deb-src-control(5)
NAME
deb-src-control - Debian source packages' master control file format
SYNOPSIS
debian/control
DESCRIPTION
Each Debian source package contains the master control file, which
contains at least 2 paragraphs, separated by a blank line. The first
paragraph lists all information about the source package in general,
while each following paragraph describes exactly one binary package.
Each paragraph consists of at least one field. A field starts with a
fieldname, such as Package or Section (case insensitive), followed by a
colon, the body of the field and a newline. Multi-line fields are also
allowed, but each supplementary line, without a fieldname, should start
with at least one space. The content of the multi-line fields is
generally joined to a single line by the tools (except in the case of
the Description field, see below). To insert empty lines into a multi-
line field, insert a dot after the space. Lines starting with a '#'
are treated as comments.
SOURCE FIELDS
Source: source-package-name (required)
The value of this field is the name of the source package, and
should match the name of the source package in the
debian/changelog file. A package name must consist only of lower
case letters (a-z), digits (0-9), plus (+) and minus (-) signs,
and periods (.). Package names must be at least two characters
long and must start with an alphanumeric character.
Maintainer: fullname-email (recommended)
Should be in the format Joe Bloggs <jbloggs@foo.com>, and
references the person who currently maintains the package, as
opposed to the author of the software or the original packager.
Uploaders: fullname-email
Lists all the names and email addresses of co-maintainers of the
package, in the same format as the Maintainer field. Multiple
co-maintainers should be separated by a comma.
Standards-Version: version-string
This documents the most recent version of the distribution
policy standards this package complies with.
Homepage: url
The upstream project home page URL.
Bugs: url
The url of the bug tracking system for this package. The current
used format is bts-type://bts-address, like
debbugs://bugs.debian.org. This field is usually not needed.
Vcs-Arch: url
Vcs-Bzr: url
Vcs-Cvs: url
Vcs-Darcs: url
Vcs-Git: url
Vcs-Hg: url
Vcs-Mtn: url
Vcs-Svn: url
The url of the Version Control System repository used to
maintain this package. Currently supported are Arch, Bzr
(Bazaar), Cvs, Darcs, Git, Hg (Mercurial), Mtn (Monotone) and
Svn (Subversion). Usually this field points to the latest
version of the package, such as the main branch or the trunk.
Vcs-Browser: url
The url of a webinterface to browse the Version Control System
repository.
Origin: name
The name of the distribution this package is originating from.
This field is usually not needed.
Section: section
This is a general field that gives the package a category based
on the software that it installs. Some common sections are
utils, net, mail, text, x11, etc.
Priority: priority
Sets the importance of this package in relation to the system as
a whole. Common priorities are required, standard, optional,
extra, etc.
The Section and Priority fields usually have a defined set of
accepted values based on the specific distribution policy.
Build-Depends: package-list
A list of packages that need to be installed and configured to
be able to build from source package. These dependencies need
to be satisfied when building binary architecture dependent or
independent packages and source packages. Including a
dependency in this field does not have the exact same effect as
including it in both Build-Depends-Arch and Build-Depends-Indep,
because the dependency also needs to be satisfied when building
the source package.
Build-Depends-Arch: package-list
Same as Build-Depends, but they are only needed when building
the architecture dependent packages. The Build-Depends are also
installed in this case. This field is supported since dpkg
1.16.4; in order to build with older dpkg versions,
Build-Depends should be used instead.
Build-Depends-Indep: package-list
Same as Build-Depends, but they are only needed when building
the architecture independent packages. The Build-Depends are
also installed in this case.
Build-Conflicts: package-list
A list of packages that should not be installed when the package
is built, for example because they interfere with the build
system used. Including a dependency in this list has the same
effect as including it in both Build-Conflicts-Arch and
Build-Conflicts-Indep, with the additional effect of being used
for source-only builds.
Build-Conflicts-Arch: package-list
Same as Build-Conflicts, but only when building the architecture
dependent packages. This field is supported since dpkg 1.16.4;
in order to build with older dpkg versions, Build-Conflicts
should be used instead.
Build-Conflicts-Indep: package-list
Same as Build-Conflicts, but only when building the architecture
independent packages.
The syntax of the Build-Depends, Build-Depends-Arch and
Build-Depends-Indep fields is a list of groups of alternative packages.
Each group is a list of packages separated by vertical bar (or "pipe")
symbols, '|'. The groups are separated by commas. Commas are to be
read as "AND", and pipes as "OR", with pipes binding more tightly.
Each package name is optionally followed by an architecture qualifier
appended after a colon ':', optionally followed by a version number
specification in parentheses, an architecture specification in square
brackets, and a restriction formula consisting of one or more lists of
profile names in angle brackets.
The syntax of the Build-Conflicts, Build-Conflicts-Arch and
Build-Conflicts-Indep fields is a list of comma-separated package
names, where the comma is read as an "AND". Specifying alternative
packages using a "pipe" is not supported. Each package name is
optionally followed by a version number specification in parentheses,
an architecture specification in square brackets, and a restriction
formula consisting of one or more lists of profile names in angle
brackets.
An architecture qualifier name can be a real Debian architecture name
(since dpkg 1.16.5), any (since dpkg 1.16.2) or native (since dpkg
1.16.5). If omitted, the default for Build-Depends fields is the
current host architecture, the default for Build-Conflicts fields is
any. A real Debian architecture name will match exactly that
architecture for that package name, any will match any architecture for
that package name if the package is marked with Multi-Arch: allowed,
and native will match the current build architecture if the package is
not marked with Multi-Arch: foreign.
