Package Manager Specification

1.  Project Description

In the past, the ebuild environment has been defined by what Portage has supported. With the advent of alternative package managers, such a moving standard is no longer sufficient. The Package Manager Specification (PMS) aims to solve this by defining, independent of any package manager, what is and is not allowed in the tree, and what ebuilds may assume about their environment.

It is also required to document what each value of the EAPI ebuild variable actually means. At present PMS aims to document all Council-approved EAPIs.

A git repository with the document's sources can be found at http://git.overlays.gentoo.org/gitweb/?p=proj/pms.git;a=summary. A convenient way to be up to date with the current document is the live ebuild found in the Gentoo repository, called app-doc/pms (TeX Live needs to be installed). Additionally the approved versions are available as ebuilds of that package, too and will install a normal PDF file only.

2.  Developers

All developers can be reached by e-mail using nickname@gentoo.org.

3.  Subprojects

The Package Manager Specification project has the following subprojects:

4.  Developers

A full list of contributors is included in the document. Bugs should be reported via our Bugzilla and assigned to pms-bugs@gentoo.org. To discuss contributions or follow PMS development, please subscribe to the gentoo-pms mailing list.

5.  Generated versions of the document

Here are links to generated PDF versions of the document to make it easier for some people to read it. Approved versions of the document will be here along with those considered of interest by the PMS editors.

Versions approved by the Gentoo Council

eapi-2-approved-2008-09-25 (PDF)

eapi-3-approved-2010-01-18 (HTML, PDF)

eapi-4-approved-2011-01-17 (HTML, PDF)

eapi-5-approved-2012-09-20 (HTML, PDF)

Current HEAD (might not be completely up to date)

PMS head (HTML, PDF, Cheat Sheet)