fdroid Manual

F-Droid Server Manual

Ciaran Gultnieks and the F-Droid project

This manual is for the F-Droid repository server tools.

Copyright c 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 Ciaran Gultnieks Copyright c 2011 Henrik Tunedal,Michael Haas, John Sullivan Copyright c 2013 David Black

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under theterms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.3 or any later versionpublished by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, noFront-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is includedin the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".

iTable of Contents

1 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

2 System Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

3 Setup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33.1 Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

4 Simple Binary Repository . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

5 Building Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55.1 More about "fdroid build" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55.2 Direct Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

6 Importing Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

7 Metadata . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87.1 Category . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87.2 License . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87.3 Auto Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.4 Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.5 Web Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.6 Source Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.7 Issue Tracker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.8 Donate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.9 FlattrID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.10 Bitcoin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.11 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97.12 Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107.13 Repo Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107.14 Repo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107.15 Build Version . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117.16 AntiFeatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147.17 Disabled . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157.18 Requires Root . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157.19 Update Check Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157.20 Auto Update Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167.21 Current Version . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177.22 Current Version Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177.23 No Source Since . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

ii

8 Update Processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188.1 Detecting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188.2 Adding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

9 Build Server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199.1 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199.2 Setting up a build server . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

10 Signing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2110.1 Repo Index Signing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2110.2 Package Signing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Appendix A GNU Free Documentation License. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Chapter 1: Overview 1

1 Overview

The F-Droid server tools provide various scripts and tools that are used to maintain themain F-Droid application repository. You can use these same tools to create your ownadditional or alternative repository for publishing, or to assist in creating, testing andsubmitting metadata to the main repository.

Chapter 2: System Requirements 2

2 System Requirements

The system requirements for using the tools will vary depending on your intended usage.At the very least, youll need:

GNU/Linux Python 2.x The Android SDK Tools and Build-tools. Note that F-Droid does not assume

that you have the Android SDK in your PATH: these directories will be specifiedin your repository configuration. Recent revisions of the SDK have aapt locatedin android-sdk/build-tools/ and it may be necessary to make a symlink to it inandroid-sdk/platform-tools/

If you intend to build applications from source youll also need most, if not all, of thefollowing:

All SDK platforms requested by the apps you want to build (The Android SDK is madeavailable by Google under a proprietary license but within that, the SDK platforms,support library and some other components are under the Apache license and sourcecode is provided. Google APIs, used for building apps using Google Maps, are free tothe extent that the library comes pre-installed on the device. Google Play Services,Google Admob and others are proprietary and shouldnt be included in the main F-Droid repository.)

A version of the Android NDK Ant Ant Contrib Tasks (Debian package ant-contrib) Maven (Debian package maven) JavaCC (Debian package javacc) JDK (Debian package openjdk-6-jdk): openjdk-6 is recommended though openjdk-7

should work too

VCS clients: svn, git, git-svn, hg, bzr Miscellaneous packages listed in buildserver/cookbooks/fdroidbuild-

general/recipes/default.rb of the F-Droid server repository

A keystore for holding release keys. (Safe, secure and well backed up!)If you intend to use the Build Server system, for secure and clean builds (highly rec-

ommended), you will also need:

VirtualBox (debian package virtualbox) Ruby (debian packages ruby and rubygems) Vagrant (gem install vagrant) Paramiko (debian package python-paramiko)

Chapter 3: Setup 3

3 Setup

Because the tools and data will always change rapidly, you will almost certainly want towork from a git clone of the tools at this stage. To get started:

git clone git://gitorious.org/f-droid/fdroidserver.git

You now have lots of stuff in the fdroidserver directory, but the most important is thefdroid command script which you run to perform all tasks. This script is always runfrom a repository data directory, so the most sensible thing to do next is to put your newfdroidserver directory in your PATH.

3.1 Data

To do anything, youll need at least one repository data directory. Its from this directorythat you run the fdroid command to perform all repository management tasks. You caneither create a brand new one, or grab a copy of the data used by the main F-Droidrepository:

git clone git://gitorious.org/f-droid/fdroiddata.git

Regardless of the intended usage of the tools, you will always need to set up some basicconfiguration details. This is done by creating a file called config.py in the data directory.You should do this by copying the example file (config.sample.py) from the fdroidserverproject to your data directory and then editing according to the instructions within.

Once configured in this way, all the functionality of the tools is accessed by running thefdroid command. Run it on its own to get a list of the available sub-commands.

You can follow any command with --help to get a list of additional options availablefor that command.

fdroid update --help

Chapter 4: Simple Binary Repository 4

4 Simple Binary Repository

If you want to maintain a simple repository hosting only binary APKs obtained and com-piled elsewhere, the process is quite simple:

1. Set up the server tools, as described in Setup.

2. Make a directory for your repository. This is the directory from which you will do allthe work with your repository. Create a config file there, called config.py, by copyingthe config.sample.py from the server project and editing it.

3. Within that, make a directory called repo and put APK files in it.

4. Run fdroid update.

5. If it reports that any metadata files are missing, you can create them in the metadatadirectory and run it again.

6. To ease creation of metadata files, run fdroid update with the -c option. It will createskeleton metadata files that are missing, and you can then just edit them and fill inthe details.

7. Then, if youve changed things, run fdroid update again.

8. Running fdroid update adds an Icons directory into the repo directory, and also cre-ates the repository index (index.xml, and also index.jar if youve configured the systemto use a signed index).

9. Publish the resulting contents of the repo directory to your web server.

Following the above process will result in a repo directory, which you simply need topush to any HTTP (or preferably HTTPS) server to make it accessible.

While some information about the applications (and versions thereof) is retrieved directlyfrom the APK files, most comes from the corresponding file in the metadata directory. Themetadata file covering ALL versions of a particular application is named package.id.txtwhere package.id is the unique identifier for that package.

See the Metadata chapter for details of what goes in the metadata file. All fields arerelevant for binary APKs, EXCEPT for Build Version entries, which should be omitted.

Chapter 5: Building Applications 5

5 Building Applications

Instead of (or as well as) including binary APKs from external sources in a repository, youcan build them directly from the source code.

Using this method, it is is possible to verify that the application builds correctly, corre-sponds to the source code, and contains only free software. Unforunately, in the Androidworld, it seems to be very common for an application supplied as a binary APK to presentitself as Free Software when in fact some or all of the following are true:

1. The source code (either for a particular version, or even all versions!) is unavailable orincomplete.

2. The source code is not capable of producing the actual binary supplied.

3. The source code contains binary files of unknown origin, or with proprietary licenses.

For this reason, source-built applications are the preferred method for the main F-Droidrepository, although occasionally for technical or historical reasons, exceptions are made tothis policy.

