As usual, the Fedora Packaging Committee has been busy improving the Fedora Packaging Guidelines.

Specifically:

The Packaging Guidelines now explicitly permit desktop files to be generated inside a spec file (previously, this was implicitly acceptable): https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Guidelines#.desktop_file_creation

The Packaging Guidelines have a new section covering Explicit Requires. They should be avoided in Fedora packages except when absolutely necessary. https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Guidelines#Explicit_Requires

The Packaging Guidelines have a new section covering Symlinks. There are two types of Symlinks, Absolute and Relative. Neither is required, packagers should use their own best judgement when determining which to use in their package. https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Guidelines#Symlinks

The Packaging Guidelines have a new section covering the use of %global over %define. Whenever possible, Fedora packages should use %global. https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Guidelines#.25global_preferred_over...

The Packaging Guidelines have a new section covering the Use of Epochs. https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Guidelines#Use_of_Epochs

The Packaging Guidelines have been updated to clarify the section on Duplicate Files. A Fedora package must not list a file more than once in the spec file's %files listings. If you think your package is a valid exception to this, please bring it to the attention of the Packaging Committee so they can improve on this Guideline. https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Guidelines#Duplicate_Files

The SourceURL section of the Packaging Guidelines has a new subsection on handling Troublesome URLs: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:SourceURL#Troublesome_URLs

The Packaging Naming Guidelines has added an exception for Documentation Packages to embed the OS version in the name. Note: Packages wishing to leverage this exception will need to get explicit approval from the Fedora Documentation Project. https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:NamingGuidelines#Documentation_Pack...

The Scriptlet Snippets page section on Icon Cache handling was updated: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging/ScriptletSnippets#Icon_Cache

The Haskell Guidelines were updated: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:Haskell

The PHP Guidelines were updated to handle Channel packages: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:PHP

These guidelines (and changes) were approved by the Fedora Packaging Committee (FPC) and ratified by FESCo.

Many thanks to Remi Collet, Yaakov Nemoy, Lubomir Rintel, and all of the members of the FPC and FESCo, for assisting in drafting, refining, and passing these guidelines.

As a reminder: The Fedora Packaging Guidelines are living documents! If you find something missing, incorrect, or in need of revision, you can suggest a draft change. The procedure for this is documented here: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging/Committee#GuidelineChangeProcedure

Thanks,

~spot