From: Frank Lichtenheld Date: Sat, 6 Oct 2007 15:43:45 +0000 (+0200) Subject: deb-version.5: Add an own manpage for Dpkg's version format X-Git-Url: https://err.no/cgi-bin/gitweb.cgi?a=commitdiff_plain;h=c8fe972755e9421f90493be9278ea84f4cb8d878;p=dpkg deb-version.5: Add an own manpage for Dpkg's version format Mostly stolen from policy, which is probably as good as it gets... Only reformatted the text to roff and added the tilde patch from #382612 --- diff --git a/debian/changelog b/debian/changelog index 5e73d797..8aadeaed 100644 --- a/debian/changelog +++ b/debian/changelog @@ -1,6 +1,8 @@ dpkg (1.14.13) UNRELEASED; urgency=low - * + [ Frank Lichtenheld ] + * Add an own manpage for Dpkg's version format. Mostly stolen + from policy. Closes: #373003 -- Guillem Jover Thu, 29 Nov 2007 07:08:35 +0200 diff --git a/man/ChangeLog b/man/ChangeLog index 612216b8..38e6b6a8 100644 --- a/man/ChangeLog +++ b/man/ChangeLog @@ -1,3 +1,12 @@ +2007-11-29 Frank Lichtenheld + + * deb-control.5: Move description of + version format to... + * deb-version.5: Take the section from + policy describing version format and + sorting since this is probably as good + as it gets for describing these. + 2007-11-29 Guillem Jover * po/dpkg-man.pot: Regenerated. diff --git a/man/deb-control.5 b/man/deb-control.5 index 3802d07f..185128db 100644 --- a/man/deb-control.5 +++ b/man/deb-control.5 @@ -31,9 +31,9 @@ generate file names by most installation tools. .BR Version: " " Typically, this is the original package's version number in whatever form the program's author uses. It may also include a Debian revision number -(for non-native packages). If both version and revision are supplied, -they are separated by a hyphen, `-'. For this reason, the original version -may not have a hyphen in its version number. +(for non-native packages). The exact format and sorting algorithm +are described in +.BR deb-version (5). .TP .BR Maintainer: " " Should be in the format `Joe Bloggs ', and is typically @@ -226,6 +226,7 @@ Description: GNU grep, egrep and fgrep. . .SH SEE ALSO .BR deb (5), +.BR deb-version (5), .BR debtags (1), .BR dpkg (1), .BR dpkg-deb (1). diff --git a/man/deb-version.5 b/man/deb-version.5 new file mode 100644 index 00000000..0b3b86bd --- /dev/null +++ b/man/deb-version.5 @@ -0,0 +1,128 @@ +.\" Includes text from the Debian Policy probably by Ian Jackson and others +.\" The copyright given below is that of the whole policy, but probably +.\" incomplete. +.\" Conversion to roff by Frank Lichtenheld +.TH deb\-version 5 "2007-10-06" "Debian Project" "Debian" +.SH NAME +deb\-version \- Debian package version number format +. +.SH SYNOPSIS +.RI "[ " epoch ":] " upstream_version " [\-" debian_revision " ]" +.SH DESCRIPTION +Version numbers as used for Debian binary and source packages +consist of three components. These are: +.TP +.I epoch +This is a single (generally small) unsigned integer. It +may be omitted, in which case zero is assumed. If it is +omitted then the \fIupstream_version\fP may not +contain any colons. +.IP +It is provided to allow mistakes in the version numbers +of older versions of a package, and also a package's +previous version numbering schemes, to be left behind. +.TP +.I upstream_version +This is the main part of the version number. It is +usually the version number of the original ("upstream") +package from which the \fI.deb\fP file has been made, +if this is applicable. Usually this will be in the same +format as that specified by the upstream author(s); +however, it may need to be reformatted to fit into the +package management system's format and comparison +scheme. +.IP +The comparison behavior of the package management system +with respect to the \fIupstream_version\fP is +described below. The \fIupstream_version\fP +portion of the version number is mandatory. +.IP +The \fIupstream_version\fP may contain only +alphanumerics ("A-Za-z0-9") and the characters +.BR . " " + " " \- " " : " " ~ +(full stop, plus, hyphen, colon, tilde) and should +start with a digit. If there is no +\fIdebian_revision\fP then hyphens are not allowed; +if there is no \fIepoch\fP then colons are not +allowed. +.TP +.I debian_revision +This part of the version number specifies the version of +the Debian package based on the upstream version. It +may contain only alphanumerics and the characters +.BR + " " . " " ~ +(plus, full stop, tilde) and is +compared in the same way as the +\fIupstream_version\fP is. +.IP +It is optional; if it isn't present then the +\fIupstream_version\fP may not contain a hyphen. +This format represents the case where a piece of +software was written specifically to be turned into a +Debian package, and so there is only one "debianisation" +of it and therefore no revision indication is required. +.IP +It is conventional to restart the +\fIdebian_revision\fP at '1' each time time the +\fIupstream_version\fP is increased. +.IP +Dpkg will break the version +number apart at the last hyphen in the string (if there +is one) to determine the \fIupstream_version\fP and +\fIdebian_revision\fP. The absence of a +\fIdebian_revision\fP compares earlier than the +presence of one (but note that the \fIdebian_revision\fP +is the least significant part of the version number). +.SS Sorting Algorithm +The \fIupstream_version\fP and \fIdebian_revision\fP +parts are compared by the package management system using the +same algorithm: +.PP +The strings are compared from left to right. +.PP +First the initial part of each string consisting entirely of +non-digit characters is determined. These two parts (one of +which may be empty) are compared lexically. If a difference +is found it is returned. The lexical comparison is a +comparison of ASCII values modified so that all the letters +sort earlier than all the non-letters and so that a tilde +sorts before anything, even the end of a part. For example, +the following parts are in sorted order: '~~', '~~a', '~', +the empty part, 'a'. +.PP +Then the initial part of the remainder of each string which +consists entirely of digit characters is determined. The +numerical values of these two parts are compared, and any +difference found is returned as the result of the comparison. +For these purposes an empty string (which can only occur at +the end of one or both version strings being compared) counts +as zero. +.PP +These two steps (comparing and removing initial non-digit +strings and initial digit strings) are repeated until a +difference is found or both strings are exhausted. +.PP +Note that the purpose of epochs is to allow us to leave behind +mistakes in version numbering, and to cope with situations +where the version numbering scheme changes. It is +\fBnot\fP intended to cope with version numbers containing +strings of letters which the package management system cannot +interpret (such as 'ALPHA' or 'pre\-'), or with +silly orderings. +.SH CAVEATS +The tilde character and its special sorting properties were introduced +in dpkg, version 1.10 and some parts of dpkg-dev only gained +support for it later in the 1.10.x series. +.SH SEE ALSO +.BR deb-control (5), +.BR deb (5), +.BR dpkg (1) +.SH AUTHORS +Copyright © 1996,1997,1998 Ian Jackson and Christian Schwarz. +.br +Copyright © 2007 Frank Lichtenheld +.sp +This manual is free software; you may redistribute it and/or modify it +under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the +Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) any later +version.