When building applications from source, it should be noted that you will be signingthem (all APK files must be signed to be installable on Android) with your own key. Whenan application is already installed on a device, it is not possible to upgrade it in place toa new version signed with a different key without first uninstalling the original. This maypresent an inconvenience to users, as the process of uninstalling loses any data associatedwith the previous installation.

The process for managing a repository for built-from-source applications is very similarto that described in the Simple Binary Repository chapter, except now you need to:

1. Include Build Version entries in the metadata files.

2. Run fdroid build to build any applications that are not already built.

3. Run fdroid publish to finalise packaging and sign any APKs that have been built.

5.1 More about "fdroid build"

When run without any parameters, fdroid build will build any and all versions of applica-tions that you dont already have in the repo directory (or more accurately, the unsigneddirectory). There are various other things you can do. As with all the tools, the --helpoption is your friend, but a few annotated examples and discussion of the more commonusage modes follows:

To build a single version of a single application, you could run the following:

./fdroid build --package=org.fdroid.fdroid --vercode 16

This attempts to build version code 16 (which is version 0.25) of the F-Droid client.Many of the tools recognise this --package parameter, allowing their activity to be limitedto just a single package.

If the build above was successful, two files will have been placed in the unsigned direc-tory:

org.fdroid.fdroid_16.apk

org.fdroid.fdroid_16_src.tar.gz

Chapter 5: Building Applications 6

The first is the (unsigned) APK. You could sign this with a debug key and push it directto your device or an emulator for testing. The second is a source tarball containing exactlythe source that was used to generate the binary.

If you were intending to publish these files, you could then run:

./fdroid publish

The source tarball would move to the repo directory (which is the directory you wouldpush to your web server). A signed and zip-aligned version of the APK would also appearthere, and both files would be removed from the unsigned directory.

If youre building purely for the purposes of testing, and not intending to push the resultsto a repository, at least yet, the --test option can be used to direct output to the tmpdirectory instead of unsigned. A similar effect could by achieved by simply deleting theoutput files from unsigned after the build, but with the risk of forgetting to do so!

Along similar lines (and only in conjunction with --test, you can use --force to forcea build of a Disabled application, where normally it would be completely ignored. Similarlya version that was found to contain ELFs or known non-free libraries can be forced to build.See also scanignore= in the Build Version section.

If the build was unsuccessful, you can find out why by looking at the output in the logs/directory. If that isnt illuminating, try building the app the regular way, step by step:android update project, ndk-build, ant debug.

Note that source code repositories often contain prebuilt libraries. If the app is beingconsidered for the main F-Droid repository, it is important that all such prebuilts are builteither via the metadata or by a reputable third party.

5.2 Direct Installation

You can also build and install directly to a connected device or emulator using the --install switch. If you do this without using --package and --vercode then all versionsof all packages will be installed (with each individual version overwriting the previous!).In most cases, this will not be what you want to do, so execution will stop straight away.However, you can override this if youre sure thats what you want, by using --all. Notethat currently, no sanity checks are performed with this mode, so that if the version isincorrect or that if the package name is different, you wont be informed.

Chapter 6: Importing Applications 7

6 Importing Applications

To help with starting work on including a new application, fdroid import will take a URLand optionally some other parameters, and attempt to construct as much information aspossible by analysing the source code. Basic usage is:

./fdroid import --url=http://address.of.project

For this to work, the URL must point to a project format that the script understands.Currently this is limited to one of the following:

1. Gitorious - https://gitorious.org/PROJECTNAME/REPONAME

2. Github - https://github.com/USER/PROJECT

3. Google Code - http://code.google.com/p/PROJECT/ Supports git, svn and hg repos.

Some Google Code projects have multiple repositories, identified by a dropdown liston the source/checkout page. To access one other than the default, specify its nameusing the --repo switch.

4. Bitbucket - https://bitbucket.org/USER/PROJECT/

5. Git - git://REPO

Depending on the project type, more or less information may be gathered. For example,the license will be retrieved from a Google Code project, but not a GitHub one. A barerepo url, such as the git:// one, is the least preferable optional of all, since you will have toenter much more information manually.

If the import is successful, a metadata file will be created. You will need to edit thisfurther to check the information, and fill in the blanks.

If it fails, youll be told why. If it got as far as retrieving the source code, you can inspectit further by looking in tmp/importer where a full checkout will exist.

A frequent cause of initial failure is that the project directory is actually a subdirectoryin the repository. In this case, run the importer again using the --subdir option to tellit where. It will not attempt to determine this automatically, since there may be severaloptions.

Chapter 7: Metadata 8

7 Metadata

Information used by update.py to compile the public index comes from two sources:

1. the APK files in the repo directory, and

2. the metadata files in the metadata directory.

The metadata files are simple, easy to edit text files, always named as the applicationspackage ID with .txt appended.

Note that although the metadata files are designed to be easily read and writable byhumans, they are also processed and written by various scripts. They are capable of rewrit-ing the entire file when necessary. Even so, the structure and comments will be preservedcorrectly, although the order of fields will be standardised. (In the event that the originalfile was in a different order, comments are considered as being attached to the field followingthem). In fact, you can standardise all the metadata in a single command, without changingthe functional content, by running:

fdroid rewritemetadata

The following sections describe the fields recognised within the file.

7.1 Category

A single category for the application to be placed in. There is no fixed list of categories -both the client and the web site will automatically show any categories that exist in anyapplications. However, if your metadata is intended for the main F-Droid repository, youshould use one of the existing categories (look at the site/client), or discuss the proposal toadd a new one.

Additional categories can be specified, by using ; as a separator. In this case the firstis the primary category, and the only one that will be seen by clients that only understandone.

7.2 License

The overall license for the application, or in certain cases, for the source code only.

Common values:

GPLv2 GNU GPL version 2 GPLv2+ GNU GPL version 2 or later GPLv3 GNU GPL version 3 GPLv3+ GNU GPL version 3 or later GPL An unspecified GPL version. Use this only as a last resort or if there is some

confusion over compatiblity of component licenses: particularly the use of Apachelibraries with GPLv2 source code.

AGPL Afferro GPL version 3. Apache2 Apache 2 MIT MIT X11 license BSD BSD license - the original 4-clause version. NewBSD BSD license - the new, or modified, version.


7.3 Auto Name

The name of the application as can best be retrieved from the source code. This is doneso that the commitupdates script can put a familiar name in the commit description. It isgenerated automatically when fdroid checkupdates is run.

7.4 Name

The name of the application. Normally, this field should not be present since the applica-tions correct name is retrieved from the APK file. However, in a situation where an APKcontains a bad or missing application name, it can be overridden using this. Note that thisonly overrides the name in the list of apps presented in the client; it doesnt changed thename or application label in the source code.

