dpkg/man/en/deb.5.sgml

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<refentry id="deb.5">
  <refmeta>
    <refentrytitle>deb</refentrytitle>
    <manvolnum>5</manvolnum>
    <refmiscinfo class="source">Debian Project</refmiscinfo>
    <refmiscinfo class="manual">dpkg suite</refmiscinfo>
  </refmeta>

  <refnamediv>
    <refname>deb</refname>
    <refpurpose>Debian binary package format</refpurpose>
  </refnamediv>

  <refsynopsisdiv>
    <synopsis><filename>filename.deb</filename></synopsis>
  </refsynopsisdiv>

  <refsect1>
    <title>Description</title>

    <para>
      The <filename>.deb</filename> format is the Debian binary package file
      format. It is understood by <productname>dpkg</productname> 0.93.76 and
      later, and is generated by default by all versions of
      <productname>dpkg</productname> since 1.2.0 and all i386/ELF versions
      since 1.1.1elf.
    </para>

    <para>
      The format described here is used since Debian 0.93; details of the old
      format are described in
      <citerefentry><refentrytitle>deb-old</refentrytitle><manvolnum>5</manvolnum></citerefentry>.
    </para>
  </refsect1>

  <refsect1>
    <title>Format</title>

    <para>
      The file is an <emphasis>ar</emphasis> archive with a magic number of
      <emphasis>!&lt;arch&gt;</emphasis>.
    </para>

    <para>
     The first member is named <filename>debian-binary</filename> and contains
     a series of lines, separated by newlines. Currently only one line is
     present, the format version number, <emphasis>2.0</emphasis> at the time
     this manual page was written. Programs which read new-format archives
     should be prepared for the minor number to be increased and new lines to
     be present, and should ignore these if this is the case.
    </para>

    <para>
      If the major number has changed, an incompatible change has been made and
      the program should stop. If it has not, then the program should be able
      to safely continue, unless it encounters an unexpected member in the
      archive (except at the end), as described below.
    </para>

    <para>
      The second required member is named <filename>control.tar.gz</filename>.
      It is a gzipped tar archive containing the package control information,
      as a series of plain files, of which the file
      <filename>control</filename> is mandatory and contains the core control
      information.  Please see the <emphasis remap='I'>Debian Packaging Manual,
      section 2.2</emphasis> for details of these files. The control tarball
      may optionally contain an entry for `<filename>.</filename>', the current
      directory.
    </para>

    <para>
      The third, last required member is named
      <filename>data.tar.gz</filename>. It contains the filesystem archive as a
      gzipped tar archive.
    </para>

    <para>
      These members must occur in this exact order. Current implementations
      should ignore any additional members after
      <filename>data.tar.gz</filename>.  Further members may be defined in the
      future, and (if possible) will be placed after these three. Any
      additional members that may need to be inserted before
      <filename>data.tar.gz</filename> and which should be safely ignored by
      older programs, will have names starting with an underscore.
    </para>

    <para>
      Those new members which won't be able to be safely ignored will be
      inserted before <filename>data.tar.gz</filename> with names starting with
      something other than underscores, or will (more likely) cause the major
      version number to be increased.
    </para>
  </refsect1>

  <refsect1>
    <title>See Also</title>

    <para>
      <citerefentry>
        <refentrytitle>deb-old</refentrytitle>
	<manvolnum>5</manvolnum>
      </citerefentry>,

      <citerefentry>
        <refentrytitle>dpkg-deb</refentrytitle>
	<manvolnum>1</manvolnum>
      </citerefentry>,

      <citerefentry>
        <refentrytitle>deb-control</refentrytitle>
	<manvolnum>5</manvolnum>
      </citerefentry>,

      Debian Packaging Manual
    </para>
  </refsect1>
</refentry>