1 .\" dpkg manual page - deb-control(5)
3 .\" Copyright © 1995 Raul Miller, Ian Jackson, Ian Murdock
4 .\" Copyright © 1999 Ben Collins <bcollins@debian.org>
5 .\" Copyright © 2000 Wichert Akkerman <wakkerma@debian.org>
6 .\" Copyright © 2007-2011, 2013-2015 Guillem Jover <guillem@debian.org>
7 .\" Copyright © 2008-2012 Raphaël Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org>
9 .\" This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
10 .\" it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
11 .\" the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
12 .\" (at your option) any later version.
14 .\" This is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
15 .\" but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
16 .\" MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
17 .\" GNU General Public License for more details.
19 .\" You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
20 .\" along with this program. If not, see <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
22 .TH deb\-control 5 "%RELEASE_DATE%" "%VERSION%" "dpkg suite"
25 deb\-control \- Debian binary packages' master control file format
31 Each Debian binary package contains the master \fIcontrol\fP file, which
32 contains a number of fields.
33 Each field begins with a tag, such as
37 (case insensitive), followed by a colon, and the body of the field.
38 Fields are delimited only by field tags. In other words, field text
39 may be multiple lines in length, but the installation tools will
40 generally join lines when processing the body of the field (except
47 .BR Package: " \fIpackage-name\fP (required)"
48 The value of this field determines the package name, and is used to
49 generate file names by most installation tools.
51 .BR Version: " \fIversion-string\fP (required)"
52 Typically, this is the original package's version number in whatever form
53 the program's author uses. It may also include a Debian revision number
54 (for non-native packages). The exact format and sorting algorithm
58 .BR Maintainer: " \fIfullname-email\fP (recommended)"
59 Should be in the format “Joe Bloggs <jbloggs@foo.com>”, and is typically
60 the person who created the package, as opposed to the author of the
61 software that was packaged.
63 .BR Description: " \fIshort-description\fP (recommended)"
65 .BI " " "long-description"
67 The format for the package description is a short brief summary on the
68 first line (after the \fBDescription\fP field). The following lines should be
69 used as a longer, more detailed description. Each line of the long description
70 must be preceded by a space, and blank lines in the long description must
71 contain a single ‘\fB.\fP’ following the preceding space.
73 .BI Section: " section"
74 This is a general field that gives the package a category based on the
75 software that it installs.
76 Some common sections are \fButils\fP, \fBnet\fP, \fBmail\fP, \fBtext\fP,
79 .BI Priority: " priority"
80 Sets the importance of this package in relation to the system as a whole.
81 Common priorities are \fBrequired\fP, \fBstandard\fP, \fBoptional\fP,
88 fields usually have a defined set of accepted values based on the specific
92 .BR Installed\-Size: " size"
93 The approximate total size of the package's installed files, in KiB units.
96 .BR Essential: " \fByes\fP|\fBno\fP"
97 This field is usually only needed when the answer is \fByes\fP. It denotes
98 a package that is required for proper operation of the system. Dpkg
99 or any other installation tool will not allow an
101 package to be removed (at least not without using one of the force options).
103 .BR Build\-Essential: " \fByes\fP|\fBno\fP"
104 This field is usually only needed when the answer is \fByes\fP, and is
105 commonly injected by the archive software.
106 It denotes a package that is required when building other packages.
108 .BR Architecture: " \fIarch\fP|\fBall\fP (recommended)"
109 The architecture specifies which type of hardware this package was compiled
111 Common architectures are \fBamd64\fP, \fBarmel\fP, \fBi386\fP, \fBpowerpc\fP,
115 value is meant for packages that are architecture independent.
116 Some examples of this are shell and Perl scripts, and documentation.
119 The name of the distribution this package is originating from.
122 The \fIurl\fP of the bug tracking system for this package. The current
123 used format is \fIbts-type\fP\fB://\fP\fIbts-address\fP, like
124 \fBdebbugs://bugs.debian.org\fP.
127 The upstream project home page \fIurl\fP.
130 List of tags describing the qualities of the package. The description and
131 list of supported tags can be found in the \fBdebtags\fP package.
133 .BR Multi\-Arch: " \fBno\fP|\fBsame\fP|\fBforeign\fP|\fBallowed\fP"
134 This field is used to indicate how this package should behave on a multi-arch
139 This value is the default when the field is omitted, in which case
140 adding the field with an explicit \fBno\fP value is generally not needed.
143 This package is co-installable with itself, but it must not be used to
144 satisfy the dependency of any package of a different architecture from
148 This package is not co-installable with itself, but should be allowed to
149 satisfy a non-arch-qualified dependency of a package of a different arch
150 from itself (if a dependency has an explicit arch-qualifier then the
151 value \fBforeign\fP is ignored).
154 This allows reverse-dependencies to indicate in their \fBDepends\fP
155 field that they accept this package from a foreign architecture by
156 qualifying the package name with \fB:any\fP, but has no effect otherwise.
159 .BR Source: " \fIsource-name\fP [\fB(\fP\fIsource-version\fP\fB)\fP]"
160 The name of the source package that this binary package came from, if it is
161 different than the name of the package itself.
162 If the source version differs from the binary version, then the
163 \fIsource-name\fP will be followed by a \fIsource-version\fP in parenthesis.
164 This can happen for example on a binary-only non-maintainer upload, or when
165 setting a different binary version via «\fBdpkg\-gencontrol \-v\fP».
167 .BI Subarchitecture: " value"
169 .BI Kernel\-Version: " value"
171 .BI Installer\-Menu\-Item: " value"
172 These fields are used by the debian\-installer and are usually not needed.
173 See /usr/share/doc/debian\-installer/devel/modules.txt from the
175 package for more details about them.