7.5 Web Site

The URL for the applications web site.

7.6 Source Code

The URL to view or obtain the applications source code. This should be something human-friendly. Machine-readable source-code is covered in the Repo field.

7.7 Issue Tracker

The URL for the applications issue tracker. Optional, since not all applications have one.

7.8 Donate

The URL to donate to the project. This should be the projects donate page if it has one.

It is possible to use a direct PayPal link here, if that is all that is available. However,bear in mind that the developer may not be aware of that direct link, and if they laterchanged to a different PayPal account, or the PayPal link format changed, things could gowrong. It is always best to use a link that the developer explicitly makes public, ratherthan something that is auto-generated button code.

7.9 FlattrID

The projects Flattr (http://flattr.com) ID, if it has one. This should be a numeric ID,such that (for example) https://flattr.com/thing/xxxx leads directly to the page to donateto the project.

7.10 Bitcoin

A bitcoin address for donating to the project.

7.11 Summary

A brief summary of what the application is. Since the summary is only allowed one line onthe list of the F-Droid client, keeping it to within 32 characters will ensure it fits even onthe smallest screens.


7.12 Description

A full description of the application, relevant to the latest version. This can span multiplelines (which should be kept to a maximum of 80 characters), and is terminated by a linecontaining a single ..

Basic MediaWiki-style formatting can be used. Leaving a blank line starts a new para-graph. Surrounding text with make it italic, and with makes it bold.

You can link to another app in the repo by using [[app.id]]. The link will be madeappropriately whether in the Android client, the web repo browser or the wiki. The linktext will be the apps name.

Links to web addresses can be done using [http://example.com Text].

Bulletted lists are done by simply starting each item with a * on a new line, and numberedlists are the same but using #. There is currently no support for nesting lists - you can haveone level only.

It can be helpful to note information pertaining to updating from an earlier version;whether the app contains any prebuilts built by the upstream developers or whether non-free elements were removed; whether the app is in rapid development or whether the latestversion lags behind the current version; whether the app supports multiple architectures orwhether there is a maximum SDK specified (such info not being recorded in the index).

7.13 Repo Type

The type of repository - for automatic building from source. If this is not specified, auto-matic building is disabled for this application. Possible values are:

git svn git-svn hg bzr srclib

7.14 Repo

The repository location. Usually a git: or svn: URL, for example.

The git-svn option connects to an SVN repository, and you specify the URL inexactly the same way, but git is used as a back-end. This is preferable for performancereasons, and also because a local copy of the entire history is available in case theupstream repository disappears. (It happens!). In order to use Tags as updatecheck mode for this VCS type, the URL must have the tags= special argument set.Likewise, if you intend to use the RepoManifest/branch scheme, you would wantto specify branches= as well. Finally, trunk= can also be added. All these specialarguments will be passed to "git svn" in order, and their values must be relativepaths to the svn repo root dir. Heres an example of a complex git-svn Repo URL:http://svn.code.sf.net/p/project/code/svn;trunk=trunk;tags=tags;branches=branches

For a Subversion repo that requires authentication, you can precede the repo URL withusername:password and those parameters will be passed as --username and --password


to the SVN checkout command. (This works only for plain svn and not for git-svn - one ofthe very few cases where using svn is advisable).

7.15 Build Version

Any number of these fields can be present, each specifying a version to automatically buildfrom source. The value is a comma-separated list. For example:

Build Version:0.12,3,651696a49be2cd7db5ce6a2fa8185e31f9a20035

The above specifies to build version 0.12, which has a version code of 3. The thirdparameter specifies the tag, commit or revision number from which to build it in the sourcerepository.

If the commit version starts with a !, that version is not built. Instead, everything afterthe ! is used as a reason why it cant be built. The purpose of this feature is to allownon-buildable releases (e.g. the source is not published) to be flagged, so the scripts dontgenerate repeated messages about them. (And also to record the information for reviewlater). If an apk has already been built, ! causes it to be deleted once fdroid update isrun; this is the procedure if ever a version has to be replaced.

In addition to the three, always required, parameters described above, further parameterscan be added (in name=value format) to apply further configuration to the build. Theseare (roughly in order of application):

subdir=

Specifies to build from a subdirectory of the checked out source code. Normallythis directory is changed to before building,

submodules=yes

Use if the project (git only) has submodules - causes git submodule init andupdate to be executed after the source is cloned.

init=xxxx

As for prebuild, but runs on the source code BEFORE any other processingtakes place.

You can use $$SDK$$, $$NDK$$ and $$MVN3$$ to substitute the paths tothe android SDK and NDK directories, and maven 3 executable respectively.

oldsdkloc=yes

The sdk location in the repo is in an old format, or the build.xml is expectingsuch. The new format is sdk.dir while the VERY OLD format is sdk-location.Typically, if you get a message along the lines of: "com.android.ant.SetupTaskcannot be found" when trying to build, then try enabling this option.

target=

Specifies a particular SDK target for compilation, overriding theproject.properties of the app and possibly sub-projects. Note that this doesnot change the target SDK in the AndroidManifest.xml the level of featuresthat can be included in the build. This is likely to cause the whole build.xmlto be rewritten, which is fine if its a standard android file or doesnt alreadyexist, but not a good idea if its heavily customised. If you get an error aboutinvalid target, first try init=rm -rf bin/; otherwise this parameter should dothe trick.


update=xxx

By default, android update project is used to generate or update the build.xmlfile. Specifying update=no bypasses that.

Specifiying update=force forces rebuilding of the build.xml file at the same time- this is frequently needed with r14 of the Android platform tools. Be aware ofany customisations in build.xml when using update=force.

Otherwise, value can be a semicolon-separated list of directories in which torun android update project relative to the main application directory (whichmay include subdir parameter). Default value is ., and passing non-defaultvalue may be useful for multi-component projects. Note that --subprojectsswitch is automatically passed to android update project, so using explicit listmay be needed only for peculiar source layouts.

encoding=xxxx

Adds a java.encoding property to local.properties with the given value. Gen-erally the value will be utf-8. This is picked up by the SDKs ant rules, andforces the Java compiler to interpret source files with this encoding. If youreceive warnings during the compile about character encodings, you probablyneed this.

forceversion=yes

If specified, the package version in AndroidManifest.xml is replaced with theversion name for the build as specified in the metadata.

This is useful for cases when upstream repo failed to update it for specific tag;to build an arbitrary revision; to make it apparent that the version differs sig-nificantly from upstream; or to make it apparent which architecture or platformthe apk is designed to run on.

forcevercode=yes

If specified, the package version code in the AndroidManifest.xml is replacedwith the version code for the build. See also forceversion.

rm=

Specifies the relative path of a file to delete before the build is done. Thepath is relative to the base of the build directory - i.e. the root of the directorystructure checked out from the source respository - not necessarily the directorythat contains AndroidManifest.xml.

