What to upload
This site is intended for the distribution of any type of freely distributable software. However, due to copyright laws and internet provider restrictions, we have to set the following conditions:
DO NOT UPLOAD:
- Unlicensed copies of commercial software
- Software with a license in conflict with Aminet’s nature
- Samples from copyrighted CDs, TV or radio broadcasts
- Musical mods that are cover versions from copyrighted songs
- Images or animations from copyrighted image sources
- Images depicting persons who didn’t agree with the distribution
- Images of sexual content
- GNU software without sources or written offer
- DMS files (use ADF if you really need to upload a disk image)
- Insulting/obscene material
Please respect these conditions, or you could bring Aminet in danger of being shut down. Aminet staff reserves the right to remove any contribution without warning if it doesn’t comply to the above rules or is otherwise unfit.
The readme file
Each upload to Aminet needs to be accompanied by a readme file: Along with PictureView.lha you would upload PictureView.readme, along with w2c-sources.tar.gz you would upload w2c-sources.readme. The format of this readme file needs to follow certain rules which are explained in The Readme file.
Where to upload
You need to use an FTP client to upload to Aminet. Connect to ftp://main.aminet.net/new using anonymous as user and your email address as password.
Filename conventions, accepted filetypes
The maximum file name length is 30 characters including the filename suffix (.lha, .adf, .readme). Mixed case is OK, but it should be mainly lowercase. If your file name is generic (ls, pipe), append your initials (pipe-JU). Filenames should only contain letters, digits, dots, underscores (“_”) and hyphens (“-“).
The following file formats are accepted on Aminet:
| file type | notes | filename extensions |
|---|---|---|
| Archives | LhA, self extracting LhA or ZIP | .lha, .run, .zip |
| Disk images | ADF images or gzipped ADF images | .adf, .adz |
| Pictures | JPEG, PNG or GIF pictures | .jpg, .png, .gif |
| Documents | PDF documents or plain text | .pdf, .txt |
| Audio recordings | Ogg Theora, MP3 | .ogg, .mp3 |
| Videos | MPEG | .mpg |
| Compressors | For packing ISOs or Tarballs (see below) | .gz, .bz2 |
| Tarballs | Optionally compress with one of the above | .tar, .tar.gz, .tgz, .tar.bz2 |
Note that the Aminet team recommends the use of file formats that are not affected by patent, copyright or trademark issues and for which open source implementations are available. MP3, MPEG and GIF are only supported for historical reasons.
Further notes for uploaders
Some other things you should keep in mind when preparing an Aminet upload:
- If your upload is shareware, restricted or just a demo version, please mention that in the readme.
- Make sure your readme file is formatted correctly: Lines should not be longer than 78 characters, a line should be terminated only by a linefeed (LF) character (that’s the way AmigaOS and Unix do it), *not* with both CR (carriage return) and LF (that’s the Windows way).
- Version numbers should be part of the readme file, not part of the filename.
- You can overwrite old versions of your uploads by uploading again using the same file name. This is the preferred way to do updates.
- Don’t update too often - one update per week should be sufficient. Whenever you update an existing archive, make sure you specify a different version number and clearly mark the changes.
Check list
- Did you specify all required fields (Short:, Uploader:, Type: and Architecture:) in the readme file?
- Are there older versions of your package already available on Aminet? If yes, make sure you use the replaces: field to remove them from Aminet.
- Are the archives okay? Use UNIX LhA to find out.
- Is there a .readme file for *every* file you are about to upload?
- Are the base names of the .readme and the archive the same? Same case?
- Are all filenames 30 characters or shorter?
- Does none of the archives contain copyrighted or Workbench material?
Thanks for checking, you’re saving us a lot of work.