pager policy
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          cron jobs
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          device files
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          don't install shared libraries as executable
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          app-defaults files may not be conffiles
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.1.3.0">
    <title>Version 2.1.3</title>

    <para>
      Released March, 1997.
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          two programs with different functionality must not have the same
          name
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          "Webstandard 3.0"
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          "Standard for Console Messages"
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Libraries should be compiled with `-D_REENTRANT'
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Libraries should be stripped with <command>strip
          --strip-unneeded</command>
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.1.2.0">
    <title>Version 2.1.2</title>

    <para>
      Released November, 1996.
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Some changes WRT shared libraries
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.1.1.0">
    <title>Version 2.1.1</title>

    <para>
      Released September, 1996.
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          No hard links in source packages
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Do not use <command>dpkg-divert</command> or
          <command>update-alternatives</command> without consultation
        </para>
      </listitem>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Shared libraries must be installed stripped
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>

  <section id="s-2.1.0.0">
    <title>Version 2.1.0</title>

    <para>
      Released August, 1996.
    </para>

    <itemizedlist>
      <listitem>
        <para>
          Upstream changelog must be installed too
        </para>
      </listitem>
    </itemizedlist>
  </section>
</appendix>