Multiple files can be specified by separating they with ;.

fixtrans=yes

Modifies any instances of string resources that use multiple formatting argu-ments, but dont use positional notation. For example, "Hello %s, %d" becomes"Hello %1$s, %2$d". Newer versions of the Android platform tools enforce thissensible standard. If you get error messages relating to that, you need to enablethis.

fixapos=yes

Like fixtrans, but deals with an even older issue relating to unescaped apos-trophes in translation strings.


extlibs=a;b;c

Specifies a list of external libraries (jar files) from the build/extlib library,which will be placed in the libs directory of the project. Separate items withsemicolons.

srclibs=a@r;b@r1;

Specifies a list of source libraries or Android projects. Separate items withsemicolons, and each item is of the form name@rev where name is the predefinedsource library name and rev is the revision or tag in source control to use.

Each srclib has a metadata file under srclibs/ in the repository directory, andthe source code is stored in build/srclib/. Repo Type: and Repo: are specifiedin the same way as for apps; Subdir: can be a comma separated list, for whendirectories are renamed by upstream; Update Project: updates the projects inthe working directory and one level down; Prepare: can be used for any kind ofpreparation: in particular if you need to update the project with a particulartarget. You can then also use $$name$$ in the init/prebuild/build command tosubstitute the relative path to the library directory, but it could need tweakingif youve changed into another directory.

patch=x Apply patch(es). x names one (or more - comma-seperated) files within adirectory below the metadata, with the same name as the metadata file butwithout the extension. Each of these patches is applied to the code in turn.

prebuild=xxxx

Specifies a shell command (or commands - chain with &&) to run before thebuild takes place. Backslash can be used as an escape character to insert literalcommas, or as the last character on a line to join that line with the next. It hasno special meaning in other contexts; in particular, literal backslashes shouldnot be escaped.

The command runs using bash.

Note that nothing should be build during this prebuild phase - scanning of thecode and building of the source tarball, for example, take place after this. Forcustom actions that actually build things, use build instead.

You can use $$name$$ to substitute the path to a referenced srclib - see thesrclib directory for details of this.

You can use $$SDK$$, $$NDK$$ and $$MVN3$$ to substitute the paths tothe android SDK and NDK directories, and maven 3 executable respectivelye.g. for when you need to run android update project explicitly.

initfun=yes

Enables a selection of mad hacks to make com.funambol.android build. Prob-ably not useful for any other application.

scanignore=path1;path2;...

Enables one or more files/paths to be exlcuded from the scan process. Thisshould only be used where there is a very good reason, and probably accompa-nied by a comment explaining why it is necessary.

When scanning, files whose relative paths start with any of the paths given hereare ignored.


build=xxxx

As for prebuild, but runs during the actual build phase (but before the mainant/maven build). Use this only for actions that do actual building. Anyprepartion of the source code should be done using init or prebuild.

You can use $$SDK$$, $$NDK$$ and $$MVN3$$ to substitute the paths tothe android SDK and NDK directories, and maven 3 executable respectively.

buildjni=[yes|no|]

Enables building of native code via the ndk-build script before doing the mainant build. The value may be a list of directories relative to the main applicationdirectory in which to run ndk-build, or yes which corresponds to . . Usingexplicit list may be useful to build multi-component projects.

The build and scan processes will complain (refuse to build) if this parameter isnot defined, but there is a jni directory present. If the native code is being builtby other means, you can specify no here to avoid that. However, if the nativecode is actually not required, remove the directory instead (using prebuild forexample).

maven=yes

Build with maven instead of ant

bindir=

Normally the build output (apk) is expected to be in the bin subdirectory belowthe ant build files. If the project is configured to put it elsewhere, that can bespecified here, relative to the base of the checked out repo.

antcommand=xxx

Specify an alternate ant command (target) instead of the default release. Itcant be given any flags, such as the path to a build.xml.

novcheck=yes

Dont check that the version name and code in the resulting apk are correct bylooking at the build output - assume the metadata is correct. This takes awaya useful level of sanity checking, and should only be used if the values cant beextracted.

Another example, using extra parameters:

Build Version:1.09.03,10903,45,subdir=Timeriffic,oldsdkloc=yes

7.16 AntiFeatures

This is optional - if present, it contains a comma-separated list of any of the following values,describing an anti-feature the application has. Even though such apps wont be displayedunless a settings box is ticked, it is a good idea to mention the reasons for the anti-feature(s)in the description:

Ads - the application contains advertising. Tracking - the application tracks and reports your activity to somewhere without

your consent. Its commonly used for when developers obtain crash logs without theusers consent, or when an app is useless without some kind of authentication.


NonFreeNet - the application relies on computational services that are impossible toreplace or that the replacement cannot be connected to without major changes to theapp.

NonFreeAdd - the application promotes non-Free add-ons, such that the app is effec-tively an advert for other non-free software and such software is not clearly labelled assuch.

NonFreeDep - the application depends on a non-Free application (e.g. Google Maps)- i.e. it requires it to be installed on the device, but does not include it.

7.17 Disabled

If this field is present, the application does not get put into the public index. This allowsmetadata to be retained while an application is temporarily disabled from being published.The value should be a description of why the application is disabled. No apks or sourcecode archives are deleted: to purge an apk see the Build Version section or delete manuallyfor developer builds. The field is therefore used when an app has outlived its usefulness,because the source tarball is retained.

7.18 Requires Root

Set this optional field to "Yes" if the application requires root privileges to be usable. Thislets the client filter it out if the user so desires. Whether root is required or not, it is goodto give a paragraph in the description to the conditions on which root may be asked forand the reason for it.

7.19 Update Check Mode

This determines the method using for determining when new releases are available - inother words, the updating of the Current Version and Current Version Code fields in themetadata by the fdroid checkupdates process.

Valid modes are:

None - No checking is done because theres no appropriate automated way of doingso. Updates should be checked for manually. Use this, for example, when deployingbetas or patched versions; when builds are done in a directory different to where theAndroidManifest.xml is; if the developers use the gradle build system and store versioninfo in a separate file; if the developers make a new branch for each release and dontmake tags; or if youve changed the package name or version code logic.

Static - No checking is doneeither development has ceased or new versions are notdesired. This method is also used when there is no other checking method availableand the upstream developer keeps us posted on new versions.

