NAME

BUILDINFO - Information on package build environments for ALPM based packages (version 2).

DESCRIPTION

The BUILDINFO format is a textual format that describes a package's build environment. Such files are located at the root of ALPM packages, are named .BUILDINFO and are usually used to reproduce the environment in which a package has been build. For further information refer to Arch Linux's reproducible builds effort[1].

The BUILDINFO format exists in multiple versions. The information in this document is for version 2, which is the current version and has been introduced with the release of pacman 6.0.0 on 2021-05-20.

Changes since the last version

The new keywords buildtool and buildtoolver have been added to track the package name, version and architecture of the tool used to setup the build environment for a package.

General Format

A BUILDINFO file consists of a series of lines, each providing information on an aspect of the build environment of a package, or the file format itself. Leading whitespace is always ignored.

Unless noted otherwise, the information contained in a BUILDINFO file is considered to be covered by the set of the 95 printable ASCII characters.

Keywords

The information encoded on each line is represented by a single keyword definition. Each such definition consists of a key from the following list immediately followed by a whitespace, an '=' sign, another whitespace and a value.

By default, the below keyword definitions must be used once per BUILDINFO. As exception to this rule, the keywords buildenv, options and installed may be provided zero or more times.

format

The BUILDINFO file format version. The value must be a plain positive integer. This must be 2 for BUILDINFO version 2.

pkgname

The name of the package. The value is an alpm-package-name (e.g. example).

pkgbase

The base name of the package. This keyword reflects the name of the sources from which the package is built. If the sources of the package are used to build a single package, the value is the same as that of pkgname. If the sources of the package are used to build several packages, the value may differ from that of pkgname (see PKGBUILD PACKAGE SPLITTING for further information). The value is covered by the same rules as that of pkgname (e.g. example).

pkgver

The full version of the package. Note, that this is not to be confused with alpm-pkgver, which only represents a subset of this keyword! The value is an alpm-package-version, either in full or in full with epoch form (e.g. 1.0.0-1 or 1:1.0.0-1, respectively).

pkgarch

The architecture of the package (see alpm-architecture for further information). The value must be covered by the set of alphanumeric characters and '_' (e.g. x86_64 or any).

pkgbuild_sha256sum

The hex representation of the SHA-256 checksum of the PKGBUILD used to build the package. The value must be covered by the set of hexadecimal characters and must be 64 characters long (e.g. 946d8362de3cebe3c86765cb36671a1dfd70993ac73e12892ac7ac5e6ff7ef95).

packager

The User ID of the entity, that built the package. The value is meant to be used for identity lookups and represents an OpenPGP User ID[2]. As such, the value is a UTF-8-encoded string, that is conventionally composed of a name and an e-mail address, which aligns with the format described in RFC 2822[3] (e.g. John Doe <john@example.org>).

builddate

The date at which the build of the package started. The value must be numeric and represent the seconds since the Epoch, aka. 'Unix time' (e.g. 1729181726).

builddir

The absolute directory path in which the package has been built by the build tool (e.g. makepkg). The value is a UTF-8-encoded string and must represent a valid absolute directory (e.g. /builddir).

startdir

The directory from which makepkg was executed. The value is a UTF-8-encoded string and must represent a valid absolute directory (e.g. /startdir).

buildtool

The package name of the tool used to set up the build environment. This helps the Arch Linux's Reproducible Builds effort to reproduce the environment in which a package has been built. The value must be a valid package name as described in pkgname.

buildtoolver

The full version of the buildtool used to set up the build environment. The value may take one of two forms:

  • An alpm-package-version in full or in full with epoch form (e.g. 1.0.0-1 or 1:1.0.0-1, respectively), directly followed by a '-' sign, directly followed by an alpm-architecture (e.g. 1.0.0-1-any or 1:1.0.0-1-any, respectively).. This format is commonly used by Arch Linux's build tools.
  • An alpm-package-version in minimal or minimal with epoch form (e.g. 1.0.0 or 1:1.0.0, respectively). This format is commonly used by makepkg.

buildenv

A build environment used by the package build tool (i.e. makepkg, defined in BUILDENV of makepkg.conf) when building the package. This keyword definition may be provided zero or more times. The value must be a unique word, optionally prefixed by a single '!', which indicates the negation of the environment (e.g. color or !color).

options

An option used by the package build tool (i.e. makepkg, defined in OPTIONS of makepkg.conf) when building the package. This keyword definition may be provided zero or more times. The value must be a unique word, optionally prefixed by a single '!', which indicates the negation of the option (e.g. debug or !debug).

installed

The information about an installed package during build time of the package. This keyword definition may be provided zero or more times. The value represents a composite string, composed of an alpm-package-name, directly followed by a '-' sign, directly followed by an alpm-package-version (in full or in full in epoch form), directly followed by a '-' sign, followed by an alpm-architecture (e.g. example-1:1.0.0-1-x86_64).

EXAMPLES

format = 2
pkgname = example
pkgbase = example
pkgver = 1:1.0.0-1
pkgarch = any
pkgbuild_sha256sum = b5bb9d8014a0f9b1d61e21e796d78dccdf1352f23cd32812f4850b878ae4944c
packager = John Doe <john@example.org>
builddate = 1729181726
builddir = /build
startdir = /startdir/
buildtool = devtools
buildtoolver = 1:1.2.1-1-any
buildenv = !color
buildenv = check
options = !strip
options = staticlibs
installed = other-package-1:0.5.0-3-any
installed = package2-2.1.0-6-x86_64

SEE ALSO

alpm-buildinfo(1), makepkg.conf(5), PKGBUILD(5), alpm-architecture(7), alpm-package-name(7), alpm-package-version(7), alpm-pkgver(7), devtools(7), makepkg(8), pacman(8), repro(8)

NOTES

  1. Arch Linux's Reproducible Builds effort

    https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Reproducible_builds

  2. OpenPGP User ID

    https://openpgp.dev/book/certificates.html#user-ids

  3. RFC 2822

    https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2822