version number does not start with digit

Hi,

The policy has always been that way, but dpkg started enforcing it now.

http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-controlfields.html#s-f-Version is Debian's policy on version numbers. In particular: "The upstream_version may contain only alphanumerics and the characters . + - : ~ (full stop, plus, hyphen, colon, tilde) and should start with a digit." While this is only a "should", it has been strongly encouraged for a very long time, and dpkg now enforces it.

Thanks, we'll make sure our stamps conform these rules.

Sorry if I'm bumping the wrong thread - this is the reason, apparently, why I cannot install kicad from PPA... So is there something like a command line switch to persuade dpkg to ignore "version number does not start with digit" and insteall anyway?

Thanks in advance for any answers,
Cheers!

What does one do with this dpkg mess:

The following packages will be upgraded:
  libtelepathy-glib0
1 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 downgraded, 0 to remove and 47 not upgraded.
Need to get 864 kB of archives. After unpacking 7,905 kB will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n/?] y
Get:1 http://ppa.launchpad.net/telepathy/ppa/ubuntu/ natty/main libtelepathy-glib0 i386 0.14.5-1~ppa11.04+1 [475 kB]
Get:2 http://ubuntu.saix.net/ubuntu-archive/ natty/main empathy-common all 2.34.0-0ubuntu3 [389 kB]
Fetched 864 kB in 51s (16.9 kB/s)
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 1052 package 'rblyrics':
 error in Version string 'svn200': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 6127 package 'gnome-menu-setup-0.1.3':
 error in Version string 'r1-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 26451 package 'ilbc':
 error in Version string 'rfc3951-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 46876 package 'bigbrowser.67a8cab6b46ffb720390acabfc10c1b921f48376.1':
 error in Version string 'v0.1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 55722 package 'vkplayer.aad6619168252aaacd4c97c7ad18b4fba8bf74bc.1':
 error in Version string 'v1.10beta': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 64044 package 'nosefart-2.7':
 error in Version string 'mls-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 75195 package 'snackr.f1d918dbbb855380948fa918b5fd343f1decb758.1':
 error in Version string 'v0.41': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 76004 package 'flvplay.60dc2f44e9279f78adb1c59bce2562d79016dd2f.1':
 error in Version string 'v1.18': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 94474 package 'yuuguu':
 error in Version string 'build.3480': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/available' near line 42795 package 'vkplayer.aad6619168252aaacd4c97c7ad18b4fba8bf74bc.1':
 error in Version string 'v1.10beta': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/available' near line 49040 package 'nosefart-2.7':
 error in Version string 'mls-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: downgrading empathy-common from 3.0.0-1~ppa11.04+1 to 2.34.0-0ubuntu3.
(Reading database ... 607065 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to replace empathy-common 3.0.0-1~ppa11.04+1 (using .../empathy-common_2.34.0-0ubuntu3_all.deb) ...
Unpacking replacement empathy-common ...
Preparing to replace libtelepathy-glib0 0.14.3-1ubuntu1 (using .../libtelepathy-glib0_0.14.5-1~ppa11.04+1_i386.deb) ...
Unpacking replacement libtelepathy-glib0 ...
Processing triggers for hicolor-icon-theme ...
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 1054 package 'rblyrics':
 error in Version string 'svn200': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 6129 package 'gnome-menu-setup-0.1.3':
 error in Version string 'r1-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 26453 package 'ilbc':
 error in Version string 'rfc3951-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 46878 package 'bigbrowser.67a8cab6b46ffb720390acabfc10c1b921f48376.1':
 error in Version string 'v0.1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 55724 package 'vkplayer.aad6619168252aaacd4c97c7ad18b4fba8bf74bc.1':
 error in Version string 'v1.10beta': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 64046 package 'nosefart-2.7':
 error in Version string 'mls-1': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 75197 package 'snackr.f1d918dbbb855380948fa918b5fd343f1decb758.1':
 error in Version string 'v0.41': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 76006 package 'flvplay.60dc2f44e9279f78adb1c59bce2562d79016dd2f.1':
 error in Version string 'v1.18': version number does not start with digit
dpkg: warning: parsing file '/var/lib/dpkg/status' near line 94476 package 'yuuguu':
 error in Version string 'build.3480': version number does not start with digit
Setting up empathy-common (2.34.0-0ubuntu3) ...
Setting up libtelepathy-glib0 (0.14.5-1~ppa11.04+1) ...
Processing triggers for libc-bin ...
ldconfig deferred processing now taking place
localepurge: Disk space freed in /usr/share/locale: 0 KiB
localepurge: Disk space freed in /usr/share/man: 0 KiB
localepurge: Disk space freed in /usr/share/gnome/help: 1488 KiB
localepurge: Disk space freed in /usr/share/omf: 0 KiB
localepurge: Disk space freed in /usr/share/doc/kde/HTML: 0 KiB

Total disk space freed by localepurge: 1488 KiB

Hi David Robert Lewis,

Your problem, whilst slightly related, is not the same one as dealt with in this question. It would be more appropriate for you to have opened a separate question, to avoid confusion, and sending unwanted comment notifications to subscribers to the original question.

That said, the answer to your question is: Uninstall the packages with triggering the warnings, or upgrade them to fixed versions, if they exist.

The related discussion is: http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=620566

I have an 'upstream' adobe air package that 'violates' that new rule and that I want to install, causing the air package installation to fail with an informative 'Error #1' message (hurrah for log files).

The 'fix' from the '--force-bad-version' workaround mentioned in the debian bug report doesn't help here, because dpkg is used internally to the adobe air installer...

So I patched my dpkg to stop being annoying, with these two added lines:

diff -ur dpkg.orig/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/parsehelp.c dpkg/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/parsehelp.c
--- dpkg.orig/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/parsehelp.c 2011-04-29 22:11:36.000000000 -0400
+++ dpkg/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/parsehelp.c 2011-07-13 12:11:29.246018188 -0400
@@ -354,6 +354,7 @@
 static const char *
 version_strict_check(struct versionrevision *rversion)
 {
+ return NULL;
   const char *ptr;

   /* XXX: Would be faster to use something like cisversion and cisrevision. */
diff -ur dpkg.orig/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/test/t-version.c dpkg/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/test/t-version.c
--- dpkg.orig/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/test/t-version.c 2011-04-29 22:11:36.000000000 -0400
+++ dpkg/dpkg-1.16.0~ubuntu7.1//lib/dpkg/test/t-version.c 2011-07-13 12:16:30.456642448 -0400
@@ -165,6 +165,7 @@
 static void
 test(void)
 {
+ return;
  test_version_compare();
  test_version_parse();
 }

Can somebody interpret the above posting. Which lines does one add to which file?