RepoManifest - At the most recent commit, the AndroidManifest.xml file is looked forin the directory where it was found in the the most recent build. The appropriateness ofthis method depends on the development process used by the applications developers.You should not specify this method unless youre sure its appropriate. For example,some developers bump the version when commencing development instead of whenpublishing. It will return an error if the AndroidManifest.xml has moved to a differentdirectory or if the package name has changed. The current version that it gives may not


be accurate, since not all versions are fit to be published. Therefore, before building,it is often necessary to check if the current version has been published somewhere bythe upstream developers, either by checking for apks that they distribute or for tags inthe source code repository.

It currently works for every repository type to different extents, except the srclib repotype. For git, git-svn and hg repo types, you may use "RepoManifest/yourbranch" asUCM so that "yourbranch" would be the branch used in place of the default one. Thedefault values are "master" for git, "default" for hg and none for git-svn (it stays inthe same branch). On the other hand, branch support hasnt been implemented yet inbzr and svn, but RepoManifest may still be used without it.

Tags - The AndroidManifest.xml file in all tagged revisions in the source repositoryis checked, looking for the highest version code. The appropriateness of this methoddepends on the development process used by the applications developers. You shouldnot specify this method unless youre sure its appropriate. It shouldnt be used if thedevelopers like to tag betas or are known to forget to tag releases. Like RepoManifest,it will not return the correct value if the directory containing the AndroidManifest.xmlhas moved. Despite these caveats, it is the often the favourite update check mode.

It currently only works for git and git-svn repositories. In the case of the latter, therepo URL must encode the path to the trunk and tags.

Market - This is being phased out and should only be used when the other automaticmodes dont work. It wont work if the developer deploys multiple apks to GooglePlay; if the current version does not have more than one review; or if the package hasbeen abandoned in favour of another. Nevertheless, it can often be helpful to consultGoogle Play for version information when checking the validity of the current versionobtained via RepoManifest.

7.20 Auto Update Mode

This determines the method using for auto-generating new builds when new releases areavailable - in other words, adding a new Build Version line to the metadata. This happens inconjunction with the Update Check Mode functionality - i.e. when an update is detectedby that, it is also processed by this.

Valid modes are:

None - No auto-updating is done Version - Identifies the target commit (i.e. tag) for the new build based on the given

version specification, which is simply text in which %v and %c are replaced with therequired version name and version code respectively.

For example, if an app always has a tag "2.7.2" corresponding to version 2.7.2, youwould simply specify "Version %v". If an app always has a tag "ver 1234" for a versionwith version code 1234, you would specify "Version ver %c".

Additionally, a suffix can be added to the version name at this stage, to differentiate F-Droids build from the original. Continuing the first example above, you would specifythat as "Version +-fdroid %v" - "-fdroid" is the suffix.


7.21 Current Version

The name of the version that is current. There may be newer versions of the applicationthan this (e.g. betas), and there will almost certainly be older ones. This should be theone that is recommended for general use. In the event that there is no source code for thecurrent version, or that non-free libraries are being used, this would ideally be the latestversion that is still free, though it may still be expedient to retain the automatic updatecheck see No Source Since.

This field is normally automatically updated - see Update Check Mode.

7.22 Current Version Code

The version code corresponding to the Current Version field. Both these fields must be cor-rect and matching although its the current version code thats used by Android to determineversion order and by F-Droid client to determine which version should be recommended.

This field is normally automatically updated - see Update Check Mode.

7.23 No Source Since

In case we are missing the source code for the Current Version reported by Upstream, orthat non-free elements have been introduced, this defines the first version that began tomiss source code. Apps that are missing source code for just one or a few versions, butprovide source code for newer ones are not to be considered here - this field is intendedto illustrate which apps do not currently distribute source code, and since when have theybeen doing so.

Chapter 8: Update Processing 18

8 Update Processing

8.1 Detecting

There are various mechanisms in place for automatically detecting that updates are avail-able for applications, with the Update Check Mode field in the metadata determining whichmethod is used for a particular application.

Running the fdroid checkupdates command will apply this method to each applicationin the repository and update the Current Version and Current Version Code fields in themetadata accordingly.

As usual, the -p option can be used with this, to restrict processing to a particularapplication.

Note that this only updates the metadata such that we know what the current pub-lished/recommended version is. It doesnt make that version available in the repository -for that, see the next section.

8.2 Adding

Adding updates (i.e. new versions of applications already included in the repository) hap-pens in two ways. The simple case is applications where the APK files are binaries, retrievedfrom a developers published build. In this case, all thats required is to place the new binaryin the Repo directory, and the next run of fdroid update will pick it up.

For applications built from source, it is necessary to add a new Build Version line tothe metadata file. At the very least, the version name, version code and commit will bedifferent. It is also possible that the additional build flags will change between versions.

For processing multiple updates in the metadata at once, it can be useful to run fdroidupdate --interactive. This will check all the applications in the repository, and whereupdates are required you will be prompted to [E]dit the metadata, [I]gnore the update, or[Q]uit altogether.

Chapter 9: Build Server 19

9 Build Server

The Build Server system isolates the builds for each package within a clean, isolated andsecure throwaway virtual machine environment.

9.1 Overview

Building applications in this manner on a large scale, especially with the involvement ofautomated and/or unattended processes, could be considered a dangerous pastime from asecurity perspective. This is even more the case when the products of the build are alsodistributed widely and in a semi-automated ("you have updates available") fashion.

Assume that an upstream source repository is compromised. A small selection of thingsthat an attacker could do in such a situation:

1. Use custom ant build steps to execute virtually anything as the user doing the build.

2. Access the keystore.

3. Modify the built apk files or source tarballs for other applications in the repository.

4. Modify the metadata (which includes build scripts, which again, also includes the abilityto execute anything) for other applications in the repository.

Through complete isolation, the repurcussions are at least limited to the applicationin question. Not only is the build environment fresh for each build, and thrown awayafterwards, but it is also isolated from the signing environment.

Aside from security issues, there are some applications which have strange requirementssuch as custom versions of the NDK. It would be impractical (or at least extremely messy) tostart modifying and restoring the SDK on a multi-purpose system, but within the confinesof a throwaway single-use virtual machine, anything is possible.

All this is in addition to the obvious advantage of having a standardised and completelyreproducible environment in which builds are made. Additionally, it allows for specialisedcustom build environments for particular applications.

9.2 Setting up a build server

In addition to the basic setup previously described, you will also need a Vagrant-compatibleUbuntu Raring base box called raring32 (or raring64 for a 64-bit VM, if you want it to bemuch slower, and require more disk space).

You can use a different version or distro for the base box, so long as you dont expectany help making it work. One thing to be aware of is that working copies of source treesare moved from the host to the guest, so for example, having subversion v1.6 on the hostand v1.7 on the guest would fail.

Unless youre very trusting. you should create one of these for yourself from verifiedstandard Ubuntu installation media. However, you could skip over the next few para-graphs (and sacrifice some security) by downloading https://f-droid.org/raring32.boxor https://f-droid.org/raring64.box.

