openwrt/docs/package-creation-procedure.md

Package Creation Procedure

New Standard Workflow (as of 2025-12-13)

1. Build Format: Always build packages as .tar.gz first.

   • Do NOT build directly as .ipk.
   • The .tar.gz must contain: debian-binary, control.tar.gz, data.tar.gz.

2. Verification:

   • Verify the .tar.gz can be extracted using standard tar -xzf.
   • Check contents of extracted archive.

3. Finalize:

   • Only AFTER verification is successful, rename the .tar.gz file to .ipk.

Why?

This ensures the package structure is valid and compatible with standard archive tools before being deployed, preventing "malformed package" errors on some systems.