diff --git a/_service b/_service
deleted file mode 100644
index 2b02572..0000000
--- a/_service
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,3 +0,0 @@
-<services>
-  <service name="format_spec_file"></service>
-</services>
diff --git a/get_version_number.sh b/get_version_number.sh
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..26f2b51
--- /dev/null
+++ b/get_version_number.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+# Note: this file is used in the spec file, do not remove it
+sourcedir=$1
+test -n "${sourcedir}" || sourcedir=$PWD
+test -e ${sourcedir}/ncurses.spec  || exit 1
+version=$(sed -rn '/^Version:[[:space:]]+/{s/^Version:[[:space:]]+([0-9]+\.[0-9]+)(\.[^\.]+)?/\1/p}' ${sourcedir}/ncurses.spec) || exit 1
+test -e ${sourcedir}/ncurses-${version}.tar.gz || exit 1
+last=($(tar Oxf ${sourcedir}/ncurses-${version}.tar.gz ncurses-${version}/VERSION)) || exit 1
+test -e ${sourcedir}/ncurses-${version}-patches.tar.bz2 || echo ${last[2]}
+tar --wildcards -tf ${sourcedir}/ncurses-${version}-patches.tar.bz2 '*/*.patch' &> /dev/null || echo ${last[2]}
+OFS="$IFS"
+IFS=-
+last=($(tar -tf ${sourcedir}/ncurses-${version}-patches.tar.bz2 | sed -r 's@\.patch$@@'| sort -t '-' -k 3,3 -n | tail -n 1))
+IFS="$OFS"
+echo ${last[2]}
diff --git a/ncurses.changes b/ncurses.changes
index 9b6713b..37ab5ed 100644
--- a/ncurses.changes
+++ b/ncurses.changes
@@ -1,3 +1,10 @@
+-------------------------------------------------------------------
+Mon Apr  6 10:31:47 UTC 2020 - Dr. Werner Fink <werner@suse.de>
+
+- Use %() to extract patch date for adding it to version 
+  * add script get_version_number.sh whic his used within the
+    spec file to determine the actual patch version date
+
 -------------------------------------------------------------------
 Mon Apr  6 06:50:14 UTC 2020 - Dr. Werner Fink <werner@suse.de>
 
diff --git a/ncurses.spec b/ncurses.spec
index 8365915..cfd5877 100644
--- a/ncurses.spec
+++ b/ncurses.spec
@@ -31,7 +31,7 @@
 %global soname_tinfo tinfow
 %endif
 
-%define patchlvl 20200404
+%define patchlvl %(%{_sourcedir}/get_version_number.sh %{_sourcedir})
 %define basevers 6.2
 
 Name:           ncurses
diff --git a/pre_checkin.sh b/pre_checkin.sh
deleted file mode 100644
index 5dc92e3..0000000
--- a/pre_checkin.sh
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,9 +0,0 @@
-#!/bin/bash
-version=$(sed -rn '/^Version:[[:space:]]+/{s/^Version:[[:space:]]+([0-9]+\.[0-9]+)(\.[^\.]+)?/\1/p}' ncurses.spec) || exit 1
-test -e ncurses-${version}-patches.tar.bz2 || exit 1
-OFS="$IFS"
-IFS=-
-last=($(tar -tf ncurses-${version}-patches.tar.bz2 | sed -r 's@\.patch$@@'| sort -t '-' -k 3,3 -n | tail -n 1))
-IFS="$OFS"
-patch=${last[2]}
-sed -ri "/^%define[[:space:]]+patchlvl/{ s/(^%define[[:space:]]+patchlvl)[[:space:]]+.*/\1 ${patch}/ }" ncurses.spec