Package: lintian Version: 2.52.0~bpo10+1 Severity: normal Hi,
The code for rules-requires-root-explicitly is: # Check Rules-Requires-Root if (defined(my $r3 = $processable->source_field('rules-requires-root'))) { if ($r3 eq 'no') { $self->tag('rules-does-not-require-root'); } elsif ($r3 eq 'binary-targets') { $self->tag('rules-requires-root-explicitly'); } } else { $self->tag('rules-requires-root-missing'); } That does not match https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-controlfields.html#s-f-rules-requires-root, which allows Rules-Requires-Root to take other values than binary-targets (see the discussion about keywords in Policy). In that case, the tag should also be emitted. An example of package for which that fails is libcap2_2.27-1, which specifies: Rules-Requires-Root: dpkg/target-subcommand - Lucas -- System Information: Debian Release: 10.3 APT prefers stable-updates APT policy: (500, 'stable-updates'), (500, 'stable'), (500, 'oldstable') Architecture: amd64 (x86_64) Kernel: Linux 5.3.0-0.bpo.2-amd64 (SMP w/8 CPU cores) Kernel taint flags: TAINT_WARN, TAINT_OOT_MODULE, TAINT_UNSIGNED_MODULE Locale: LANG=en_DK.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_DK.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE=en_US:en (charmap=UTF-8) Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system) LSM: AppArmor: enabled Versions of packages lintian depends on: ii binutils 2.31.1-16 ii bzip2 1.0.6-9.2~deb10u1 ii diffstat 1.62-1 ii dpkg 1.19.7 ii dpkg-dev 1.19.7 ii file 1:5.35-4+deb10u1 ii gettext 0.19.8.1-9 ii gpg 2.2.12-1+deb10u1 ii intltool-debian 0.35.0+20060710.5 ii libapt-pkg-perl 0.1.34+b1 ii libarchive-zip-perl 1.64-1 ii libberkeleydb-perl 0.55-2 ii libcapture-tiny-perl 0.48-1 ii libcgi-pm-perl 4.40-1 ii libclass-accessor-perl 0.51-1 ii libclass-xsaccessor-perl 1.19-3+b2 ii libclone-perl 0.41-1+b1 ii libdpkg-perl 1.19.7 ii libemail-valid-perl 1.202-1 ii libfile-basedir-perl 0.08-1 ii libfile-find-rule-perl 0.34-1 ii libfont-ttf-perl 1.06-1 ii libio-async-loop-epoll-perl 0.20-1 ii libio-async-perl 0.72-1 ii libipc-run-perl 20180523.0-1 ii libjson-perl 4.02000-1 ii liblist-compare-perl 0.53-1 ii liblist-moreutils-perl 0.416-1+b4 ii libmldbm-perl 2.05-2 ii libmoo-perl 2.003004-2 ii libmoox-aliases-perl 0.001006-1 ii libnamespace-clean-perl 0.27-1 ii libpath-tiny-perl 0.108-1 ii libtext-levenshtein-perl 0.13-1 ii libtimedate-perl 2.3000-2+deb10u1 ii libtry-tiny-perl 0.30-1 ii libtype-tiny-perl 1.004004-1 ii liburi-perl 1.76-1 ii libxml-libxml-perl 2.0134+dfsg-1 ii libyaml-libyaml-perl 0.76+repack-1 ii man-db 2.8.5-2 ii patchutils 0.3.4-2 ii perl [libdigest-sha-perl] 5.28.1-6 ii t1utils 1.41-3 ii xz-utils 5.2.4-1 Versions of packages lintian recommends: ii libperlio-gzip-perl 0.19-1+b5 Versions of packages lintian suggests: ii binutils-multiarch 2.31.1-16 ii libhtml-parser-perl 3.72-3+b3 ii libtext-template-perl 1.55-1 -- no debconf information