Chapter 5. Control files and their fields

36

5.6.15

Date

This field includes the date the package was built or last edited.

The value of this field is usually extracted from the

debian/changelog

file   see `Debian

changelog:

debian/changelog

' on page

21

).

5.6.16

Format

This field specifies a format revision for the file. The most current format described in the

Policy Manual is version 1.5. The syntax of the format value is the same as that of a package

version number except that no epoch or Debian revision is allowed   see `

Version

' on page

33

.

5.6.17

Urgency

This is a description of how important it is to upgrade to this version from previous ones.

It consists of a single keyword usually taking one of the values

low

,

medium

or

high

(not

case sensitive) followed by an optional commentary (separated by a space) which is usually in

parentheses. For example:

Urgency: low (HIGH for users of diversions)

The value of this field is usually extracted from the

debian/changelog

file   see `Debian

changelog:

debian/changelog

' on page

21

.

5.6.18

Changes

This field contains the human readable changes data, describing the differences between the

last version and the current one.

There should be nothing in this field before the first newline; all the subsequent lines must be

indented by at least one space; blank lines must be represented by a line consisting only of a

space and a full stop.

The value of this field is usually extracted from the

debian/changelog

file   see `Debian

changelog:

debian/changelog

' on page

21

).

Each version's change information should be preceded by a  title  line giving at least the ver 

sion, distribution(s) and urgency, in a human readable way.

If data from several versions is being returned the entry for the most recent version should be

returned first, and entries should be separated by the representation of a blank line (the  title 

line may also be followed by the representation of blank line).