178 .BI Depends: " package-list"
179 List of packages that are required for this package to provide a
180 non-trivial amount of functionality. The package maintenance software
181 will not allow a package to be installed if the packages listed in its
183 field aren't installed (at least not without using the force options).
184 In an installation, the postinst scripts of packages listed in \fBDepends\fP
185 fields are run before those of the packages which depend on them. On the
186 opposite, in a removal, the prerm script of a package is run before
187 those of the packages listed in its \fBDepends\fP field.
189 .BI Pre\-Depends: " package-list"
190 List of packages that must be installed
192 configured before this one can be installed. This is usually used in the
193 case where this package requires another package for running its preinst
196 .BI Recommends: " package-list"
197 Lists packages that would be found together with this one in all but
198 unusual installations. The package maintenance software will warn the
199 user if they install a package without those listed in its
203 .BI Suggests: " package-list"
204 Lists packages that are related to this one and can perhaps enhance
205 its usefulness, but without which installing this package is perfectly
214 fields is a list of groups of alternative packages. Each group is a list
215 of packages separated by vertical bar (or “pipe”) symbols,
217 The groups are separated by commas.
218 Commas are to be read as “AND”, and pipes as “OR”, with pipes
219 binding more tightly.
220 Each package name is optionally followed by an architecture qualifier
221 appended after a colon ‘\fB:\fP’, optionally followed by a version
222 number specification in parentheses.
224 An architecture qualifier name can be a real Debian architecture name
225 (since dpkg 1.16.5) or \fBany\fP (since dpkg 1.16.2).
226 If omitted, the default is the current binary package architecture.
227 A real Debian architecture name will match exactly that architecture for
228 that package name, \fBany\fP will match any architecture for that package
229 name if the package has been marked as \fBMulti\-Arch: allowed\fP.
231 A version number may start with a ‘\fB>>\fP’, in which case any later
232 version will match, and may specify or omit the Debian packaging revision
233 (separated by a hyphen).
234 Accepted version relationships are ‘\fB>>\fP’ for greater than,
235 ‘\fB<<\fP’ for less than, ‘\fB>=\fP’ for greater than or
236 equal to, ‘\fB<=\fP’ for less than or equal to, and ‘\fB=\fP’
239 .BI Breaks: " package-list"
240 Lists packages that this one breaks, for example by exposing bugs
241 when the named packages rely on this one. The package maintenance
242 software will not allow broken packages to be configured; generally
243 the resolution is to upgrade the packages named in a
247 .BI Conflicts: " package-list"
248 Lists packages that conflict with this one, for example by containing
249 files with the same names. The package maintenance software will not
250 allow conflicting packages to be installed at the same time. Two
251 conflicting packages should each include a
253 line mentioning the other.
255 .BI Replaces: " package-list"
256 List of packages files from which this one replaces. This is used for
257 allowing this package to overwrite the files of another package and
258 is usually used with the
260 field to force removal of the other package, if this one also has the
261 same files as the conflicted package.
268 is a list of package names, separated by commas (and optional whitespace).
273 fields, the comma should be read as “OR”.
274 An optional architecture qualifier can also be appended to the package name
275 with the same syntax as above, but the default is \fBany\fP instead of the
276 binary package architecture.
277 An optional version can also be given with the same syntax as above for the
285 .BI Provides: " package-list"
286 This is a list of virtual packages that this one provides.
287 Usually this is used in the case of several packages all providing the
289 For example, sendmail and exim can serve as a mail server, so they
290 provide a common package (“mail\-transport\-agent”) on which
291 other packages can depend.
292 This will allow sendmail or exim to serve as a valid option to satisfy
294 This prevents the packages that depend on a mail server from having to
295 know the package names for all of them, and using ‘\fB|\fP’ to
300 is a list of package names, separated by commas (and optional whitespace).
301 An optional architecture qualifier can also be appended to the package
302 name with the same syntax as above.
303 If omitted, the default is the current binary package architecture.
304 An optional exact (equal to) version can also be given with the same
305 syntax as above (honored since dpkg 1.17.11).
308 .BI Built\-Using: " package-list"
309 This field lists extra source packages that were used during the build of this
310 binary package. This is an indication to the archive maintenance software that
311 these extra source packages must be kept whilst this binary package is
313 This field must be a list of source package names with strict ‘\fB=\fP’
314 version relationships. Note that the archive maintenance software is likely to
315 refuse to accept an upload which declares a
317 relationship which cannot be satisfied within the archive.
320 .BI Built\-For\-Profiles: " profile-list (obsolete)"
321 This field used to specify a whitespace separated list of build profiles that
322 this binary packages was built with (since dpkg 1.17.2 until 1.18.18).
323 The information previously found in this field can now be found in the
324 \fB.buildinfo\fP file, which supersedes it.
327 .BI Auto\-Built\-Package: " reason-list"
328 This field specifies a whitespace separated list of reasons why this package
330 Binary packages marked with this field will not appear in the
331 \fIdebian/control\fP master source control file.
332 The only currently used reason is \fBdebug\-symbols\fP.
342 Maintainer: Wichert Akkerman <wakkerma@debian.org>
345 Pre\-Depends: libc6 (>= 2.0.105)
348 Description: GNU grep, egrep and fgrep.
349 The GNU family of grep utilities may be the "fastest grep in the west".
350 GNU grep is based on a fast lazy-state deterministic matcher (about
351 twice as fast as stock Unix egrep) hybridized with a Boyer-Moore-Gosper
352 search for a fixed string that eliminates impossible text from being
353 considered by the full regexp matcher without necessarily having to
354 look at every character. The result is typically many times faster
355 than Unix grep or egrep. (Regular expressions containing backreferencing
356 will run more slowly, however).
362 .BR deb\-version (5),
~mdw / dpkg / blob