Repository Guidelines

Repository Layout

Like all other distros, the VectorLinux repositories are divided into different areas. Traditionally, these are named as follows.

packages

This area of the repositories holds the packages that ship on the ISO image at the time of the release. These will be outdated as development progresses, but are to be kept there for long term support. These packages will remain there and will not be updated.

Note

In order to maintain stability and support, the packages in this section do not receive further updates.

patches

This area contains stable, tested packages that represent updates and and security fixes to the packages in the packages section. The packages should be moved to this area only after being reasonably tested.

extra

This area contains packages that are considered stable enough but that are not vital to the system. These packages have been used to fulfill dependencies on the vlbuildbot package building process. This area will contain other featured packages that are not vital for a working system installation but offer addditional functionality on top of the base system. These packages are well supported but do not necesarily ship with the ISO image. The packages in this area will receive updates.

untested

This area will contain the most current bleeding-edge versions of packages. The vlbuildbot system will upload packages to this area directly, so that means the packages in this area are the most unstable used for development and testing purposes. Packages in this section are automatically purged every week.

Preparing for Distro Release

While the distro is preparing a new release, all current packages will remain in the untested area. This allows for testing ISO images to be built and tested as a whole.

Once the testing ISO is stable enough to release the final product, the following steps should be taken to create the stable areas of the repositories for the new release.

  1. All packages that make up the BB (buildbase) ISO image should be moved to the packages section of the new stable repository. These will not receive any kind of updates at all.
  2. All other packages that are in the untested repository but wont ship on the final ISO image should be moved to the extra section of the repository.
  3. The patches section of the repositories will start off empty, most likely with empty metadata just so slapt-get wont fail for the users.
  4. The untested repository will enter automatic purging mode limiting the life of untested packages to one week from the time it gets built and uploaded by vlbuildbot. That two week period should be enough for stabilized packages to make it to extra or patches as needed.
  5. Development will begin on a new release, so a new untested repository will be needed for the new release.

Note

The automatic purging cycle does not affect the untested area for a release while in development.

Note

Packages that exist in the packages section should not exist in the extra section. If a package from packages requires a security or bug fix, that update goes in the patches section of the repositories.