1deb-substvars(5) dpkg suite deb-substvars(5)
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6 deb-substvars - Debian source substitution variables
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9 substvars
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12 Before dpkg-source, dpkg-gencontrol and dpkg-genchanges write their
13 control information (to the source control file .dsc for dpkg-source
14 and to standard output for dpkg-gencontrol and dpkg-genchanges) they
15 perform some variable substitutions on the output file.
16 A variable substitution has the form ${variable-name}. Variable names
18 consist of alphanumerics, hyphens and colons and start with an
19 alphanumeric. Variable substitutions are performed repeatedly until
20 none are left; the full text of the field after the substitution is
21 rescanned to look for more substitutions.
22 After all the substitutions have been done each occurrence of the
24 string ${} (which is not a legal substitution) is replaced with a $
25 sign.
26 While variable substitution is done on all control fields, some of
28 those fields are used and needed during the build when the substitution
29 did not yet occur. That's why you can't use variables in the Package,
30 Source and Architecture fields.
31 Variable substitution happens on the content of the fields after they
33 have been parsed, thus if you want a variable to expand over multiple
34 lines you do not have to include a space after the newline. This is
35 done implicitly when the field is output. For example, if the variable
36 ${Description} is set to "foo is bar.${Newline}foo is great." and if
37 you have the following field:
38 Description: foo application
40 ${Description}
41 .
42 More text.
43 It will result in:
45 Description: foo application
47 foo is bar.
48 foo is great.
49 .
50 More text.
51 Variables can be set using the -V common option. They can be also
53 specified in the file debian/substvars (or whatever other file is
54 specified using the -T option). This file consists of lines of the form
55 name=value. Trailing whitespace on each line, blank lines, and lines
56 starting with a # symbol (comments) are ignored.
57 Additionally, the following standard variables are available:
59 Arch The current host architecture (i.e. the architecture the package
61 is being built for, the equivalent of DEB_HOST_ARCH).
62 source:Version
64 The source package version (since dpkg 1.13.19).
65 source:Upstream-Version
67 The upstream source package version, including the Debian
68 version epoch if any (since dpkg 1.13.19).
69 binary:Version
71 The binary package version (which may differ from source:Version
72 in a binNMU for example; since dpkg 1.13.19).
73 Source-Version
75 The source package version (from the changelog file). This
76 variable is now obsolete and emits an error when used as its
77 meaning is different from its function, please use the
78 source:Version or binary:Version as appropriate.
79 Installed-Size
81 The approximate total size of the package's installed files.
82 This value is copied into the corresponding control file field;
83 setting it will modify the value of that field. If this variable
84 is not set dpkg-gencontrol will compute the default value by
85 accumulating the size of each regular file and symlink rounded
86 to 1 KiB used units, and a baseline of 1 KiB for any other
87 filesystem object type.
88 Note: Take into account that this can only ever be an
90 approximation, as the actual size used on the installed system
91 will depend greatly on the filesystem used and its parameters,
92 which might end up using either more or less space than the
93 specified in this field.
94 Extra-Size
96 Additional disk space used when the package is installed. If
97 this variable is set its value is added to that of the
98 Installed-Size variable (whether set explicitly or using the
99 default value) before it is copied into the Installed-Size
100 control file field.
101 S:fieldname
103 The value of the source stanza field fieldname (which must be
104 given in the canonical capitalisation; since dpkg 1.18.11).
105 Setting these variables has no effect other than on places where
106 they are expanded explicitly. These variables are only
107 available when generating binary control files.
108 F:fieldname
110 The value of the output field fieldname (which must be given in
111 the canonical capitalisation). Setting these variables has no
112 effect other than on places where they are expanded explicitly.
113 Format The .changes file format version generated by this version of
115 the source packaging scripts. If you set this variable the
116 contents of the Format field in the .changes file will change
117 too.
118 Newline, Space, Tab
120 These variables each hold the corresponding character.
121 shlibs:dependencyfield
123 Variable settings with names of this form are generated by
124 dpkg-shlibdeps.
125 dpkg:Upstream-Version
127 The upstream version of dpkg (since dpkg 1.13.19).
128 dpkg:Version
130 The full version of dpkg (since dpkg 1.13.19).
131 If a variable is referred to but not defined it generates a warning and
133 an empty value is assumed.
134
136 debian/substvars
137 List of substitution variables and values.
138
140 dpkg(1), dpkg-genchanges(1), dpkg-gencontrol(1), dpkg-shlibdeps(1),
141 dpkg-source(1).
1421.18.25 2018-06-26 deb-substvars(5)