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+---
+title: Package Metadata for ELF Files
+category: Interfaces
+layout: default
+SPDX-License-Identifier: LGPL-2.1-or-later
+---
+
+# Package Metadata for Core Files
+
+*Intended audience: hackers working on userspace subsystems that create ELF binaries
+or parse ELF core files.*
+
+## Motivation
+
+ELF binaries get stamped with a unique, build-time generated hex string identifier called
+`build-id`, [which gets embedded as an ELF note called `.note.gnu.build-id`](https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Releases/FeatureBuildId).
+In most cases, this allows to associate a stripped binary with its debugging information.
+It is used, for example, to dynamically fetch DWARF symbols from a debuginfo server, or
+to query the local package manager and find out the package metadata or, again, the DWARF
+symbols or program sources.
+
+However, this usage of the `build-id` requires either local metadata, usually set up by
+the package manager, or access to a remote server over the network. Both of those might
+be unavailable or forbidden.
+
+Thus it becomes desirable to add additional metadata to a binary at build time, so that
+`systemd-coredump` and other services analyzing core files are able to extract said
+metadata simply from the core file itself, without external dependencies.
+
+## Implementation
+
+This document will attempt to define a common metadata format specification, so that
+multiple implementers might use it when building packages, or core file analyzers, and
+so on.
+
+The metadata will be embedded in a single, new, 4-bytes-aligned, allocated, 0-padded,
+read-only ELF header section, in a name-value JSON object format. Implementers working on parsing
+core files should not assume a specific list of names, but parse anything that is included
+in the section, and should look for the note using the `note type`. Implementers working on
+build tools should strive to use the same names, for consistency. The most common will be
+listed here. When corresponding to the content of os-release, the values should match, again for consistency.
+
+If available, the metadata should also include the debuginfod server URL that can provide
+the original executable, debuginfo and sources, to further facilitate debugging.
+
+* Section header
+
+```
+SECTION: `.note.package`
+note type: `0xcafe1a7e`
+Owner: `FDO` (FreeDesktop.org)
+Value: a single JSON object encoded as a zero-terminated UTF-8 string
+```
+
+* JSON payload
+
+```json
+{
+ "type":"rpm", # this provides a namespace for the package+package-version fields
+ "os":"fedora",
+ "osVersion":"33",
+ "name":"coreutils",
+ "version":"4711.0815.fc13",
+ "architecture":"arm32",
+ "osCpe": "cpe:/o:fedoraproject:fedora:33", # A CPE name for the operating system, `CPE_NAME` from os-release is a good default
+ "debugInfoUrl": "https://debuginfod.fedoraproject.org/"
+}
+```
+
+The format is a single JSON object, encoded as a zero-terminated `UTF-8` string.
+Each name in the object shall be unique as per recommendations of
+[RFC8259](https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc8259#section-4). Strings shall
+not contain any control character, nor use `\uXXX` escaping.
+
+When it comes to JSON numbers, this specification assumes that JSON parsers
+processing this information are capable of reproducing the full signed 53bit
+integer range (i.e. -2⁵³+1…+2⁵³-1) as well as the full 64-bit IEEE floating
+point number range losslessly (with the exception of NaN/-inf/+inf, since JSON
+cannot encode that), as per recommendations of
+[RFC8259](https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc8259#page-8). Fields in
+these JSON objects are thus permitted to encode numeric values from these
+ranges as JSON numbers, and should not use numeric values not covered by these
+types and ranges.
+
+Reference implementations of [packaging tools for .deb and .rpm](https://github.com/systemd/package-notes)
+are available, and provide macros/helpers to include the note in binaries built
+by the package build system. They make use of the new `--package-metadata` flag that
+is available in the bfd, gold, mold and lld linkers (versions 2.39, 1.3.0 and 15.0
+respectively). This linker flag takes a JSON payload as parameter.
+
+## Well-known keys
+
+The metadata format is intentionally left open, so that vendors can add their own information.
+A set of well-known keys is defined here, and hopefully shared among all vendors.
+
+| Key name | Key description | Example value |
+|--------------|--------------------------------------------------------------------------|---------------------------------------|
+| type | The packaging type | rpm |
+| os | The OS name, typically corresponding to ID in os-release | fedora |
+| osVersion | The OS version, typically corresponding to VERSION_ID in os-release | 33 |
+| name | The source package name | coreutils |
+| version | The source package version | 4711.0815.fc13 |
+| architecture | The binary package architecture | arm32 |
+| osCpe | A CPE name for the OS, typically corresponding to CPE_NAME in os-release | cpe:/o:fedoraproject:fedora:33 |
+| debugInfoUrl | The debuginfod server url, if available | https://debuginfod.fedoraproject.org/ |