Getting Started With LSB 2.0

LSB 2.0 is out! This page provides some resources for getting started early: what's new in LSB 2.0, early access to the specification, developer tools, test suites and other software.

What's New in LSB 2.0

LSB 2.0 represents an upgrade of many of the underlying specifications, in particular the Single UNIX Specification (SUS). While LSB 1.3 was based on SUSv2, LSB2.0 is based on SUSv3, which is also IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 (POSIX) and ISO/IEC 9945:2003. Also important in LSB 2.0 is a restructuring of the documents to facilitate future growth, and the development of additional standards which are built on top of the LSB. LSB 2.0 also introduces support for POSIX threads and for C++ applications.

The LSB 2.0 Specification

The LSB Specification documents have been restructured for the 2.0 release. This restructuring will permit management of the documents to be decentralized, allowing area experts to take ownership of their respective portion of the specification, without the burden of also having to be responsible for portions outside of their area of expertise.

The LSB 2.0 document structure lays the groundwork for the creation of additional specification modules which exist on top of the Core LSB specification. These new modules can permit the addition of functionallity which might otherwise be considered out of scope for the LSB, as well as allowing groups outside of the LSB to add functionallity using the framework established by the LSB.

The LSB 1.3 specification consisted of a monolithic document known as the Generic LSB, which is supplemented by an architecture specific document.

The LSB 2.0 specification has been split into a set of documents, organized by functional area. The FSG's LSB Certification program then reassembles these documents into a single certification target whose content is similar to the 1.3 document structure. This extra layer of documents will permit certification programs for other system configuration to be created in the future.

The table below provides a key to the composition of the specification documents. Document sets available for certification are shown in the left column. Available documents are shown in the Architecture column. A blank space indiciates a document which has not yet been created. The full document set with links may be found on the Released Specifications page.

How to Use an LSB 1.3 System for LSB 2.0

Unofficially, LSB 1.3-conforming systems should be quite usable for preliminary LSB 2.0 work. If the system has previously been used for 1.3 development, the 2.0 developer tools need to be installed (see below). If the LSB 2.0 package dependency is needed, it may be added to a 1.3 system by installing an unofficial package (lsb-dummy) from the LSB project. See http://ftp.freestandards.org/pub/lsb/lsbdev/unreleased/. This package will add the 2.0 "provides" (lsb-core and lsb-graphics for the target architecture and noarch) if lsb=1.3 is already provided.

WARNING: the lsb-dummy package does not provide official LSB 2.0 support and thus should be used with care - official support can only come from your distribution vendor. When such a support package is available, lsb-dummy will need to be removed.

LSB 2.0 Testing

The LSB 2.0 testing program builds on the LSB 1.3 tests. lsb-runtime-test has been expanded with new tests including threads tests. lsb-test-pam is added for PAM testing, and lsb-test-vsw4 will be added for X11 testing soon after the 2.0 release. For more informattion about LSB platform testing, see the LSB Test pages.

Releases

The released test packages can be found on the LSB Download Page. Debian users will need to convert these packages with apt for installation.

LSB 2.0 Developer Tools and Application Tests

The developer toolset consists of packages named: lsb-build-base, lsb-build-cc, lsb-build-c++ and lsb-build-chroot. For more information on the build tools in general see the LSB Build page.

The application test toolset consists of packages named: lsb-appchk, lsb-libchk, lsb-cmdchk and lsb-pkgchk. lsb-cmdchk and lsb-libchk are of interest primarily to system implementors. lsb-appchk and lsb-pkgchk are of interest primarily to application developers.

In a change from LSB 1.3, all of these packages install under /opt/lsb to comply with FHS guidelines. /opt/lsb is reserved to the LSB project.

Releases

The 2.0 released packages can be found on the LSB Download Page. Debian users should get these packages directly from the Debian project, or convert the LSB project's packages with apt.

Nightly Build Snapshots

The developer tools and application test tools are built nightly. To access these untested versions, see http://ftp.freestandards.org/pub/lsb/snapshots. Snapshot and beta versions should not be used for official builds and tests; post-2.0 snapshots are likely to have migrated away from strict 2.0 compliance.

Debian archive

For Debian users, a package archive is generated from these nightly builds. To access these, add the following lines to /etc/apt/sources.list:

        # LSB project snapshots
        deb http://ftp.freestandards.org/pub/lsb binary/
	

Yum archive

For RPM users who have the yum tool available, the snapshots are also yum-enabled. To access these, add the following lines to /etc/yum.conf.

        [lsb-snapshots]
        name=LSB project snapshots - $basearch
        baseurl=http://ftp.freestandards.org/pub/lsb/snapshots
	

Yum can be obtained from www.linux.duke.edu/projects/yum. It requires python-rpm (python api to rpm database), which is part of the upstream rpm packages but is not necessarily packaged by all distributions.

LSB 2.0 Sample Implementation

Releases

The LSB 2.0 Sample Implementation is available from the LSB Download Page.

Snapshot Builds

To access untested snapshot builds of the lsb-si, see http://ftp.freestandards.org/pub/lsb/snapshots/impl.

LSB 2.0 Application Battery

Releases

The LSB 2.0 Application battery can be found on the LSB Download Page.