{
    "mode": "man",
    "parameter": "deb822",
    "section": "5",
    "url": "https://www.chedong.com/phpMan.php/man/deb822/5/json",
    "generated": "2026-07-05T05:26:42Z",
    "sections": {
        "NAME": {
            "content": "deb822 - Debian RFC822 control data format\n",
            "subsections": []
        },
        "DESCRIPTION": {
            "content": "The package management system manipulates data represented in a common format, known as\ncontrol data, stored in control files.  Control files are used for source packages, binary\npackages and the .changes files which control the installation of uploaded files (dpkg's\ninternal databases are in a similar format).\n",
            "subsections": []
        },
        "SYNTAX": {
            "content": "A control file consists of one or more paragraphs of fields (the paragraphs are also\nsometimes referred to as stanzas).  The paragraphs are separated by empty lines.  Parsers may\naccept lines consisting solely of U+0020 SPACE and U+0009 TAB as paragraph separators, but\ncontrol files should use empty lines.  Some control files allow only one paragraph; others\nallow several, in which case each paragraph usually refers to a different package.  (For\nexample, in source packages, the first paragraph refers to the source package, and later\nparagraphs refer to binary packages generated from the source.)  The ordering of the\nparagraphs in control files is significant.\n\nEach paragraph consists of a series of data fields.  Each field consists of the field name\nfollowed by a colon (U+003A ‘:’), and then the data/value associated with that field.  The\nfield name is composed of US-ASCII characters excluding control characters, space, and colon\n(i.e., characters in the ranges U+0021 ‘!’ through U+0039 ‘9’, and U+003B ‘;’ through U+007E\n‘~’, inclusive).  Field names must not begin with the comment character (U+0023 ‘#’), nor\nwith the hyphen character (U+002D ‘-’).\n\nThe field ends at the end of the line or at the end of the last continuation line (see\nbelow).  Horizontal whitespace (U+0020 SPACE and U+0009 TAB) may occur immediately before or\nafter the value and is ignored there; it is conventional to put a single space after the\ncolon.  For example, a field might be:\n\nPackage: dpkg\n\nthe field name is Package and the field value dpkg.\n\nEmpty field values are only permitted in source package control files (debian/control).  Such\nfields are ignored.\n\nA paragraph must not contain more than one instance of a particular field name.\n\nThere are three types of fields:\n\nsimple\nThe field, including its value, must be a single line.  Folding of the field is not\npermitted.  This is the default field type if the definition of the field does not\nspecify a different type.\n\nfolded\nThe value of a folded field is a logical line that may span several lines.  The lines\nafter the first are called continuation lines and must start with a U+0020 SPACE or a\nU+0009 TAB.  Whitespace, including any newlines, is not significant in the field\nvalues of folded fields.\n\nThis folding method is similar to RFC5322, allowing control files that contain only\none paragraph and no multiline fields to be read by parsers written for RFC5322.\n\nmultiline\nThe value of a multiline field may comprise multiple continuation lines.  The first\nline of the value, the part on the same line as the field name, often has special\nsignificance or may have to be empty.  Other lines are added following the same\nsyntax as the continuation lines of the folded fields.  Whitespace, including\nnewlines, is significant in the values of multiline fields.\n\nWhitespace must not appear inside names (of packages, architectures, files or anything\nelse) or version numbers, or between the characters of multi-character version\nrelationships.\n\nThe presence and purpose of a field, and the syntax of its value may differ between types\nof control files.\n\nField names are not case-sensitive, but it is usual to capitalize the field names using\nmixed case as shown below.  Field values are case-sensitive unless the description of the\nfield says otherwise.\n\nParagraph separators (empty lines) and lines consisting only of U+0020 SPACE and U+0009\nTAB, are not allowed within field values or between fields.  Empty lines in field values\nare usually escaped by representing them by a U+0020 SPACE followed by a dot (U+002E\n‘.’).\n\nLines starting with U+0023 ‘#’, without any preceding whitespace are comments lines that\nare only permitted in source package control files (debian/control) and in deb-origin(5)\nfiles.  These comment lines are ignored, even between two continuation lines.  They do\nnot end logical lines.\n\nAll control files must be encoded in UTF-8.\n",
            "subsections": []
        },
        "SEE ALSO": {
            "content": "RFC822, RFC5322.\n\n\n\n1.21.1                                       2025-09-09                                    deb822(5)",
            "subsections": []
        }
    },
    "summary": "deb822 - Debian RFC822 control data format",
    "flags": [],
    "examples": [],
    "see_also": []
}