Christian T. Steigies writes ("Re: Debian part of a version number when epoch
is bumped"):
> This should be documented somewhere where a regular DD can easily learn
> about these restrictions. Looking at the debian-policy, I still do not see
> what I did wrong with my recent upload:
>
> https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/
>
> 5.6.12. Version
> The version number of a package. The format is:
> [epoch:]upstream_version[-debian_revision].
>
> The three components here are:
>
> epoch
> This is a single (generally small) unsigned integer. It may be omitted, in
> which case zero is assumed. If it is omitted then the upstream_version may
> not contain any colons.
I suggest something like this wording to replace the following
paragraphs about the epoch:
Epochs exist to cope with changes to the upstream version numbering
scheme, and some other difficult cases. The epoch is a powerful
tool, but increasing the epoch it has downsides and should be
avoided when possible.
If you think you need to increase the epoch for a package, please
consult debian-devel first.
Ian.
