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NAME

       forktracer.conf - apt-forktracer configuration file

DESCRIPTION

       apt-forktracer  reports  "non-standard" packages which are installed in
       the system.  The configuration files let you  ignore  (skip  reporting)
       some  of  them, provided they meet certain criteria.  The program reads
       the      /etc/apt/forktracer.conf      file,      as      well       as
       /etc/apt/forktracer.d/*.conf (skipping hidden files).

       A  config  file  consists  of  any number of stanzas, separated with at
       least one empty lines.  A stanza has the following format:

           Package: package
           Accept-Origin: origin1
           Track-Origin: origin2
           Track-Version: version

       All these lines in a stanza are required, and they have  the  following
       meaning:

       package
              the name of the package to which this stanza applies

       origin1
              the  value  of  the  Origin  field  of  the source, from which a
              package should be ignored.  A package will be  ignored,  if  its
              candidate version comes from source1, and at the same time meets
              the condition given by the Track-* fields.  A  special  value  *
              means, that a package should be ignored regardless of the source
              of the candidate version.

       origin2
              the value of the Origin field of  the  source,  from  which  the
              newest  available  version should be tracked.  A special value *
              means, that a  generally  newest  available  version  should  be
              tracked, regardless of source.

       version
              is  the  required  version  string  available  from  the origin2
              source.  Apart from a  literal  version  string,  the  following
              special  values may be used: =candidate, which means the current
              candidate version, and =candidate-base,  which  means  the  base
              version (see below) of the current candidate version.

       The above stanza would cause package to be skipped from program output,
       as long as its candidate version comes from origin1, and  at  the  same
       time its newest version available from origin2 equals version.

       If  there  is  more  than  one  stanza  for a given package, then it is
       omitted from the program output if at least one  of  them  matches  the
       current situation.

   Base version definition
       A  base version is extracted from a given version by stripping from its
       end the shortest string starting with a tilde  character.  For  example
       for version 1:1.2-3~4~5 the base version is 1:1.2-3~4.

   Default configuration
       If for a given package package there is no stanza in the configuration,
       then the program acts as if the following two stanzas existed:

           Package: package
           Accept-Origin: *
           Track-Origin: distributor
           Track-Version: =candidate

           Package: package
           Accept-Origin: *
           Track-Origin: distributor
           Track-Version: =candidate-base

       where distributor is the system distributor’s identifier,  as  returned
       by  lsb_release --id or by the DISTRIB_ID field in the /etc/lsb-release
       file.

EXAMPLES

   Unofficial package
       apt-forktracer reports  packages  which  are  not  available  from  any
       official source, for example:

           puppet-softwarelab (0.2) [SoftwareLab: 0.2 0.1]

       The following stanza makes it skip such packages:

           Package: puppet-softwarelab
           Accept-Origin: SoftwareLab
           Track-Origin: *
           Track-Version: =candidate

       If   the  puppet-softwarelab  package  will  be  "pinned"  to  "release
       o=Softwarelab", then such configuration will make apt-forktracer report
       if puppet-softwarelab appears in any source other than SoftwareLab in a
       version newer than the one available from it.

   Backport
       Installing a backport has a similar effect to installing an  unofficial
       package:

           spamc (3.2.3-0.volatile1) [Debian: 3.1.7-2] [volatile.debian.org: 3.2.3-0.volatile1]

       The following stanza will cause such package to be skipped:

           Package: spamc
           Accept-Origin: volatile.debian.org
           Track-Origin: *
           Track-Version: =candidate

       In  this  situation a small official version string change (for example
       to 3.1.7-2etch1)  will  be  silently  ignored.  Such  configuration  is
       therefore  only suitable for cases where you trust the person providing
       the backport to carefully track changes in the stable edition and  make
       sure  they  are incorporated in the backport they are distributing.  In
       other cases, you should probably use the following configuration.

   Own modifications
       Sometimes there is a situation  where  you  make  minor  changes  to  a
       package,  and you would like to know when a new official stable version
       is released, so that you can update your modified version.

           policyd-weight (0.1.14-beta-6etch2.0.sl.1) [Debian: 0.1.14-beta-6etch2] [SoftwareLab: 0.1.14-beta-6etch2.0.sl.1]

       The following configuration is useful in such cases:

           Package: policyd-weight
           Accept-Origin: SoftwareLab
           Track-Origin: Debian
           Track-Version: 0.1.14-beta-6etch2

       It is worth mentioning, that if you apply  a  certain  convention  when
       numbering   the   modified  version,  then  the  Default  configuration
       described before is sufficient.  In this case, if the modified  version
       would  have  a  version number such as 0.1.14-beta-6etch2~sl.1 then the
       above-mentioned stanza would be unnecessary.  What is more, there would
       be  no  need to keep any configuration up-to-date in case of new stable
       version  releases,  because  the  default  configuration   is   created
       dynamically based on the current situation.

FILES

       /etc/apt/forktracer.conf
       /etc/apt/forktracer.d/*.conf

SEE ALSO

       apt-cache(8), apt-forktracer(8), apt_preferences(5).