<para>
Important news about changes in a package can also be put in
<filename>NEWS.Debian</filename> files.
-The news will be displayed by tools like apt-listchanges, before all the rest
+The news will be displayed by tools like <systemitem role="package">apt-listchanges</systemitem>, before all the rest
of the changelogs. This is the preferred means to let the user know about
-significant changes in a package. It is better than using debconf notes since
+significant changes in a package. It is better than using <systemitem role="package">debconf</systemitem> notes since
it is less annoying and the user can go back and refer to the
<filename>NEWS.Debian</filename> file after the install. And it's better than listing
major changes in <filename>README.Debian</filename>, since the user can easily
</para>
<para>
The short description should be kept short (50 characters or so) so that it may
-be accomodated by most debconf interfaces. Keeping it short also helps
+be accommodated by most debconf interfaces. Keeping it short also helps
translators, as usually translations tend to end up being longer than the
original.
</para>
The short description should be phrased in the form of a question which should
be kept short and should generally end with a question mark. Terse writing
style is permitted and even encouraged if the question is rather long (remember
-that translations are often longer than original versions)
+that translations are often longer than original versions).
</para>
</listitem>
<listitem>
If the default value may vary depending on language/country (for instance the
default value for a language choice), consider using the special _Default
type documented in <citerefentry> <refentrytitle>po-debconf</refentrytitle>
-<manvolnum>7</manvolnum> </citerefentry>).
+<manvolnum>7</manvolnum> </citerefentry>.
</para>
</section>
<section id="bpp-i18n">
<title>Internationalization</title>
+<para>
+This section contains global information for developers to make translators'
+life easier. More information for translators and developers interrested
+in internationalization are available in the <ulink
+url="&url-i18n-l10n;">Internationalisation and localisation in Debian</ulink>
+documentation.
+</para>
<section id="bpp-i18n-debconf">
<title>Handling debconf translations</title>
<para>
file which is included by all the different translations. This makes it much
easier, for instance, to keep URLs up to date across multiple files.
</para>
+<para>
+Some tools (e.g. <systemitem role="package">po4a</systemitem>, <systemitem
+role="package">poxml</systemitem>, or the <systemitem
+role="package">translate-toolkit</systemitem>) are specialized in extracting
+the translatable material from different formats. They produce PO files, a
+format quite common to translators, which permits to see what needs to be
+retranslated when the translated document is updated.
+</para>
</section>
</section>
<command>apt-cache search .|grep dummy</command> or
<command>apt-cache search .|grep transitional</command>.
</para>
+<para>
+Also, it is recommended to adjust its section to
+<literal>oldlibs</literal>
+and its priority to
+<literal>extra</literal>
+in order to ease <command>deborphan</command>'s job.
+</para>
</section>
<section id="bpp-origtargz">
Depends: libfoo (= ${binary:Version})
</screen>
</section>
+<section id="bpp-meta">
+<title>Best practices for meta-packages</title>
+<para>
+A meta-package is a mostly empty package that makes it easy to install a
+coherent set of packages that can evolve over time. It achieves this by
+depending on all the packages of the set. Thanks to the power of APT, the
+meta-package maintainer can adjust the dependencies and the user's system
+will automatically get the supplementary packages. The dropped packages
+that were automaticaly installed will be also be marked as removal
+candidates (and are even automatically removed by <command>aptitude</command>).
+<systemitem role="package">gnome</systemitem> and
+<systemitem role="package">linux-image-amd64</systemitem> are two examples
+of meta-packages (built by the source packages
+<systemitem role="package">meta-gnome2</systemitem> and
+<systemitem role="package">linux-latest</systemitem>)
+</para>
+<para>
+The long description of the meta-package must clearly document its purpose
+so that the user knows what he will lose if he removes the package. Being
+explicit about the consequences is recommended. This is particularly
+important for meta-packages which are installed during initial
+installation and that have not been explicitly installed by the user.
+Those tend to be important to ensure smooth system upgrades and
+the user should be discouraged from uninstalling them to avoid
+potential breakages.
+</para>
+</section>
</section>