phpman > man > deb822(5)

deb822(5)                                    dpkg suite                                    deb822(5)



NAME
       deb822 - Debian RFC822 control data format

DESCRIPTION
       The package management system manipulates data represented in a common format, known as
       control data, stored in control files.  Control files are used for source packages, binary
       packages and the .changes files which control the installation of uploaded files (dpkg's
       internal databases are in a similar format).

SYNTAX
       A control file consists of one or more paragraphs of fields (the paragraphs are also
       sometimes referred to as stanzas).  The paragraphs are separated by empty lines.  Parsers may
       accept lines consisting solely of U+0020 SPACE and U+0009 TAB as paragraph separators, but
       control files should use empty lines.  Some control files allow only one paragraph; others
       allow several, in which case each paragraph usually refers to a different package.  (For
       example, in source packages, the first paragraph refers to the source package, and later
       paragraphs refer to binary packages generated from the source.)  The ordering of the
       paragraphs in control files is significant.

       Each paragraph consists of a series of data fields.  Each field consists of the field name
       followed by a colon (U+003A ‘:’), and then the data/value associated with that field.  The
       field name is composed of US-ASCII characters excluding control characters, space, and colon
       (i.e., characters in the ranges U+0021 ‘!’ through U+0039 ‘9’, and U+003B ‘;’ through U+007E
       ‘~’, inclusive).  Field names must not begin with the comment character (U+0023 ‘#’), nor
       with the hyphen character (U+002D ‘-’).

       The field ends at the end of the line or at the end of the last continuation line (see
       below).  Horizontal whitespace (U+0020 SPACE and U+0009 TAB) may occur immediately before or
       after the value and is ignored there; it is conventional to put a single space after the
       colon.  For example, a field might be:

        Package: dpkg

       the field name is Package and the field value dpkg.

       Empty field values are only permitted in source package control files (debian/control).  Such
       fields are ignored.

       A paragraph must not contain more than one instance of a particular field name.

       There are three types of fields:

           simple
               The field, including its value, must be a single line.  Folding of the field is not
               permitted.  This is the default field type if the definition of the field does not
               specify a different type.

           folded
               The value of a folded field is a logical line that may span several lines.  The lines
               after the first are called continuation lines and must start with a U+0020 SPACE or a
               U+0009 TAB.  Whitespace, including any newlines, is not significant in the field
               values of folded fields.

               This folding method is similar to RFC5322, allowing control files that contain only
               one paragraph and no multiline fields to be read by parsers written for RFC5322.

           multiline
               The value of a multiline field may comprise multiple continuation lines.  The first
               line of the value, the part on the same line as the field name, often has special
               significance or may have to be empty.  Other lines are added following the same
               syntax as the continuation lines of the folded fields.  Whitespace, including
               newlines, is significant in the values of multiline fields.

           Whitespace must not appear inside names (of packages, architectures, files or anything
           else) or version numbers, or between the characters of multi-character version
           relationships.

           The presence and purpose of a field, and the syntax of its value may differ between types
           of control files.

           Field names are not case-sensitive, but it is usual to capitalize the field names using
           mixed case as shown below.  Field values are case-sensitive unless the description of the
           field says otherwise.

           Paragraph separators (empty lines) and lines consisting only of U+0020 SPACE and U+0009
           TAB, are not allowed within field values or between fields.  Empty lines in field values
           are usually escaped by representing them by a U+0020 SPACE followed by a dot (U+002E
           ‘.’).

           Lines starting with U+0023 ‘#’, without any preceding whitespace are comments lines that
           are only permitted in source package control files (debian/control) and in deb-origin(5)
           files.  These comment lines are ignored, even between two continuation lines.  They do
           not end logical lines.

           All control files must be encoded in UTF-8.

SEE ALSO
       RFC822, RFC5322.



1.21.1                                       2025-09-09                                    deb822(5)