*** SVARDOS PACKAGE FORMAT ***
Package files provide an easy way to manage software on SvarDOS. These
packages must adhere to a strict convention so they can be handled properly
by the SvarDOS package manager.
Package filenames
Packages names must follow some basic rules. They shall be max. 8 letters long
(but should not be too short either, since a 1 or 2-letters package name might
be confusing), and must not be composed of characters other than a-b, 0-9 and
'_'. This for backward compatibility with short file names (8+3) and ISO 9660
file systems (used on CDROMs). The package filename is always followed by the
.svp ("SvarDOS Package") extension.
Package files
SvarDOS uses ZIP files as its package file format. This format has been chosen
because ZIP files under DOS have become the de facto way to distribute
collections of files. Also, the ZIP file format is well documented, well
supported, and in the public domain.
Here below is the recommended command line that can be used to create a
package for a program named EXAMPLE labelled as version "1.2.34" using
Info-ZIP's Zip:
zip -9rkDX example-1.2.34.svp subdir1 subdir2 ... subdirN
If you are using 7za to create your packages, then use this:
7za a -mm=deflate -mx=9 -tzip example-1.2.34.svp subdir1 subdir2 ... subdirN
Note: The version in the filename is just an information for packagers so they
don't need to look into each package to know what version to expect there. In
LSM versions you might have non-filesystem-compatible stuff like "10/11/11" so
we don't want to enforce any kind of correlation.
Package directory structure
The directory structure of a package depends on the type of packages.
For "core" packages, we have this:
APPINFO Put the program's LSM file here
BIN Binaries, such as EXE, COM and LNG files
DOC\PKGNAME Package documentation, if any
HELP\ Optional "help" documentation in AMB format (PKGNAME.AMB)
NLS\PKGNAME Localization files in the legacy, multifile (CATS) format
Non-core packages use a slightly different directory organization. For
example, if we were to consider a package FOO, we might end up with the
following structure:
APPINFO\FOO.LSM Package meta file for the FOO program
PROGS\FOO\FOO.EXE The program's executable
PROGS\FOO\FOO.TXT Some documentation
PROGS\FOO\FILE.DAT Data file used by the FOO program
Note the PROGS directory above. This is the category to which the package
belongs. The package installer might change this directory at install time,
depending on the user's preferences. Possible categories are listed below:
Category | Description
DEVEL | Development tools (mostly compilers)
DRIVERS | Drivers
GAMES | Games
PROGS | User programs, tools...
Note: "DOC", "NLS", "BIN" and "HELP" directories are strictly reserved to
CORE packages.
LSM meta-data files
Every package MUST contain an LSM file in its "APPINFO" directory. This LSM
file is a text file that contains basic information about the package. Its
format is very simple, it must contain at least two lines:
version: x.y.z
description: package description
It may optionally contain also a line describing hardware requirements of the
package, such as:
hwreq: 286 fpu cga hgc
The "hwreq" line contains a space-separated list of tokens that represent
hardware requirements. Following tokens are possible.
CPU family : 8086 186 286 386 486 586
CPU features : fpu
Graphic cards: mda cga ega mcga vga svga
If the package should display an informational message after its installation,
then the LSM file may contain one or more "warn" lines. These are displayed by
the pkg tool whenever the package is installed or updated. Example:
version: 1.0
description: logic game with lots of colors
hwreq: 386 vga
warn: This game will not run properly unless you define a TEMP
warn: environment variable that points at a writeable directory.
Any other lines are ignored by the SvarDOS package manager.
Package versions
The version present in the LSM file is meant to reflect the version of the
packaged software, but it may happen that a package needs to be changed to
fix a strictly packaging-related issue (for example a forgotten documentation
file or a recompilation of the binary using a better set of flags...). In such
case, the version of the software does not change, but the version of the
package itself needs to change so users know something changed. That's where
"SvarDOS revisions" come in. A version string is basically following such
format:
UPSTREAM_VER[+SVARREV]
UPSTREAM_VER is the exact version string advertised by the software. It may
be pretty much anything. This upstream version may be optionally followed by a
plus sign and the SvarDOS revision. In the event that the upstream version
already contains a plus sign, then SvarDOS revision is delimited with a tilde.
The SvarDOS revision starts at 0 and increments by 1 each time that the given
upstream revision is repackaged. The SvarDOS revision restarts whenever the
upstream version changes. The SvarDOS revision of 0 is always hidden.
Examples:
FDISK 1.54 <- originally packaged version
FDISK 1.54+1 <- package has been changed, but not the upstream version
FDISK 1.55 <- upstream version increased, so SvarDOS rev restarts
FDISK 1.55+1 <- new version of the package, but still contains FDISK 1.55
FDISK 1.55+2 <- another new version of the package, etc
The entire version string of a package must never exceed 16 characters.
Sources
When a packaged software has its sources available, then it is recommended to
archive also them. To that effect, put the sources into a ZIP archive that has
the same filename as the package, but a *.zip extension (as opposed to the
*.svp extension of the proper package). The result would be that the packaged
software would be distributed within two files. Example for FDISK:
fdisk-1.55+2.svp <- binaries (ZIP archive following the SVP structure)
fdisk-1.55+2.zip <- sources (flat, unstructured ZIP archive)
The ZIP file must obviously contain the source code that belongs to the exact
same version present in the SVP package.