Documentation for creating a base box can be found at http://docs.vagrantup.com/v1/docs/base_boxes.html.

In addition to carefully following the steps described there, you should consider thefollowing:

Chapter 9: Build Server 20

1. It is advisable to disable udev network device persistence, otherwise any movement ofthe VM between machines, or reconfiguration, will result in broken networking.

For a Debian/Ubuntu default install, just touch /etc/udev/rules.d/75-persistent-net-generator.rules to turn off rule generation, and at the same time,get rid of any rules its already created in /etc/udev/rules.d/70-persistent-net.rules.

2. Unless you want the VM to become totally inaccessible following a failed boot, you needto set GRUB_RECORDFAIL_TIMEOUT to a value other than -1 in /etc/grub/default andthen run update-grub.

You may also want to edit buildserver/Vagrantfile - in particular there is a path forretrieving the base box if it doesnt exist, and an apt proxy definition, both of which mayneed customising for your environment.

With this base box available, you should then create makebs.config.py, usingmakebs.config.sample.py as a reference - look at the settings and documentationthere to decide if any need changing to suit your environment. You can then go to thefdroidserver directory and run this:

./makebuildserver.py

This will take a long time, and use a lot of bandwidth - most of it spent installing thenecessary parts of the Android SDK for all the various platforms. Luckily you only need todo it occasionally. Once you have a working build server image, if the recipes change (e.g.when packages need to be added) you can just run that script again and the existing onewill be updated in place.

The main sdk/ndk downloads will automatically be cached to speed things up the nexttime, but theres no easy way of doing this for the longer sections which use the SDKsandroid tool to install platforms, add-ons and tools. However, instead of allowing automaticcaching, you can supply a pre-populated cache directory which includes not only thesedownloads, but also .tar.gz files for all the relevant additions. If the provisioning scriptsdetect these, they will be used in preference to running the android tools. For example, ifyou have buildserver/addons/cache/platforms/android-15.tar.gz that will be usedwhen installing the android-15 platform, instead of re-downloading it using android updatesdk --no-ui -t android-15.

Once its complete youll have a new base box called buildserver which is whats usedfor the actual builds. You can then build packages as normal, but with the addition of the--server flag to fdroid build to instruct it to do all the hard work within the virtualmachine.

The first time a build is done, a new virtual machine is created using the buildserverbox as a base. A snapshot of this clean machine state is saved for use in future builds, toimprove performance. You can force discarding of this snapshot and rebuilding from scratchusing the --resetserver switch with fdroid build.

Chapter 10: Signing 21

10 Signing

There are two kinds of signing involved in running a repository - the signing of the APKfiles generated from source builds, and the signing of the repo index itself. The latter isoptional, but very strongly recommended.

10.1 Repo Index Signing

When setting up the repository, one of the first steps should be to generate a signing keyfor the repository index. This will also create a keystore, which is a file that can be usedto hold this and all other keys used. Consider the location, security and backup status ofthis file carefully, then create it as follows:

keytool -genkey -v -keystore my.keystore -alias repokey -keyalg RSA -keysize

2048 -validity 10000

In the above, replace my.keystore with the name of the keystore file to be created, andrepokey with a name to identify the repo index key by.

Youll be asked for a password for the keystore, AND a password for the key. Theyshouldnt be the same. In between, youll be asked for some identifying details which willgo in the certificate.

The two passwords entered go into config.py, as keystorepass and keypass respec-tively. The path to the keystore file, and the alias you chose for the key also go into thatfile, as keystore and repo_keyalias respectively.

10.2 Package Signing

With the repo index signing configured, all that remains to be done for package signing towork is to set the keydname field in config.py to contain the same identifying details youentered before.

A new key will be generated using these details, for each application that is built. (If aspecific key is required for a particular application, this system can be overridden using thekeyaliases config settings.

Appendix A: GNU Free Documentation License 22

Appendix A GNU Free Documentation License

Version 1.3, 3 November 2008

Copyright c 2000, 2001, 2002, 2007, 2008 Free Software Foundation, Inc.http://fsf.org/

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copiesof this license document, but changing it is not allowed.

0. PREAMBLE

The purpose of this License is to make a manual, textbook, or other functional anduseful document free in the sense of freedom: to assure everyone the effective freedomto copy and redistribute it, with or without modifying it, either commercially or non-commercially. Secondarily, this License preserves for the author and publisher a wayto get credit for their work, while not being considered responsible for modificationsmade by others.

This License is a kind of copyleft, which means that derivative works of the documentmust themselves be free in the same sense. It complements the GNU General PublicLicense, which is a copyleft license designed for free software.

We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for free software, becausefree software needs free documentation: a free program should come with manualsproviding the same freedoms that the software does. But this License is not limited tosoftware manuals; it can be used for any textual work, regardless of subject matter orwhether it is published as a printed book. We recommend this License principally forworks whose purpose is instruction or reference.

1. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS

This License applies to any manual or other work, in any medium, that contains anotice placed by the copyright holder saying it can be distributed under the termsof this License. Such a notice grants a world-wide, royalty-free license, unlimited induration, to use that work under the conditions stated herein. The Document,below, refers to any such manual or work. Any member of the public is a licensee, andis addressed as you. You accept the license if you copy, modify or distribute the workin a way requiring permission under copyright law.

A Modified Version of the Document means any work containing the Document ora portion of it, either copied verbatim, or with modifications and/or translated intoanother language.

A Secondary Section is a named appendix or a front-matter section of the Documentthat deals exclusively with the relationship of the publishers or authors of the Documentto the Documents overall subject (or to related matters) and contains nothing thatcould fall directly within that overall subject. (Thus, if the Document is in part atextbook of mathematics, a Secondary Section may not explain any mathematics.) Therelationship could be a matter of historical connection with the subject or with relatedmatters, or of legal, commercial, philosophical, ethical or political position regardingthem.

The Invariant Sections are certain Secondary Sections whose titles are designated, asbeing those of Invariant Sections, in the notice that says that the Document is released


under this License. If a section does not fit the above definition of Secondary then it isnot allowed to be designated as Invariant. The Document may contain zero InvariantSections. If the Document does not identify any Invariant Sections then there are none.

The Cover Texts are certain short passages of text that are listed, as Front-CoverTexts or Back-Cover Texts, in the notice that says that the Document is released underthis License. A Front-Cover Text may be at most 5 words, and a Back-Cover Text maybe at most 25 words.

