The last version of the LSB <http://www.linuxbase.org/spec/gLSB/gLSB/swinstall. html> says:
Currently the LSB does not officially specify a package format; however, the recommended package format is RPM (Version 3) with some restrictions listed below. RPM is the defacto standard on Linux [sic] and supported either directly, or indirectly by the widest number of distributions. The intent is to in the future replace this format with a new format currently being developed. (End of quote) So, LSB is not a specification for Linux-based operating systems but for the subset of them which uses the RPM format. Moreover, the FAQ <http://www.linuxbase.org/spec/faq.htm#pckg2.1l> says: This arrangement was agreed up on by the major distributions including deb based ones (eg Debian, Storm, Corel) as well as RPM based ones (Red Hat, SuSE, TurboLinux, Caldera, Mandrake). (End of quote) Is it true that Debian approved this "standard"?