Debian Policy 4.7.0.0 released

Sean Whitton <[email protected]> Sun, 07 Apr 2024 13:25:50 +0800
Newsgroups	gmane.linux.debian.devel.announce
Message-ID	<[email protected]>
Hello everyone,

I just pushed version 4.7.0.0 of the Debian Policy Manual and related
documents to sid.  Below you will find the significant normative changes
from the previously-announced release of Policy (4.6.2.0).

Thank you to everyone who contributed to this release, including those
named in the changelog who formally proposed and seconded wording, and
also those who otherwise participated in the discussions leading up to
the wording change proposals.

I would particularly like to call out Guillem Jover for a big chunk of
work standardising the usage of dpkg-related terminology, and Stéphane
Blondon for a new Debian-specific Sphinx theme for our html edition.
Holger Wansing and Dmitry Shachnev did a lot of follow-up work to get
that format published properly on the web mirrors.

=*=*=*=

2.2.1
    Document that source packages in the *main* archive area may build
    binary packages in the *contrib* archive area, although this is
    discouraged unless the source package is inconvenient to split.
    This does not relax the requirement that source packages in *main*
    must not have build dependencies outside of *main*.

2.2.2
    The ``non-free-firmware`` archive area has been added.

3.9
    Maintainer scripts should use native overriding mechanisms instead
    of dpkg-divert, wherever possible.  Maintainer scripts must not
    divert configuration files used by systemd components.

    Maintainer scripts must not use the alternatives system for systemd
    configuration files.

4.8
    Hard links are permitted in source packages.

4.9
    For packages in contrib, and for packages in non-free with
    ``Autobuild: yes``, required targets in d/rules are no longer
    permitted to attempt network access.  Previously, only packages in
    main had this restriction.

5.6.13
    The ``Description`` field is not present in ``.changes`` files if no
    binary packages are being uploaded.

5.6.19
    The ``Binary`` field is not present in ``.changes`` files if no
    binary packages are being uploaded.

6.3
    Packages that automatically start or stop system services must
    include ``systemd`` units unless the service is only intended for
    use on systems running alternative init systems.
    Previously, ``systemd`` also supported init scripts, but that
    support is being removed.

-- 
Sean Whitton
signature.asc (application/pgp-signature, 869 B)