A Transparent copy of the Document means a machine-readable copy, representedin a format whose specification is available to the general public, that is suitable forrevising the document straightforwardly with generic text editors or (for images com-posed of pixels) generic paint programs or (for drawings) some widely available drawingeditor, and that is suitable for input to text formatters or for automatic translation toa variety of formats suitable for input to text formatters. A copy made in an otherwiseTransparent file format whose markup, or absence of markup, has been arranged tothwart or discourage subsequent modification by readers is not Transparent. An imageformat is not Transparent if used for any substantial amount of text. A copy that isnot Transparent is called Opaque.

Examples of suitable formats for Transparent copies include plain ascii withoutmarkup, Texinfo input format, LaTEX input format, SGML or XML using a publiclyavailable DTD, and standard-conforming simple HTML, PostScript or PDF designedfor human modification. Examples of transparent image formats include PNG, XCFand JPG. Opaque formats include proprietary formats that can be read and editedonly by proprietary word processors, SGML or XML for which the DTD and/orprocessing tools are not generally available, and the machine-generated HTML,PostScript or PDF produced by some word processors for output purposes only.

The Title Page means, for a printed book, the title page itself, plus such followingpages as are needed to hold, legibly, the material this License requires to appear in thetitle page. For works in formats which do not have any title page as such, Title Pagemeans the text near the most prominent appearance of the works title, preceding thebeginning of the body of the text.

The publisher means any person or entity that distributes copies of the Documentto the public.

A section Entitled XYZ means a named subunit of the Document whose title eitheris precisely XYZ or contains XYZ in parentheses following text that translates XYZ inanother language. (Here XYZ stands for a specific section name mentioned below, suchas Acknowledgements, Dedications, Endorsements, or History.) To Preservethe Title of such a section when you modify the Document means that it remains asection Entitled XYZ according to this definition.

The Document may include Warranty Disclaimers next to the notice which states thatthis License applies to the Document. These Warranty Disclaimers are considered tobe included by reference in this License, but only as regards disclaiming warranties:any other implication that these Warranty Disclaimers may have is void and has noeffect on the meaning of this License.

2. VERBATIM COPYING


You may copy and distribute the Document in any medium, either commercially ornoncommercially, provided that this License, the copyright notices, and the licensenotice saying this License applies to the Document are reproduced in all copies, andthat you add no other conditions whatsoever to those of this License. You may not usetechnical measures to obstruct or control the reading or further copying of the copiesyou make or distribute. However, you may accept compensation in exchange for copies.If you distribute a large enough number of copies you must also follow the conditionsin section 3.

You may also lend copies, under the same conditions stated above, and you may publiclydisplay copies.

3. COPYING IN QUANTITY

If you publish printed copies (or copies in media that commonly have printed covers) ofthe Document, numbering more than 100, and the Documents license notice requiresCover Texts, you must enclose the copies in covers that carry, clearly and legibly, allthese Cover Texts: Front-Cover Texts on the front cover, and Back-Cover Texts onthe back cover. Both covers must also clearly and legibly identify you as the publisherof these copies. The front cover must present the full title with all words of the titleequally prominent and visible. You may add other material on the covers in addition.Copying with changes limited to the covers, as long as they preserve the title of theDocument and satisfy these conditions, can be treated as verbatim copying in otherrespects.

If the required texts for either cover are too voluminous to fit legibly, you should putthe first ones listed (as many as fit reasonably) on the actual cover, and continue therest onto adjacent pages.

If you publish or distribute Opaque copies of the Document numbering more than 100,you must either include a machine-readable Transparent copy along with each Opaquecopy, or state in or with each Opaque copy a computer-network location from whichthe general network-using public has access to download using public-standard networkprotocols a complete Transparent copy of the Document, free of added material. Ifyou use the latter option, you must take reasonably prudent steps, when you begindistribution of Opaque copies in quantity, to ensure that this Transparent copy willremain thus accessible at the stated location until at least one year after the last timeyou distribute an Opaque copy (directly or through your agents or retailers) of thatedition to the public.

It is requested, but not required, that you contact the authors of the Document wellbefore redistributing any large number of copies, to give them a chance to provide youwith an updated version of the Document.

4. MODIFICATIONS

You may copy and distribute a Modified Version of the Document under the conditionsof sections 2 and 3 above, provided that you release the Modified Version under preciselythis License, with the Modified Version filling the role of the Document, thus licensingdistribution and modification of the Modified Version to whoever possesses a copy ofit. In addition, you must do these things in the Modified Version:

A. Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title distinct from that of theDocument, and from those of previous versions (which should, if there were any,


be listed in the History section of the Document). You may use the same title asa previous version if the original publisher of that version gives permission.

B. List on the Title Page, as authors, one or more persons or entities responsible forauthorship of the modifications in the Modified Version, together with at least fiveof the principal authors of the Document (all of its principal authors, if it has fewerthan five), unless they release you from this requirement.

C. State on the Title page the name of the publisher of the Modified Version, as thepublisher.

D. Preserve all the copyright notices of the Document.

E. Add an appropriate copyright notice for your modifications adjacent to the othercopyright notices.

F. Include, immediately after the copyright notices, a license notice giving the publicpermission to use the Modified Version under the terms of this License, in the formshown in the Addendum below.

G. Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant Sections and required CoverTexts given in the Documents license notice.

H. Include an unaltered copy of this License.

I. Preserve the section Entitled History, Preserve its Title, and add to it an itemstating at least the title, year, new authors, and publisher of the Modified Versionas given on the Title Page. If there is no section Entitled History in the Docu-ment, create one stating the title, year, authors, and publisher of the Documentas given on its Title Page, then add an item describing the Modified Version asstated in the previous sentence.

J. Preserve the network location, if any, given in the Document for public access toa Transparent copy of the Document, and likewise the network locations given inthe Document for previous versions it was based on. These may be placed in theHistory section. You may omit a network location for a work that was publishedat least four years before the Document itself, or if the original publisher of theversion it refers to gives permission.

K. For any section Entitled Acknowledgements or Dedications, Preserve the Titleof the section, and preserve in the section all the substance and tone of each of thecontributor acknowledgements and/or dedications given therein.

L. Preserve all the Invariant Sections of the Document, unaltered in their text andin their titles. Section numbers or the equivalent are not considered part of thesection titles.

M. Delete any section Entitled Endorsements. Such a section may not be includedin the Modified Version.

N. Do not retitle any existing section to be Entitled Endorsements or to conflict intitle with any Invariant Section.

O. Preserve any Warranty Disclaimers.

If the Modified Version includes new front-matter sections or appendices that qualifyas Secondary Sections and contain no material copied from the Document, you may atyour option designate some or all of these sections as invariant. To do this, add their


titles to the list of Invariant Sections in the Modified Versions license notice. Thesetitles must be distinct from any other section titles.

You may add a section Entitled Endorsements, provided it contains nothing butendorsements of your Modified Version by various partiesfor example, statements ofpeer review or that the text has been approved by an organization as the authoritativedefinition of a standard.

