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DH_APPSTREAM(1) dh-appstream DH_APPSTREAM(1)

NAME

dh_appstream - generate and install AppStream metainfo XML

SYNOPSIS

dh_appstream [debhelper options]

DESCRIPTION

dh_appstream is a debhelper program that generates AppStream metainfo XML files from Debian binary package information and installs them into the package build directory.

Currently, dh_appstream supports generating metainfo for font packages ("<component type="font">").

The tool hooks into the debhelper sequence after dh_install, so it can discover font files that have been installed into the package build directory.

dh_appstream reads metadata from debian/control and debian/copyright, discovers font files using fc-query, and generates the metainfo XML from a built-in template.

If the file debian/package.appstream.xml exists, it is used as-is (manual override) and no auto-generation is performed.

When a license is obtained, license-detector is used to convert the license text to an SPDX expression.

FILES

Manual override. If this file exists, it is installed as-is and no auto-generation is performed.
The Source stanza's Homepage field and the binary package stanza's Description field are used to populate the metainfo XML.
If in machine-readable (DEP-5) format, the license is extracted from the header stanza's License field, or from the Files: * stanza. If the license cannot be determined from debian/copyright, it is extracted from the font file's embedded metadata instead. It is then converted to an SPDX expression with license-detector.

OPTIONS

Act only on architecture-dependent packages.
Act only on architecture-independent packages.
Act only on the specified package.
Do not act on the specified package.
Act only on packages that match the build architecture.
Do not really do anything; just print what would be done.

SEE ALSO

debhelper(7)

2026-09-15 0.2