A version number may start with a '>>', in which case any later version
will match, and may specify or omit the Debian packaging revision
(separated by a hyphen). Accepted version relationships are '>>' for
greater than, '<<' for less than, '>=' for greater than or equal to,
'<=' for less than or equal to, and '=' for equal to.
An architecture specification consists of one or more architecture
names, separated by whitespace. Exclamation marks may be prepended to
each of the names, meaning "NOT".
A restriction formula consists of one or more restriction lists,
separated by whitespace. Each restriction list is enclosed in angle
brackets. Items in the restriction list are build profile names,
separated by whitespace and can be prefixed with an exclamation mark,
meaning "NOT". A restriction formula represents a disjunctive normal
form expression.
Note that dependencies on packages in the build-essential set can be
omitted and that declaring build conflicts against them is impossible.
A list of these packages is in the build-essential package.
BINARY FIELDS
Note that the Priority, Section and Homepage fields can also be in a
binary paragraph to override the global value from the source package.
Package: binary-package-name (required)
This field is used to name the binary package name. The same
restrictions as to a source package name apply.
Architecture: arch|all|any (required)
The architecture specifies on which type of hardware this
package runs. For packages that run on all architectures, use
the any value. For packages that are architecture independent,
such as shell and Perl scripts or documentation, use the all
value. To restrict the packages to a certain set of
architectures, specify the architecture names, separated by a
space. It's also possible to put architecture wildcards in that
list (see dpkg-architecture(1) for more information about them).
Build-Profiles: restriction-formula
This field specifies the conditions for which this binary
package does or does not build. To express that condition, the
same restriction formula syntax from the Build-Depends field is
used.
If a binary package paragraph does not contain this field, then
it implicitly means that it builds with all build profiles
(including none at all).
In other words, if a binary package paragraph is annotated with
a non-empty Build-Profiles field, then this binary package is
generated if and only if the condition expressed by the
conjunctive normal form expression evaluates to true.
Package-Type: deb|udeb
This field defines the type of the package. udeb is for size-
constrained packages used by the debian installer. deb is the
default value, it is assumed if the field is absent. More types
might be added in the future.
Subarchitecture: value
Kernel-Version: value
Installer-Menu-Item: value
These fields are used by the debian-installer and are usually
not needed. See
/usr/share/doc/debian-installer/devel/modules.txt from the
debian-installer package for more details about them.
Essential: yes|no
Build-Essential: yes|no
Multi-Arch: same|foreign|allowed|no
Tag: tag-list
Description: short-description (recommended)
These fields are described in the deb-control(5) manual page, as
they are copied literally to the control file of the binary
package.
Depends: package-list
Pre-Depends: package-list
Recommends: package-list
Suggests: package-list
Breaks: package-list
Enhances: package-list
Replaces: package-list
Conflicts: package-list
Provides: package-list
Built-Using: package-list
These fields declare relationships between packages. They are
discussed in the deb-control(5) manpage.
USER-DEFINED FIELDS
It is allowed to add additional user-defined fields to the control
file. The tools will ignore these fields. If you want the fields to be
copied over to the output files, such as the binary packages, you need
to use a custom naming scheme: the fields should start with a X,
followed by one or more of the letters BCS and a hyphen. If the letter
B is used, the field will appear in the control file in the binary
package, see deb-control(5), for the letter S in the source package
control file as constructed by dpkg-source(1) and for the letter C in
the upload control (.changes) file. Note that the X[BCS]- prefixes are
stripped when the fields are copied over to the output files. A field
XC-Approved-By will appear as Approved-By in the changes file and will
not appear in the binary or source package control files.
Take into account that these user-defined fields will be using the
global namespace, which might at some point in the future collide with
officially recognized fields. To avoid such potential situation you can
prefix those fields with Private-, such as XB-Private-New-Field.
EXAMPLE
# Comment
Source: dpkg
Section: admin
Priority: required
Maintainer: Dpkg Developers <debian-dpkg@lists.debian.org>
# this field is copied to the binary and source packages
XBS-Upstream-Release-Status: stable
Homepage: https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/Dpkg
Vcs-Browser: https://anonscm.debian.org/cgit/dpkg/dpkg.git
Vcs-Git: https://anonscm.debian.org/git/dpkg/dpkg.git
Standards-Version: 3.7.3
Build-Depends: pkg-config, debhelper (>= 4.1.81),
libselinux1-dev (>= 1.28-4) [!linux-any]
Package: dpkg-dev
Section: utils
Priority: optional
Architecture: all
# this is a custom field in the binary package
XB-Mentoring-Contact: Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org>
Depends: dpkg (>= 1.14.6), perl5, perl-modules, cpio (>= 2.4.2-2),
bzip2, lzma, patch (>= 2.2-1), make, binutils, libtimedate-perl
Recommends: gcc | c-compiler, build-essential
Suggests: gnupg, debian-keyring
Conflicts: dpkg-cross (<< 2.0.0), devscripts (<< 2.10.26)
Replaces: manpages-pl (<= 20051117-1)
Description: Debian package development tools
This package provides the development tools (including dpkg-source)
required to unpack, build and upload Debian source packages.
.
Most Debian source packages will require additional tools to build;
for example, most packages need make and the C compiler gcc.
SEE ALSO
deb-control(5), deb-version(5), dpkg-source(1)
Free and Open Source Software