You may add a passage of up to five words as a Front-Cover Text, and a passage of upto 25 words as a Back-Cover Text, to the end of the list of Cover Texts in the ModifiedVersion. Only one passage of Front-Cover Text and one of Back-Cover Text may beadded by (or through arrangements made by) any one entity. If the Document alreadyincludes a cover text for the same cover, previously added by you or by arrangementmade by the same entity you are acting on behalf of, you may not add another; butyou may replace the old one, on explicit permission from the previous publisher thatadded the old one.

The author(s) and publisher(s) of the Document do not by this License give permissionto use their names for publicity for or to assert or imply endorsement of any ModifiedVersion.

5. COMBINING DOCUMENTS

You may combine the Document with other documents released under this License,under the terms defined in section 4 above for modified versions, provided that youinclude in the combination all of the Invariant Sections of all of the original documents,unmodified, and list them all as Invariant Sections of your combined work in its licensenotice, and that you preserve all their Warranty Disclaimers.

The combined work need only contain one copy of this License, and multiple identicalInvariant Sections may be replaced with a single copy. If there are multiple InvariantSections with the same name but different contents, make the title of each such sectionunique by adding at the end of it, in parentheses, the name of the original author orpublisher of that section if known, or else a unique number. Make the same adjustmentto the section titles in the list of Invariant Sections in the license notice of the combinedwork.

In the combination, you must combine any sections Entitled History in the vari-ous original documents, forming one section Entitled History; likewise combine anysections Entitled Acknowledgements, and any sections Entitled Dedications. Youmust delete all sections Entitled Endorsements.

6. COLLECTIONS OF DOCUMENTS

You may make a collection consisting of the Document and other documents releasedunder this License, and replace the individual copies of this License in the variousdocuments with a single copy that is included in the collection, provided that youfollow the rules of this License for verbatim copying of each of the documents in allother respects.

You may extract a single document from such a collection, and distribute it individu-ally under this License, provided you insert a copy of this License into the extracteddocument, and follow this License in all other respects regarding verbatim copying ofthat document.


7. AGGREGATION WITH INDEPENDENT WORKS

A compilation of the Document or its derivatives with other separate and independentdocuments or works, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is calledan aggregate if the copyright resulting from the compilation is not used to limit thelegal rights of the compilations users beyond what the individual works permit. Whenthe Document is included in an aggregate, this License does not apply to the otherworks in the aggregate which are not themselves derivative works of the Document.

If the Cover Text requirement of section 3 is applicable to these copies of the Document,then if the Document is less than one half of the entire aggregate, the Documents CoverTexts may be placed on covers that bracket the Document within the aggregate, or theelectronic equivalent of covers if the Document is in electronic form. Otherwise theymust appear on printed covers that bracket the whole aggregate.

8. TRANSLATION

Translation is considered a kind of modification, so you may distribute translationsof the Document under the terms of section 4. Replacing Invariant Sections withtranslations requires special permission from their copyright holders, but you mayinclude translations of some or all Invariant Sections in addition to the original versionsof these Invariant Sections. You may include a translation of this License, and all thelicense notices in the Document, and any Warranty Disclaimers, provided that youalso include the original English version of this License and the original versions ofthose notices and disclaimers. In case of a disagreement between the translation andthe original version of this License or a notice or disclaimer, the original version willprevail.

If a section in the Document is Entitled Acknowledgements, Dedications, or His-tory, the requirement (section 4) to Preserve its Title (section 1) will typically requirechanging the actual title.

9. TERMINATION

You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Document except as expresslyprovided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense, ordistribute it is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.

However, if you cease all violation of this License, then your license from a particularcopyright holder is reinstated (a) provisionally, unless and until the copyright holderexplicitly and finally terminates your license, and (b) permanently, if the copyrightholder fails to notify you of the violation by some reasonable means prior to 60 daysafter the cessation.

Moreover, your license from a particular copyright holder is reinstated permanently ifthe copyright holder notifies you of the violation by some reasonable means, this is thefirst time you have received notice of violation of this License (for any work) from thatcopyright holder, and you cure the violation prior to 30 days after your receipt of thenotice.

Termination of your rights under this section does not terminate the licenses of partieswho have received copies or rights from you under this License. If your rights havebeen terminated and not permanently reinstated, receipt of a copy of some or all of thesame material does not give you any rights to use it.


10. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE

The Free Software Foundation may publish new, revised versions of the GNU FreeDocumentation License from time to time. Such new versions will be similar in spiritto the present version, but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns.See http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/.

Each version of the License is given a distinguishing version number. If the Documentspecifies that a particular numbered version of this License or any later versionapplies to it, you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of thatspecified version or of any later version that has been published (not as a draft) bythe Free Software Foundation. If the Document does not specify a version number ofthis License, you may choose any version ever published (not as a draft) by the FreeSoftware Foundation. If the Document specifies that a proxy can decide which futureversions of this License can be used, that proxys public statement of acceptance of aversion permanently authorizes you to choose that version for the Document.

11. RELICENSING

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Incorporate means to publish or republish a Document, in whole or in part, as partof another Document.

An MMC is eligible for relicensing if it is licensed under this License, and if all worksthat were first published under this License somewhere other than this MMC, andsubsequently incorporated in whole or in part into the MMC, (1) had no cover textsor invariant sections, and (2) were thus incorporated prior to November 1, 2008.

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Index 29

Index

AAntiFeatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14Auto Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9Auto Update Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Bbinary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4Bitcoin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9Build Version . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

CCurrent Version . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17Current Version Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

DDescription . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10Disabled . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15Donate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

FFlattrID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Iinstallation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2Issue Tracker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Llicense . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Mmetadata . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

NName . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9No Source Since . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

RRepo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10Repo Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10Requires Root . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Ssetup, installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3Source Code . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

UUpdate Check Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

WWeb Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

OverviewSystem RequirementsSetupData

Simple Binary RepositoryBuilding ApplicationsMore about "fdroid build"Direct Installation

Importing ApplicationsMetadataCategoryLicenseAuto NameNameWeb SiteSource CodeIssue TrackerDonateFlattrIDBitcoinSummaryDescriptionRepo TypeRepoBuild VersionAntiFeaturesDisabledRequires RootUpdate Check ModeAuto Update ModeCurrent VersionCurrent Version CodeNo Source Since

Update ProcessingDetectingAdding

Build ServerOverviewSetting up a build server

SigningRepo Index SigningPackage Signing

GNU Free Documentation LicenseIndex

fdroid Manual

Documents

android sdk tools

main fdroid repository

build version

fdroid projectthis manual

main repository

sdk platforms

proprietary license

build server1910